Mods, feel free to move this to somewhere else if it's appropriate. The Raleigh News & Observer had an article about how 7 (!!!) players from the highly regarded Capital Area Soccer League Elite team have signed with UNC. The writer noted how youth club soccer is more important than high school soccer. (Old news to us, but this was on the sports front, so it was worth pointing out.) The coach of that team, and the director of CASL coaching, has ties to UNC's coach Bolowich. (sp?) What do you guys think of this? Is it common? Is it corrupt? Is it something that isn't corrupt, but could be? Does it mean that in about 3 years UNC is going to play the most flowing, tactical soccer ever seen in college?
Maybe the most flowing, tactical soccer ever in Chapel Hill. No, wait a minute, that doesn't work either, forgot about the women's team... No chance of UNC's style being flowing or tactical as long as Elmar is in charge... Interesting report, though. How do those kids rank nationally??
First of all, none of these high school players have signed anything. NLI day is in February. Secondly, this seems very odd taken at face value, and I'm sure there's more to this than meets the eye. At best, one or two of these players are getting athletic money. Don't think for a minute that Elmar isn't recruiting Nationally, or even Internationally. Fixxxer, most of these players are not even regional team caliber, if that tells you anything.
I sure hope that Elmer has some other recruits in the works, because I'm not sure that more than 1-2 of them will play at all....and none of them will be able to prove to be anything more than role players. I think Elmer is trying to grasp a hold of what he was able to do with Pause, Crawford & co. Lightning in a bottle, I'm afraid. This group is not going to be able to help you, Elmer. I can't believe that Oliver would have recruited all of these guys.
Why would Why would a recruit from outside N.C. even want to consider UNC-CH? If CASL club members are the preferred players, it appears smart out of state recruits won't risk losing playing time or their scholarships to in state boys unless they can trust that the coaching staff is totally unbiased. The calibre of player that UNC needs has plenty of opportunity to go elsewhere and not have to worry about intrinsic/obligatory favoritism. Anyone else think this "pipeline" has holes? Seems like to much inbreeding?
How on Earth would you have any idea how Elmar is dividing his money over at UNC? Also, they have several players from this year's frosh class who are no longer with the team. This, combined with the graduation of Kniepper, Crawford, Gell, Testo means there is definitely going to be money there. I'm not saying they are all getting full rides, but there will be money.
Re: Why would Chris Leitch (Ohio), David Stokes (Virginia), Danny Jackson (England), Chris Carrieri (Virginia), Marcus Storey (Texas)... And so on. I don't think the local boys get preference but anytime you build a strong program, you supplement your bench with locals. WIth only 9.9 scholarships, it's a lot easier for in-state kids to be the walk-ons and partial scholarship players than ones whose parents have to pay the out of state tuition.
I can't tell you how I know, but I know. Also, Sandon is right on...and when it's all said and done, you'll see UNC with some very high level national recruits for 2003. Those local boys are most likely roster fillers.
Re: Re: Why would Add to Sandon's comment this perspective: --You're the 7th or 8th best player on a top club team. --You've had great technical and tactical training. --You've played with and against the best players in your age cohort at state cup, regionals, top tournaments. You've been in pressure situations. --You've experienced adverstity, know what it tastes like, and know how to overcome it. --You know how to be a role player and mesh with the elite players on your team. You know that to succeed you have to work REALLY hard, avoid mistakes, play simply and strongly. --You were likely one of the top players on your HS team, and had to be a leader THERE, so you know what THAT's like too. Hey, you can pooh-pooh such guys as fillers, but give me 10 guys like that, and 4 top players at keeper, sweeper, center mid, and striker, and I will be in the NCAA mix year after year after year.
If you look at UNC-CH's current roster 12 of the 29 players hail from North Carolina. Only two of these played club with CASL.It is also worth noting that when you are talking about signing the locals in North Carolina you are not necessarily signing just fillers. I dug up information earlier this year on 311 Division 1 signees. 28 of the 311 were North Carolinians. The only state that I found with more was California(49). (Note: I'm sure the 311 were not all the signings, just the ones I could find info on) When you look at that per capita for graduating HS seniors it equates to 1:7215 in CA and 1:2425 in NC. Out of the 28 North Carolina players that signed with a Division 1 school, 5 played club ball with CASL and 8 played with Charlotte SC. Charlotte SC is really producing; out of the 8, 6 played regional ODP and 2 played for USMNT U-17.
Bradenton With that said the current roster at IMG has two from North Carolina and their both CASL players.
IMHO, Elmar is extremely smart to try this CASL pipeline. Sure, he will continue to recruit nationally...and will probably get some huge recruits. And not all the NC boys will get full rides, or even half rides. But maybe, just maybe, they have a desire to go to the school for more reasons than a huge scholarship. Elmar had success last year with a roster that was half from NC, half from elsewhere. This year's roster has 12 from NC out of 23. This year's NC players have accounted for 61% of all starts thus far, while last year NC players accounted for 51% of the starts in the championship season. So Elmar hasn't previously just filled the bench with NC players. The fact of the matter is that NC has produced some quality players. Obviously all of the NC players won't be impact, and some will sit and never get to shine for the Heels, but there is something to be said for this type of player. And maybe Elmar is getting another class that will mesh with the other talent from across the nation...just as Pause, Crawford, Porter, Gell, Testo, Yamauchi etc molded with Jackson,Leitch, Ueltschey, Storey, Stokes for last year's success.