2010 Recruits

We now have two 2010 verbals in the nationally elite Ellen Parker, well-described above, and the newly committed Sarah Bridges from Portland's Jesuit High School.

Interestingly, UPWSoccerRookie, in the above post dated May 22 of this year, seems to have anticipated that we would catch Sarah by the fact that he/she moved her to this thread where 7 weeks later she would indeed belong.

Great start on the 2010 class with two high-caliber recruits!!!

It sounds like we have a pretty good prospect in Rachel Mercik from Sacramento's Boca Soccer club. In the article with TopDrawer, she mentions UP on her list of schools she's considering. With luck, the next announcement might be that she's settled on Portland.



From the description of her play, it soundes like she'd fit right in.

As a little refresher, we will be getting Molly Klier from the same Boca club next year.

Interesting. If the Pilots do want her, I'm sure she is a great fit for us, based on the tremendous job of recruiting the Pilots staff has done in the last few years.

Great article, BTW. Sounds like she is unafraid to go 1v1 against anyone. I would call that "fearless'.

Keep us posted - Geez - if your "spider web" catches anything more about Rachel Mercik.

For the record Laguna Hills Eclipse started out as Julie Foudy alums "green machine" They terrorized the Coast league before taking best from the Mission Viejo club and other of the best players from around the region. There was many sour grapes from parents whose kids were not selected from Mission Viejo. Soon after the Eclipse was unbeatable for a few years. Mission Viejo was taken over by Billy McNihol of Galaxy fame and soon folded.
Although Abner and Clive were friends they are/were not even close as coaches/people. Abner is a great recruiter and promoter but he leaves the actual soccer development to other coaches. He is a master at spotting young talent and courting players to his team. All I can say is I am glad Portland has a "pipeline" to the club because most of the best players in so cal run either through Eclipse or Surf.

It's great to have "pipelines" in So Cal because of all the soccer talent amassed down there in that giant "people machine" of an area.

We do I believe have pipelines in other states, too, as we always seem to have a recruit or two coming in from an organization a former Pilot came from.

And I think our "reach" is slowly expanding nationwide.

(Before I get scolded for excluding the local talent, we also seem to be doing a great job of attracting some of the top talent in the state. Witness our 2009 recruiting class: think we got three locals in that class. Kendall Johnson, Taylor Brooke, and Elinor Priest.)