Mens Soccer - New Roster

[Pitt79]

This is the downside to GA/ECNL/MLS Next. A lot of those kids don't or can't play HS soccer. The competition level js much lower but they miss out on the big crowds (sometimes), school pride thing, people talking about the big game in class, etc. So yea, some random game might draw 500 (is 1000 too many) people whereas their club team just has 100 on some random field in a complex....no stadium.

That is so true, my daughter played on a middle to bad Class C team, and for a big game (for them) they might have 300 fans, in a decent size stadium, it was a small private Christian school her last 2 years, but the parents, teachers, other students come, other sports teams walk over after practice and it's an event, you go to a club tournament at a complex, like in the Soccer Plex at Germantown, Maryland and there's not even bleachers, but those teams might beat that high school team 10-0 or 15-1. That's why I told that friend of mine her daughter should play high school, the competition is worse, but the atmosphere is seriously more big time, people are fans of those BRANDS either because they or their kids went there or live in the area and don't just come because they know someone on the team, like the club games.

 

[Pitt79]

yeah celtic is still there. ECNL. MD has 3 ECNL teams: pipeline, celtic and maryland united.

celtic actually tried to do a 2nd team in severna park, which was a disaster. pipeline is the best club in maryland. we lost like 5-2 or something like that. not great, but respectable for a town team. weird game b/c they messed up and only had the full size goals on a small field.

One of the girls on my daughter's crappy small private school high school team played for Maryland United, she was a defensive player, IMO she wasn't much better if at all than my daughter, she was a year younger and ended up at a D3 school. Her mom was a jagoff though, most of the kids on the team where rec level and she'd yell at them and curse at them she was your nutjob soccer mom

 

[pitt90seven]

One of the girls on my daughter's crappy small private school high school team played for Maryland United, she was a defensive player, IMO she wasn't much better if at all than my daughter, she was a year younger and ended up at a D3 school. Her mom was a jagoff though, most of the kids on the team where rec level and she'd yell at them and curse at them she was your nutjob soccer mom

MD united practices close to us. they're not good and finish bottom of ECNL every year. one of our players joined them 2 years ago but came right back.

we haven't even played their A team in awhile. last time we played their B team it was like 15-0 (could've been 20+). it's honestly a pretty poor program and i don't know why they're still in ECNL. my son did EDP juniors last year multiple times. 1st and 2nd graders. we beat their team to a pulp. i almost went over to the parents and asked why in the hell were they paying $3k to get stomped by kids whose parents are paying $125. idiots.

 

[anon_d97v9o3a8b6xr]

Anyone who is a member of any club can go to the ID camps, it's like a for profit thing isn't it? I used to get emails with offers to go to those all the time.

And few players are really signed from the ID camps. They are a huge money maker for programs. They treat it like a regular camp and most have specific targets truly care about that they focus on at the ID camp. Not all schools but the P5 typically focus on a handful while giving other players instruction and opportunities to train with current players.

 

[anon_d97v9o3a8b6xr]

MD united practices close to us. they're not good and finish bottom of ECNL every year. one of our players joined them 2 years ago but came right back.

we haven't even played their A team in awhile. last time we played their B team it was like 15-0 (could've been 20+). it's honestly a pretty poor program and i don't know why they're still in ECNL. my son did EDP juniors last year multiple times. 1st and 2nd graders. we beat their team to a pulp. i almost went over to the parents and asked why in the hell were they paying $3k to get stomped by kids whose parents are paying $125. idiots.

ECNL boys and girls are different. ECNL for girls is solid at the national level. They also have a regional level that isn’t close. My daughters team is on the ECNL national league and play against Riverhounds. We smoked them 5-0 or something like that this year. May have been more. Riverhounds ECNL for example have had some solid players. I think a 2022 is headed to UNC, they have 2023 signed with Pitt, and a bunch of other good D1 teams. The 2023 team is probably ranked in the 40-60 place nationally. I think our team was top 25 last year but top 40 this year. The teams in top 10 are typically from larger cities or within a large city, but our team competes fairly well and we are a pretty small market that pull kids from as far away as 2 hours. On the girls side, you really have the best options in the 2-3 leagues. As far as high school goes, it’s good and bad to play. Depends on the high school. My daughters team is horrible and she has to do things that are just not normal for a player at a high level. We have one solid team loaded with ECNL girls who won states last year. They are loaded and it’s not even close for other schools.

 

[Fk_Pitt]

ECNL boys and girls are different. ECNL for girls is solid at the national level. They also have a regional level that isn’t close. My daughters team is on the ECNL national league and play against Riverhounds. We smoked them 5-0 or something like that this year. May have been more. Riverhounds ECNL for example have had some solid players. I think a 2022 is headed to UNC, they have 2023 signed with Pitt, and a bunch of other good D1 teams. The 2023 team is probably ranked in the 40-60 place nationally. I think our team was top 25 last year but top 40 this year. The teams in top 10 are typically from larger cities or within a large city, but our team competes fairly well and we are a pretty small market that pull kids from as far away as 2 hours. On the girls side, you really have the best options in the 2-3 leagues. As far as high school goes, it’s good and bad to play. Depends on the high school. My daughters team is horrible and she has to do things that are just not normal for a player at a high level. We have one solid team loaded with ECNL girls who won states last year. They are loaded and it’s not even close for other schools.

I don’t know if the riverhounds ever had a good team. Of course they do have some real talented players who have come thru there.

The problem now locally is that all the best players should be going there, but they don’t because the Riverhounds alienated the local soccer community in the beginning and they have a reputation of untrustworthiness. So instead, in any given age group, Beadling or Century GA teams have the best team in the area. And often, the best talent is split between the 3- Riverhounds, Beadling, and Century. For the Hounds to compete in the ECNL, they have to have a year where they get all the best players. I don’t think they’ve ever done that. It’s tough to do because Beadling and Century have a strong pull. Pittsburgh soccer doesn’t have a big enough pool to spilt the best talent among 3 clubs. The Hounds have a good curriculum and good coaching, but so do the other clubs. Team talent and competition is what develops players. You need the athletes first and the Hounds don’t get all of them. They only get some of them.

 

[pitt90seven]

ECNL boys and girls are different. ECNL for girls is solid at the national level. They also have a regional level that isn’t close. My daughters team is on the ECNL national league and play against Riverhounds. We smoked them 5-0 or something like that this year. May have been more. Riverhounds ECNL for example have had some solid players. I think a 2022 is headed to UNC, they have 2023 signed with Pitt, and a bunch of other good D1 teams. The 2023 team is probably ranked in the 40-60 place nationally. I think our team was top 25 last year but top 40 this year. The teams in top 10 are typically from larger cities or within a large city, but our team competes fairly well and we are a pretty small market that pull kids from as far away as 2 hours. On the girls side, you really have the best options in the 2-3 leagues. As far as high school goes, it’s good and bad to play. Depends on the high school. My daughters team is horrible and she has to do things that are just not normal for a player at a high level. We have one solid team loaded with ECNL girls who won states last year. They are loaded and it’s not even close for other schools.

I wasn't knocking ECNL. it's just one of the local clubs who competes is not good. they have all of the annapolis area and prince George's county (population > 900k) and they can't put a competitive team together. the dad of one of my son's teammates daughter was on the team and gave up. got tired of driving to NJ to get their a## kicked every other weekend.

@Fk_Pitt I forgot to add that Liverpool started up here around 10-ish years ago. we kick the crap out of them every time we play. and they just upped their fees to around $5k per year. all of that money and you really get nothing for it. we have one friend on the team and he only plays b/c he has a long time weird beef with our head coach.

 

[Fk_Pitt]

I wasn't knocking ECNL. it's just one of the local clubs who competes is not good. they have all of the annapolis area and prince George's county (population > 900k) and they can't put a competitive team together. the dad of one of my son's teammates daughter was on the team and gave up. got tired of driving to NJ to get their a## kicked every other weekend.

@Fk_Pitt I forgot to add that Liverpool started up here around 10-ish years ago. we kick the crap out of them every time we play. and they just upped their fees to around $5k per year. all of that money and you really get nothing for it. we have one friend on the team and he only plays b/c he has a long time weird beef with our head coach.

My son plays for a jabroni club locally. He knows it is in fact a jabroni team so that’s why I don’t mind saying it. We took him there because he was at a top club but his age group and team simply wasn’t good enough to be a vehicle for exposure, and he wasn’t serious enough anyways about soccer for us to drive an hour to play on the best team. (That’s the other thing, if you’re at a top club but for some odd reason that team in the age group is not strong, get out.). Plus we know for boys, the college route is way too competitive. No sense in us traveling all over the region and spending all the time and money for him if there was no payoff at the end. So he plays for this other club team now and does it for fun and fitness. They go to low level tournaments and always seem to win them…and I suppose that’s what it’s all about. The parents and players don’t know that they are traveling to northern Virginia or Columbia, MD to play and beat their local chess and computer club that plays on a soccer team on the side. Lol. So we get a kick out of their excitement, even though I know and my son knows that if we played any real teams, we’d get our asses kicked. But I do have to bite my tongue with the Dads who think the team and their kids are juggernauts.

In any event, we ran into a Liverpool team at one tourney. I forget where it was. They had the full Liverpool kits and had a kid who was like 6’5” and looked like Kurt Zouma. This was when they were probably U15. It was one of the most entertaining games I ever watched. I think it ended up being like a 5-4 match but it was wild. I don’t know if Liverpool has multiple teams in each age group. I figured that there was no way it could have been their A Team if they were in our bracket (which would have been low level). But this Kurt Zouma kid was unreal. No way he was a B teamer. So I don’t know.

 

[Pitt79]

As far as high school goes, it’s good and bad to play. Depends on the high school. My daughters team is horrible and she has to do things that are just not normal for a player at a high level.

Just curious, like what?

 

[Pitt79]

The parents and players don’t know that they are traveling to northern Virginia or Columbia, MD to play and beat their local chess and computer club that plays on a soccer team on the side. Lol. So we get a kick out of their excitement, even though I know and my son knows that if we played any real teams, we’d get our asses kicked. But I do have to bite my tongue with the Dads who think the team and their kids are juggernauts.

LOL, I gotta say, you guys fascinate me the way you take this stuff so seriously! I think I'm more like the parents who don't realize their kids are beating the chess club

Columbia, MD, like SAC, my daughter played some for their travel teams? And their rec leagues.

 

[pitt90seven]

My son plays for a jabroni club locally. He knows it is in fact a jabroni team so that’s why I don’t mind saying it. We took him there because he was at a top club but his age group and team simply wasn’t good enough to be a vehicle for exposure, and he wasn’t serious enough anyways about soccer for us to drive an hour to play on the best team. (That’s the other thing, if you’re at a top club but for some odd reason that team in the age group is not strong, get out.). Plus we know for boys, the college route is way too competitive. No sense in us traveling all over the region and spending all the time and money for him if there was no payoff at the end. So he plays for this other club team now and does it for fun and fitness. They go to low level tournaments and always seem to win them…and I suppose that’s what it’s all about. The parents and players don’t know that they are traveling to northern Virginia or Columbia, MD to play and beat their local chess and computer club that plays on a soccer team on the side. Lol. So we get a kick out of their excitement, even though I know and my son knows that if we played any real teams, we’d get our asses kicked. But I do have to bite my tongue with the Dads who think the team and their kids are juggernauts.

In any event, we ran into a Liverpool team at one tourney. I forget where it was. They had the full Liverpool kits and had a kid who was like 6’5” and looked like Kurt Zouma. This was when they were probably U15. It was one of the most entertaining games I ever watched. I think it ended up being like a 5-4 match but it was wild. I don’t know if Liverpool has multiple teams in each age group. I figured that there was no way it could have been their A Team if they were in our bracket (which would have been low level). But this Kurt Zouma kid was unreal. No way he was a B teamer. So I don’t know.

liverpool is near jabroni level. I have no doubt that a jabroni team would be competitive with their A team. they aren't ECNL. they don't have great coaches. it's just a name and most parents aren't interested in paying for that name. I mean, Maryland united practices around 15 minutes away. Celtic is 15-ish minutes away. if you're high end, you have much better and cheaper options. hell, all of our teams beat their teams and we're a community based organization.

LOL, I gotta say, you guys fascinate me the way you take this stuff so seriously! I think I'm more like the parents who don't realize their kids are beating the chess club

Columbia, MD, like SAC, my daughter played some for their travel teams? And their rec leagues.

we play SAC in everything. they don't do ECNL so it's hard to say how good the older age groups are. they have some sort of connection with DC United.

but their team for our age group won the highest EDP division in the spring. we're usually competitive with them but only beat them once or twice over several years. we seem to play their B team in every tournament - those games are very competitive but we almost always win. SAC is a good program. huge. gotta be the biggest in the state. they have like 200 kids try out for each age group.

 

[anon_d97v9o3a8b6xr]

Just curious, like what?

Over dribble, make exceptionally long runs with the ball. She has to come all the way back to help with defense and than bust her ass down the field pretty much alone. She has zero trust in her high school teammates for good reason. They lose the ball too easily, pass to the other team, pass to nowhere, and dribble out of bounds. And they will drill the ball down field and expect her to chase it down. She plays the entire game and ends up beat up not only from the excessive runs, but because her team is so bad she gets double and triple teamed and teams get very physical with her. She takes far too many hard hits, and quite often excessive in tackles. We can send her to any high school because my wife is a principal in the county. But we chose to live in this particular area so she can attend the best academic school in the county. It’s also one of the newest schools so it is modern. My kid is a very good player, works her ass off, and just loves the game. But her high school team has zero talent. We have an ECNL D1 goalie who transferred in but missed all of last year with injury and still not back. We do have two ECNL players, one who plays defense and ends up just marking someone most of the game and the other is being used in middle field and she has no business playing midfield. In the end, it turns into ugly soccer, and when we play the best team it ends up 9-0 with that team keeping all starters in the entire game because the coach wants to throttle everyone and jack up everyone’s stats. That team has been around forever. Many of the schools on our district are very new to soccer and don’t emphasize it. The best team has the best local kids, they recruit, and allow out of zone kids to attend. So it’s a bit unfair for the other teams.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

My son plays for a jabroni club locally. He knows it is in fact a jabroni team so that’s why I don’t mind saying it. We took him there because he was at a top club but his age group and team simply wasn’t good enough to be a vehicle for exposure, and he wasn’t serious enough anyways about soccer for us to drive an hour to play on the best team. (That’s the other thing, if you’re at a top club but for some odd reason that team in the age group is not strong, get out.). Plus we know for boys, the college route is way too competitive. No sense in us traveling all over the region and spending all the time and money for him if there was no payoff at the end. So he plays for this other club team now and does it for fun and fitness. They go to low level tournaments and always seem to win them…and I suppose that’s what it’s all about. The parents and players don’t know that they are traveling to northern Virginia or Columbia, MD to play and beat their local chess and computer club that plays on a soccer team on the side. Lol. So we get a kick out of their excitement, even though I know and my son knows that if we played any real teams, we’d get our asses kicked. But I do have to bite my tongue with the Dads who think the team and their kids are juggernauts.

In any event, we ran into a Liverpool team at one tourney. I forget where it was. They had the full Liverpool kits and had a kid who was like 6’5” and looked like Kurt Zouma. This was when they were probably U15. It was one of the most entertaining games I ever watched. I think it ended up being like a 5-4 match but it was wild. I don’t know if Liverpool has multiple teams in each age group. I figured that there was no way it could have been their A Team if they were in our bracket (which would have been low level). But this Kurt Zouma kid was unreal. No way he was a B teamer. So I don’t know.

We played a Liverpool team in Columbia, MD and it was maybe the worst club team I've ever seen. Not sure if it was a true Liverpool program (which are still just moneymakers who will take anyone) or just some local club who calls their teams like Liverpool, Real Madrid, PSG, etc.

On Riverhounds. Didn't they win the natty like 5 years ago with Norwin girls? I agree with what you say about why they dont get the best players now but it goes beyond alienating people. The reality is that there are enough D1 girls players south of Pittsburgh who don't see the need to fight Pgh traffic to get to practice. Not only that, Century and Beadling have a long history and their brands are well known locally.

 

[Fk_Pitt]

We played a Liverpool team in Columbia, MD and it was maybe the worst club team I've ever seen. Not sure if it was a true Liverpool program (which are still just moneymakers who will take anyone) or just some local club who calls their teams like Liverpool, Real Madrid, PSG, etc.

On Riverhounds. Didn't they win the natty like 5 years ago with Norwin girls? I agree with what you say about why they dont get the best players now but it goes beyond alienating people. The reality is that there are enough D1 girls players south of Pittsburgh who don't see the need to fight Pgh traffic to get to practice. Not only that, Century and Beadling have a long history and their brands are well known locally.

No they didn’t win the natty. If you look at the soccer pyramid, they won the US Club Soccer National Cup, which is US Club Soccers version of the USYS Presidents Cup…so it’s several rungs down on the totem pole, but the Hound milked it for all they could. But there were some real good players on that team that won state titles at a Norwin and a Canon Mac.

and as far as draw, plenty of kids from the south play for the hounds. But you’re right, Beadling and Century have a really strong pull. But even the Hounds aren’t far. You can get to Highmark or Coroapolis in 25 minutes from peters/canonsburg/USC/BP

 

[Pitt79]

we play SAC in everything. they don't do ECNL so it's hard to say how good the older age groups are. they have some sort of connection with DC United.

but their team for our age group won the highest EDP division in the spring. we're usually competitive with them but only beat them once or twice over several years. we seem to play their B team in every tournament - those games are very competitive but we almost always win. SAC is a good program. huge. gotta be the biggest in the state. they have like 200 kids try out for each age group.

My daughter played 2 years with SAC select, which was like a local travel you had to try out for. She also played a year with Ellicott City SC travel team, which was a different local club, that team was pretty bad, but the coach acted like the goal was to get D1 scholarships and win the World Cup, he wrote books about how to get recruited and tried to sell them to the parents. And like 5-6 years in the SAC rec leagues, her last two years of high school, she just played for her high school team and the SAC high school spring rec league, because she pretty much hated travel after the Ellicott City SC experience. But SAC is a great club, even if you just do rec forever they have nice facilities and uniforms and a good deal for like $250/year. Last I heard, SAC has 600 teams, over 6000 players age 4-19 and that complex has 15 fields, I think they also had a U23 team, not sure what league they where in. I actually miss going out there.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

No they didn’t win the natty. If you look at the soccer pyramid, they won the US Club Soccer National Cup, which is US Club Soccers version of the USYS Presidents Cup…so it’s several rungs down on the totem pole, but the Hound milked it for all they could. But there were some real good players on that team that won state titles at a Norwin and a Canon Mac.

and as far as draw, plenty of kids from the south play for the hounds. But you’re right, Beadling and Century have a really strong pull. But even the Hounds aren’t far. You can get to Highmark or Coroapolis in 25 minutes from peters/canonsburg/USC/BP

25 minutes maybe at 2AM. Depending on where you are, its probably closer to 40 if you are trying to make a 5:30 practice at Highmark and dont live in Lebo or Dormont. I suppose Bridgeville/SF can get there in 25-30 on the parkway but 19 is a disaster.

I know a girl who considered the Riverhounds and her dad said it just wasnt worth the extra time and paying for parking. She can play for a local club just as good or better and save the 15 extra minute commute.

 

[Pitt79]

Over dribble, make exceptionally long runs with the ball. She has to come all the way back to help with defense and than bust her ass down the field pretty much alone. She has zero trust in her high school teammates for good reason. They lose the ball too easily, pass to the other team, pass to nowhere, and dribble out of bounds. And they will drill the ball down field and expect her to chase it down. She plays the entire game and ends up beat up not only from the excessive runs, but because her team is so bad she gets double and triple teamed and teams get very physical with her. She takes far too many hard hits, and quite often excessive in tackles. We can send her to any high school because my wife is a principal in the county. But we chose to live in this particular area so she can attend the best academic school in the county. It’s also one of the newest schools so it is modern. My kid is a very good player, works her ass off, and just loves the game. But her high school team has zero talent. We have an ECNL D1 goalie who transferred in but missed all of last year with injury and still not back. We do have two ECNL players, one who plays defense and ends up just marking someone most of the game and the other is being used in middle field and she has no business playing midfield. In the end, it turns into ugly soccer, and when we play the best team it ends up 9-0 with that team keeping all starters in the entire game because the coach wants to throttle everyone and jack up everyone’s stats. That team has been around forever. Many of the schools on our district are very new to soccer and don’t emphasize it. The best team has the best local kids, they recruit, and allow out of zone kids to attend. So it’s a bit unfair for the other teams.

My experience with girls high school teams and my daughter played 2 years at a giant public school that reached the state finals and 2 years at a small private school was that those teams, even the big school, only had 2-3 players that played on big clubs. The school that made the final had two D1 recruits, one in lacrosse and one in basketball. The funny thing about Catonsville High girls soccer is that most of the star girls played multiple sports along with soccer, especially lacrosse. In Maryland though I think the top high school that wins lots of girls soccer titles is Sparrows Point, which I always thought was strange, it's very blue collar, white trashy, not the type of area where you expect them to be good at soccer, and their boys are good too.

 

[pitt90seven]

My daughter played 2 years with SAC select, which was like a local travel you had to try out for. She also played a year with Ellicott City SC travel team, which was a different local club, that team was pretty bad, but the coach acted like the goal was to get D1 scholarships and win the World Cup, he wrote books about how to get recruited and tried to sell them to the parents. And like 5-6 years in the SAC rec leagues, her last two years of high school, she just played for her high school team and the SAC high school spring rec league, because she pretty much hated travel after the Ellicott City SC experience. But SAC is a great club, even if you just do rec forever they have nice facilities and uniforms and a good deal for like $250/year. Last I heard, SAC has 600 teams, over 6000 players age 4-19 and that complex has 15 fields, I think they also had a U23 team, not sure what league they where in. I actually miss going out there.

maybe for practice but that is my most hated place for tournaments. and good grief, if you have a game on sunday mornind during church. oof. but it's a great program. we graduate into 11v11 this season so we won't have to play in that facility for tournaments moving forward. of course, that means i probably have to drive to BFE carroll county somewhere.

we have a few thousand total in our program so 6k is believable. i know they have like 200 tryout per age group. we got 65 or something this year and that was a huge turnout for us - mainly b/c a couple of local teams struggled (one contracted).

the u23 i think is the baltimore armour. i'm not totally understanding the underarmour relationship but it has some sort of tie to MLS.

 

[anon_d97v9o3a8b6xr]

25 minutes maybe at 2AM. Depending on where you are, its probably closer to 40 if you are trying to make a 5:30 practice at Highmark and dont live in Lebo or Dormont. I suppose Bridgeville/SF can get there in 25-30 on the parkway but 19 is a disaster.

I know a girl who considered the Riverhounds and her dad said it just wasnt worth the extra time and paying for parking. She can play for a local club just as good or better and save the 15 extra minute commute.

Don’t even get me started on the parking fees at Highmark. They charge $10.00 for an ECNL game. That’s the only club that charges for parking for a single game. The national event in Seattle this year charged $15 for the weekend and that’s never happened at a showcase or national playoff. I know the hounds ECNL play in the stadium but no other club charges for parking. Charging a family to park is annoying when nobody else does.

 

[Pitt79]

maybe for practice but that is my most hated place for tournaments. and good grief, if you have a game on sunday mornind during church. oof. but it's a great program. we graduate into 11v11 this season so we won't have to play in that facility for tournaments moving forward. of course, that means i probably have to drive to BFE carroll county somewhere.

we have a few thousand total in our program so 6k is believable. i know they have like 200 tryout per age group. we got 65 or something this year and that was a huge turnout for us - mainly b/c a couple of local teams struggled (one contracted).

the u23 i think is the baltimore armour. i'm not totally understanding the underarmour relationship but it has some sort of tie to MLS.

Baltimore Armour that's it!

They do have full size fields for 11 on 11, I remember tournaments there for U14 and high school age players.

I liked tournaments there, Maybe because it was like my home field.

 

[pitt90seven]

Baltimore Armour that's it!

They do have full size fields for 11 on 11, I remember tournaments there for U14 and high school age players.

I liked tournaments there, Maybe because it was like my home field.

they do but they break them up for the bigger tournaments to be used by 9v9 or 7v7 teams. the 11v11 kids get shipped to different locations. for those large tournaments, they're stuffing 2 games on each full length field. with the 8 fields, you're getting 16 teams turning over every hour on the hour, so 64 families each hour coming and going. ugh. i won't miss that.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

maybe for practice but that is my most hated place for tournaments. and good grief, if you have a game on sunday mornind during church. oof. but it's a great program. we graduate into 11v11 this season so we won't have to play in that facility for tournaments moving forward. of course, that means i probably have to drive to BFE carroll county somewhere.

we have a few thousand total in our program so 6k is believable. i know they have like 200 tryout per age group. we got 65 or something this year and that was a huge turnout for us - mainly b/c a couple of local teams struggled (one contracted).

the u23 i think is the baltimore armour. i'm not totally understanding the underarmour relationship but it has some sort of tie to MLS.

We had a game there during church. We did the let the kids out of the car thing while we look for somewhere to park.

I don't understand the Maryland/Virginia soccer system. Take a huge club like SAC. They have like 7 teams per age group. Is there not like a local community league down there similar to PA West Divisions 4-6. Kids here play for their local community AND Century/Beadling/Riverhounds/SCS/Hotspurs, etc.

 

[Pitt79]

they do but they break them up for the bigger tournaments to be used by 9v9 or 7v7 teams. the 11v11 kids get shipped to different locations. for those large tournaments, they're stuffing 2 games on each full length field. with the 8 fields, you're getting 16 teams turning over every hour on the hour, so 64 families each hour coming and going. ugh. i won't miss that.

True some of the 11v11 games are shipped to nearby high schools, I've been to all of those too.

Out of curiosity I always wondered, who plays U23? I'd think by that age, they are playing for a college team or are going pro if they're that good?

 

[Pitt79]

I don't understand the Maryland/Virginia soccer system. Take a huge club like SAC. They have like 7 teams per age group. Is there not like a local community league down there similar to PA West Divisions 4-6.

There are, in Howard County where SAC is, there are at least 5-6 more clubs, some are just travel teams and some have travel and rec leagues of their own, Catonsville where I live has 2 clubs and even community run cheap rec league, I wasn't exaggerating when I said where I live there are dozens of soccer teams for every baseball/softball team for kids. You drive into the next county or municipality 5 miles over in either direction I'm sure there are more, I just happen to only be familiar with Columbia, Ellicott City and Catonsville.

And when you say SAC has 7 travel teams per age group, figure also there are 2 full leagues per age group in addition to those, 8 teams each, Select, which is tryout based like travel, but doesn't really travel except locally and plain rec where they take everyone with no tryouts, so really I estimate SAC has 20-23 teams per age group, it's that big.

 

[pitt90seven]

True some of the 11v11 games are shipped to nearby high schools, I've been to all of those too.

Out of curiosity I always wondered, who plays U23? I'd think by that age, they are playing for a college team or are going pro if they're that good?

i think it's college kids during the summer. that's my best guess.

 

[pitt90seven]

We had a game there during church. We did the let the kids out of the car thing while we look for somewhere to park.

I don't understand the Maryland/Virginia soccer system. Take a huge club like SAC. They have like 7 teams per age group. Is there not like a local community league down there similar to PA West Divisions 4-6. Kids here play for their local community AND Century/Beadling/Riverhounds/SCS/Hotspurs, etc.

SAC is an extreme outlier. there's no other program remotely like it in the rest of MD, or DC, or NOVA. it's 25 miles for me and they have some kids from my town in the program (35-40 minutes in rush hour). traffic in NOVA and montgomery county is too horrendous to be pulling kids in from 20 miles away. there's just no way. 20 miles in NOVA during rush hour is next to impossible to get your kid to practice.

and for SAC - they have 3 good select teams in our age group. one that is excellent, one that is very good, and one that is sort of typical. so they aren't going 7 deep with quality teams or anything like that.

contrast with our team who has a huge dropoff from the A to the B team. A team absolutely slams the B team (the games shouldn't even be played). SAC's B team would give their A team a competitive match.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

SAC is an extreme outlier. there's no other program remotely like it in the rest of MD, or DC, or NOVA. it's 25 miles for me and they have some kids from my town in the program (35-40 minutes in rush hour). traffic in NOVA and montgomery county is too horrendous to be pulling kids in from 20 miles away. there's just no way. 20 miles in NOVA during rush hour is next to impossible to get your kid to practice.

and for SAC - they have 3 good select teams in our age group. one that is excellent, one that is very good, and one that is sort of typical. so they aren't going 7 deep with quality teams or anything like that.

contrast with our team who has a huge dropoff from the A to the B team. A team absolutely slams the B team (the games shouldn't even be played). SAC's B team would give their A team a competitive match.

We lost to a SAC team but I have no idea what level they were.

What I dont get is like does Maryland have a club league where SAC puts its best teams and then also a community league where they put their lower teams? How similar is the setup to PA? Can you play for your hometown team in some league of town teams within like 20 miles like in PA?

 

[Pitt79]

We lost to a SAC team but I have no idea what level they were.

What I dont get is like does Maryland have a club league where SAC puts its best teams and then also a community league where they put their lower teams? How similar is the setup to PA? Can you play for your hometown team in some league of town teams within like 20 miles like in PA?

Yes, there's BBL, Baltimore Beltway League that I know of, where clubs put their teams in and play other clubs. The lower teams at SAC or other clubs, play in their own leagues, like SAC will have a U12 league of it's own they just play each other, as far as I know, here, you can play anywhere you want, SAC had some girls come from other counties 20 miles away to play for their teams, we live in Catonsville, my daughter played for Catonsville Youth Soccer, SAC, Ellicott City SC all at various levels, it didn't matter where we lived, if you pay the fee and show up for practice and games you are in. Actually the first league my daughter played in was in Catonsville, called EDRECO, some local rec council that sponsored many sports at a local level, all at a certain park, it had 4 teams and cost $25 for the whole season, I was even assistant coach, the coaches had almost no training in that one, just dads mostly. It sounds like you are looking for some formal structure, I think here anyone could start a league or club if they wanted to. But I'm not 100% sure.

 

[Joe the Panther Fan]

No they didn’t win the natty. If you look at the soccer pyramid, they won the US Club Soccer National Cup, which is US Club Soccers version of the USYS Presidents Cup…so it’s several rungs down on the totem pole, but the Hound milked it for all they could. But there were some real good players on that team that won state titles at a Norwin and a Canon Mac.

As I recall, what happened was that it was say a U15 team (I don't remember the exact age group). They didn't actually qualify for the championship at the level they were playing at. So they asked if they could play in the other, lower level, tournament. There were no spots in the U15 tournament, so they let them play in the U16 tournament. The quality of which was so low that the won pretty easily.

I always wondered if it pissed off the kids on their actual U16 team, who actually were good enough to qualify for their (higher level) tournament but not nearly good enough to win it.

They got a lot of the publicity that they did because the father of the team's goalie was a local sports writer. So he fed people stories and they ran with them without really looking into what happened. Or maybe they did and they just didn't care, because they figured no one would know the difference.