An 11- to 13-year-old should attend college soccer camps to test their commitment and build relationships with coaches who often run club teams. A Duke recruit started at the same coach's camp in 6th grade. Prioritize large Division I camps like UCLA and Michigan, top Division III schools like Chicago and Tufts, and skip Nike ID camps and overseas club camps.
Here are 5 ID camps I recommend if you are 11 or 12 years old and 13 years old. I know a lot of you will be thinking, why do I need to go to an ID camp? I'm only 11, 12 years old. That— what's that? Technically speaking, they're probably not called ID camps because that would identify you as what ID camps are for. But these are really what we call middle school camps, and there's a couple reasons why they're so important. I'm going to get into my 5 camps in a minute. Just want to explain this. Number 1 is most of the coaches who coach in college soccer also coach in club soccer. So if you haven't been able to make your team or the MLS the next team because it's political or whatever, but you go to a camp where you pay the coach money, you're more likely to get in touch with the local club because you go to the local school's camp, because the local school's camp is run by a coach, the college coach, who also works for a club team. Number 2, you need to find out if your athlete, your son or daughter, is really committed to this. If they go to one of these camps at middle school and go, wow, that really sucked and I was miserable and I don't like it, they probably don't want to keep doing this. And then you can change your course of life, and you should do that. If on the flip side your son or daughter goes, "That was the best day of my life ever, I want to do that all day long," then you have an addicted child and there's only one way to cure them, which is to help them through the process so they can keep playing soccer. And of course, that's what I like to help kids do. The other benefit to these camps is if you get a touchpoint with these coaches at 11, at 12, at 13, at 14, at 15, now you've talked to this coach for years. Did that coach change jobs? Probably. Are they— were they at a D3 school and now they're at a D1 school? Potentially. Were they at a D1 school, maybe the assistant coach, and now they're at a head coach at a D3 school? Probably. One of our students who went to Duke was going to Duke ID camps since 6th grade. He was always very good, but when he committed as a sophomore, June 15th, the coach was like, you're one of our earliest commits ever because I know who you are. You're really good. You've been coming to my camp for 5 years and I know you want to go to my school. Now, if you're not good enough, you know, then maybe you shouldn't go to these camps. This is really advice for kids who are already juggling around 50 to 75 and are playing for pre or soon-to-be MLS NEXT. Okay, so the 5 camps are: big Division I ID camps are the best. So like if a big school like UCLA has a middle school camp, go. UCLA's is really good, UCSB's is really good, Maryland's, Michigan's, Ohio's, they're all great. Number 2, it's really hard to find Division III camps with this age, but the top academic schools do have them. Chicago, Tufts, NESCACs. You want to go to those. Number 3, avoid any Nike ID camps. Number 4, don't go to any camps abroad. They're not going to help you. Any camp by Real Madrid or Barcelona, none of that will help you play at the next level, not even at the pro level. Comment the word early and we can find out if it's too early for you to start this process.
