The 2022 team is up. I’ll help you out. There are 3 kids from MN that made it this year. 2 players from the HC’s team made—that’s it. I believe he had about 6 that tried out but didn’t make the cut. The Command team is very diverse—check out the roster.
The Highlight team went exactly as stated with 9 players from the True IL team making it—they aren’t even the best players on that team. This team will get killed, as they didn’t select properly.
I’m a HS coach and had no skin in the game for the Command team.
The command team may be more diverse, but they have 4 Lou Fusz girls on their team (including 2 26s) , who oh by the way have one of the three coaches on the squad. Both of their 25 and 26 teams routine play in the bottom divisions of midwest tourneys and get blown out by B teams of the top clubs.
How many Lou Fusz players made the highlight team without a coach? Yup, zero.
So since their 25 and 26 teams routinely get blown out, it's impossible they could have 3 or 4 good players that showed well at tryouts? There were some really good kids that got washed out for different things, such as not hustling back on D, being so right-handed dominant they never switched sides, or other items. I think some of those kids could have beaten out the LF players if they didn't have those flaws.
I think some of the kids, regardless of how good they are, will be in for an eye-opening time when they step on the field in Maryland. The margin of error gets smaller and the details matter a lot more. This may be more of an issue with the goalies, but that's a hard position if you haven't seen shots like they will see out east. If the players don't do well, I'm certain they will see less playing time, as the Command HC is most likely playing to win (as they did last year).
For the Highlight Division, I honestly do not know any of the LF players that are 23's or 24's. I do know of other players from other clubs that didn't make the team and one could speculate it is because they weren't part of the same teams as the three Highlight coaches. (A couple players that didn't make it were multi-time UA150 and AA participants with some not even making callbacks.) I think at least one was a personal slight to a competing club coach. It's hard to overlook there is a lot of competition between club coaches and not all club coaches have good relationships with each other. Some hold deep grudges when their teams get blown out repeatedly, some have thin skin and take everything personal, some are jerks, etc. You really see it all on the club circuit and at these events.
Its tough in the midwest. There are pretty much a handful of clubs who devleop national-level talent. And then you are basically dividing up the talent in half. Since it seems half the top clubs are blacklisted at American Select and the other half are blacklisted at UA, it is nearly impossible to put together a competitive team.
Looking at rosters, i think only one club (Lakeshore) placed more than three girls at both UA and American Select. Until that changes, the midwest team won't be competitive at either event.
In the Highlight division Midwest went 3-2 last year and lost a close one to LI who won it all. Not saying we were top 3 team there but LI cruised most games and we hung with the best. Just don’t get why we don’t pick the best players; why don’t they want to represent the MW, not True Illinois. I know everyone has their own politics when it comes to selection, but when I look at LI roster, the girls are from all different HS’s. maybe couple kids from same school.
Some of the Midwest coaches would rather advertise how many players they had in UA rather than win it. (I would like to point out, a few years back, one of the True coaches said she wasn't picking her players because she knew they weren't the best players there--the team did well that year.) Midwest Highlight went 2-3 last year--Command went 3-2. Highlight did have a close one with LI for sure.
Some coaches get it...others just want more sign-ups for their club teams because UA players.
