Welcome to another high school soccer season in which so many boys’ and girls’ players are coming and going that you’ll need to make a phone call or send a text to the head coach to confirm who’s playing or who’s off competing for a club team, a national team or working out with a pro team.
It’s not chaos, just another sign of the many options elite players in Southern California have to consider, and playing high school soccer isn’t exactly the No. 1 in priority in the minds of USA Soccer, club teams, college programs and pro teams.
The example of Santa Margarita’s top senior girls’ players, goalie Peyton Trayer and forward Coral Fry, is perhaps the future. They helped the Eagles win the Southern Section Open Division championship as juniors. This season, they’ll be playing for Santa Margarita this month until they leave in January to join their respective college programs — North Carolina and Tennessee. Each said seven recruits from their future college teams are also leaving high school early.
“For me, it’s a huge advantage to go in the spring, start classes and get acclimated to the environment, get a semester ahead training with the team and do the strength and conditioning to be ready for my freshman season,” Trayer said.
Said Fry: “The higher level of training is going to help me so much by the time the college season comes around.”
Trayer and three other players got into trouble last season when they went to participate in a pro team training session in Brazil and were declared ineligible in the middle of the high school season for violating CIF bylaw 600.
Under CIF rules, players can’t play simultaneously on a club team and a high school team. There’s also USA Soccer commitments in the middle of the high school season and many club teams are not letting students play both. For girls and boys, they are not allowed to try out with a pro team during their high school season.
“It’s a ripple effect,” Santa Margarita coach Craig Bull said. “It’s really the pro clubs driving this. I’m from Europe. We graduate high school 16 years old and you’re signing a pro contract if you’re good enough and you’re training five days a week, where you’re 16 to 18 here, playing club and high school soccer, training two or three days. This is about America keeping up with the rest of the world.”
Seven coaches from teams Santa Margarita will face in nonleague games this season told Bull they have players choosing not to play high school soccer.
To help replace Trayer and Fry after December, Santa Margarita has one of the nation’s top juniors, Mia Corona, a UCLA commit, set to join the team in January. She missed last season working out with pro teams and hopes to be finished with her training for the last part of the high school season.
Remember how Harvard-Westlake was without the Thompson sisters, Alyssa and Gisele, for much of their four-year high school careers. Alyssa turned pro her senior year and both signed with Nike in 2022. “There’s so much talent in Southern California,” Harvard-Westlake coach Richard Simms said.
The good news for the Wolverines this season is that their top two players are available. Leading scorer Kaia Santomarco-King is a Colorado commit and goalie Sasha Selvaggio is a Ohio State commit and Italian national team participant. The Wolverines, Santa Margarita, Corona Santiago, Mater Dei and Sherman Oaks Notre Dame all should have top teams.
Boys teams held off scheduling games until after a big club tournament this past weekend in San Diego and the MLS Next tournament in Arizona this week.
Cathedral goalie Peter Cornejo attended the FIFA U-17 World Cup in November representing El Salvador.
(Eric Sondheimer / Los Angeles Times)
“We just go with who we have,” Loyola coach Chris Walter said. “It’s a tough situation. I don’t think it’s fair for student athletes to have to make decisions. They should be able to play at their school or the highest level they can.”
Loyola has a top player, Cody Davis, who hasn’t played high school soccer since his freshman season. He’s committed to Loyola Marymount and won’t be playing again this high school season. Loyola’s top returning player is Josh Gallagher. Birmingham has lost brothers Carlos and Christian Esnal, who decided to pursue playing in Uruguay. Robert Mejia joins the team after not playing high school before. “He’s really good,” coach Gus Villalobos said.
Give credit to those sticking it out with high school soccer and trying to prove you can still be an elite player.
Defending City Section champion El Camino Real and long-time rival Birmingham should battle it out again for a City boys title. In the Southern Section, Cathedral returns nine players, including goalie Peter Cornejo, who played in the under-17 World Cup representing El Salvador. The annual Loyola vs. Cathedral nonleague match is scheduled for Dec. 9 at Loyola.
JSerra is the defending Southern Section Open Division boys champion, and should face competition from Mater Dei, Cathedral, Bishop Amat, Orange Lutheran and Palos Verdes.
Meanwhile, coaches and CIF officials need to figure out a plan going forward to find ways to keep their elite players competing for their high schools.
CIF Executive Director Ron Nocetti said schools have failed to change or get rid of bylaw 600, because it effects all sports and would create additional issues. “We consistently reach out to various soccer organizations to work with them,” he said.
World Cup participant Trinity Rodman attended JSerra but never played high school soccer after playing for Corona del Mar her freshman year.
“These girls need both,” Bull said. “They love high school soccer [and] what it brings and they love club [and] what it brings. We need to find a way to do both.”
