A soccer recruiting advisor gives three steps for 12-year-olds aiming for college: join a top MLS Next or ECNL club for visibility, attend college ID camps in middle school, and make a one-minute highlight video. He cites a player who stayed with De Anza Forest U13 and committed to Division I.
If I was 12 years old, what would I be doing right now in order to play college soccer? There are 3 things that I think you should be doing. Number 1 is you got to be trying out for the best MLS Next or ECNL team in your area. I know a lot of you are going to say, well, the coach sucks or the training sucks, but it's unfortunate. I'm not here to make you a better player. I'm here to help you play college soccer. It's about being in the right place at the right time, being seen by the right people. So if you go on my Instagram, you will see we interviewed this kid who just committed to USSB and then transferred to Amherst. He was playing for U13 De Anza Forest. As a 12-year-old, stayed within the organization, got better at soccer, and that's how he was able to eventually commit through, of course, the recruiting process. But if you don't start there, you're in a lot of trouble. Number 2, you should be going to middle school ID camps. Middle school ID camps are an awesome way to get to know college coaches, see if your child would like doing this at all. They may find it's overwhelming, or you, the athlete, might find you don't want to play soccer that badly. But also, and this is the real secret, most of the college coaches work within the club world. They are either the director of a club, for example, Occidental, the head coach there is the director of SURF. So if he sees you at a middle school camp and thinks you're really good, he will bring you into the MLS Next or ECNL organization. So go to the college middle school events or camps, we call them. They're not really ID camps, they're just camps. Because college coaches are the ones with the power. So get to the college coaches. And number 3 is make a highlight video. You should have at least a 1-minute video. It doesn't have to be amazing, you're only 12 years old. But this way, by the time you're 13 or 14 and you call me as the Called Soccer guy, I can say, hey, look, you might be able to play Division 1 soccer based off this information. As opposed to, 'Look, you're not on track to play Division 1. We have to catch up,' and so on and so forth. If you want my help playing college soccer, give me a call. Links in the bio. Talk soon. Goodbye. DM me from
