D1 soccer programs often illegally contact sophomores, so elite-level players should reach out first during freshman and sophomore years. Top schools aim to offer by junior year, with most recruiting finishing by March of senior year. Late interest signals you're behind the typical timeline.
How does the recruiting timeline look like for a mid-tier D1 academic school? First of all, D1 schools break the rules all the time. We had a kid who committed to a very top school who was getting calls from D1 schools their sophomore year in high school, which is illegal, but it does happen. So they are taking notes on you. So first of all, reach out to D1 schools if you're playing MLS Next or ECNL or even USL Academy during your freshman and sophomore year. Make sure you also talk to D3s because it will get your momentum up. But the timeline for a mid-tier Atlantic D1 school would be like they want You want to make offers going into your junior year for their top choices. Those same kids are being recruited by multiple people, so they may not say yes. Then, most of the time they're done recruiting by December, March of your senior year, but you don't want to be getting recruited in December, March because that means you're way behind everybody else. So you really want to get to the front of the line so at the very least you can find out, hey, you know what, they don't like me, I need to move on, and you want to find that out as quickly as you can, and that takes a long time.
