The University of Texas, Austin

EVERYTHING IS BIGGER IN TEXAS

In the state of Texas, it’s go big, or go home; a mantra the University of Texas’ athletic department lives by every single day.

The University of Texas in Austin boasts the country’s largest Division I athletic department bringing in $215 million dollars in revenue in 2017 and operating from a $207 million-dollar expense budget that year, according to USA Today. With such extensive funding, administrators, coaches, and players have more resources at their disposal, allowing the University more flexibility when it comes to paying for events and costs.

Of the 500 student-athletes and 20 sports programs at the University of Texas, the women’s soccer program is on the rise. Under head coach Angela Kelly, who has been with the program since 2011, the Longhorn soccer program is coming off one of their most successful years in program history. During the non-conference preseason, the team sported a perfect 12-0 record eventually making it to the third round of the NCAA post-season tournament where they lost to Duke, a Final Four competitor.  

The secret to her program’s success, Kelly shares, is recruiting. “You have to recruit the best talent in the country in order to win championships,” she said.

Recruiting the best talent in the country, in today’s recruiting climate, means recruiting players at ages as young as seventh and eighth grade. And while this shift in the age at which athletes are being recruited may be uncharted territory for some collegiate coaches, it’s a path Kelly was already set on years ago. In 2014, Haley Berg, a current UT freshman, announced her commitment to the University and became a youth soccer sensation after her story was featured in an article by the New York Times. She was 14 years old at the time and had just entered high school. This was four years ago.

Berg is one of the many early commitments that the University had, and continues to lock in for their future. Another noteworthy player recruited to the Longhorn program at the age of 10 years old, Olivia Moultrie.

The University of Texas women’s soccer program has, and continues to be at the forefront of recruiting in collegiate soccer. To stay competitive and become a national power, Kelly and her staff continue to push the envelope and recruit younger players before other programs can, in the hope of securing a promising future for her program.

A NEW YORK TIMES SENSATION

Today, hearing the commitment of a 14-year-old to play soccer at a top university raises no eyebrows. However, this news, four years ago, was a different story. Texas’ secret was out.

On January 26, 2014, The New York Times released an article featuring youth soccer standout, Haley Berg. Berg was 14 years old at the time and had already accepted a full-ride scholarship to play for the University of Texas the summer prior to starting her freshman year of high school.

The article outlines Berg’s recruiting journey noting she started to gain coaches attention in seventh grade. Before confirming her decision to attend the University of Texas, Berg weighed other options at other large Division I universities like the University of Colorado and Texas A&M.

Angela Kelly and other college coaches like Anson Dorrance, coach of women’s soccer powerhouse University of North Carolina, are quoted in the article expressing their hope that the recruiting process would slow down. They said it was detrimental to the sport and the girls as a whole, according to the article, but continued to persist because of the growing competition in the sport itself.

Fast forward to today, and the trend that Kelly and other coaches had wished would falter, is still steamrolling with full force; something that the Longhorn women’s soccer coaching staff have, and continue, to find themselves in the thick of.

“It’s a slippery slope,” said UT assistant Keely Hagen. “Once you’re on the slope you just kind of keep going because ultimately you don’t want to miss out on the national team kids.”

Haley Berg is now a current freshman at the University of Texas and had a breakout first season in her first year as a Longhorn. She started 16 of 18 games in the season scoring five goals and tallying three assists. She was also named the BIG 12 conference Freshman of the Year and placed on the conference All-Freshman team. In January of 2018, Berg was invited to the U-19 U.S. Women’s National Team training camp.

As for Kelly and her staff, they continue to recruit players as young as they pursued Haley Berg in part that other coaches don’t have the opportunity to secure that talent, and in hope that the youth athletes they secure will make an impact once they arrive to the university, such as Berg did this past season.

“I believe that the people that are meant to play for me, and for us, will play, and will be here,” Kelly said. “I believe everything  that is meant to be, happens.”

KEYS TO SUCCESS

Though trends have shifted over the years, Kelly still upholds her same recruiting philosophy and implements it into her program and staff, daily.

“We still recruit the same. We just have to go out and watch younger age groups,” she said.

The Longhorn coaching staff’s mindset is simple when it comes to recruiting; identify a player with talent that you wouldn’t want to see playing for the opposing team.

“Everybody always asks me, what are you looking for in a player,” Kelly laughs. “I just like to go up to a field and I like to sit there  for 10-15 minutes and really ,really take it in and say, ‘you know, I certainly wouldn’t want to be facing that young lady.’”

Kelly says the factors that draw her immediate attention to a player are the young lady’s speed, technical ability on the ball, shot, or ability to turn with pressure on her back.

Keri Sanchez, fellow assistant coach, says besides a player’s physical talent, there’s one more aspect that speaks louder to their potential future as a Longhorn.

“You’re trying to evaluate their character, as much or more, than they’re ability on the ball,” she adds. “Because that will translate into getting a player who is the right fit for you.”

The coaching staff spends as much, if not more, time getting to know a player on the field as they do off the field. Kelly finds it imperative to get to know a player, their family, their values, and where they come from.

“If an opportunity is going to be afforded to anybody that is going to play at the University of Texas, then there has been a tremendous amount of thought that is put behind it,” Kelly said.

Once Kelly is interested in a youth athlete, she says she remains in contact, but never places any sort of pressure on the player to make a decision; something that she says is against her philosophy as a coach and an educator.

“We really pride ourselves here on never putting a time demand or a time frame on a young lady,” she said.

And it’s all part of a plan, she says, is fool-proof.

“We also very rarely have young ladies that ever want to leave our program.”

LOOKING AHEAD FOR THE LONGHORNS

Kelly and her staff will continue to follow suit in the recruiting game and recruit athletes at young ages because of their desire to become a national powerhouse program.

“At big schools, you gotta win to keep your job. And so then going after the next best thing you want to make sure you’ve landed her,” said Sanchez.

While Kelly and her staff may not be thrilled about the current age at which they are having to recruit players to her program, she says the shifting trend does not all fall on the actions of the coaches. She notes that there are other, more positive factors, that are causing players to make decisions about their future at younger ages.

“I think there’s a lot of mid major schools, a lot of institutions that have really stepped up and put the finances and back their women’s soccer programs along with their women’s sports,” she said. “I think over the past 10 years, opportunity has just risen.”

More funding for mid-major schools increases the amount of scholarship money that is available for players to attend that school, increasing the overall competition among schools and among coaches to recruit players to their institution.

“In an odd sense, I think it’s a positive because it means the game has been growing,” Kelly said.

But beyond the recruiting battle to secure the top talent in the country, the coaches at the University of Texas continue to place the best interest of the female athlete as their top priority.

“Athletics is about passion, about heart, about desire, about will,” Kelly said.

Key values that will never diminish in the sport despite the noise that surrounds the collegiate recruiting process.

“I just want to see it (recruiting) be positive for the game, and continue to grow the game and be positive for the young student-athletes. They are ultimately playing this game because they have joy in the game, and the last thing that we ever want to do is take away that joy.”