The summer update for the 2016 girls IMG Academy 150 is out today, and Mallory Pugh continues her reign at the top. The attack minded midfielder was in the starting lineup against both Germany and Brazil at the FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup, the only player in her class even named to the squad, and will hopefully continue that run as the tournament continues.

A quartet of center backs take the stage as they move up the ranks based on post season play. PDA’s Amanda Visco, FC Bucks’ Laura Suero, Crossfire Premier’s Samantha Hiatt, and Dallas Texans’ Atupele Mshana all performed well enough to earn spots on TopDrawerSoccer.com Best XI lists this summer. Visco and Mshana earned their accolades at the ECNL finals, and though neither player’s team took home the trophy, Visco did enough to raise her ranking to No. 19 from No. 22, while Mshana, a verbal commit to Texas(w), climbs to No. 89. Suero, now at No. 66 and Hiatt, now at No. 75 were integral parts of two of the best defenses in the country this season, Suero earning a Best XI nod for her efforts at ECNL playoffs.

MORE: Top U16 Players from ECNL Finals | Best Defense in the ECNL | ECNL Seattle Best XI

Several players had breakout seasons in 2013-14, earning a spot in the IMG Academy 150 for the first time. San Diego Surf forward Taylor McMorrow, at No. 88, finished the season with 15 goals and 6 assists and has established herself as one of the top forwards in this class. Colorado Storm midfielder/forward Emily Langenderfer, at No. 115, led her team to the top of the Heartland Division this season and recently made her verbal commitment to ACC program Boston College.  Real Colorado midfielder Alyssa Kaiser, at No. 121, impressed our staff at ECNL playoffs, and will head to Tulsa in 2016.

Not only has the IMG Academy 150 received scrutiny, but the regional lists have been updated as well. Keep checking back this week as we unveil newcomers such as Boston Breakers midfielder and New England Combine standout Kelsey Gilbert, Match Fit Academy forward Lacey Strahm, Pleasanton Rage midfielder/forward Emma Barrow, Las Vegas Premier goalkeeper Jessica Anaya, and many, many more.

As far as how we arrive at the rankings, it’s no simple task.

We keep a national database of players as the starting point for our rankings (if you’re not in it, enter a profile here).

We track an extensive list of selections to national team camps and other honors including USSF Development Academy (Boys), ECNL (Girls), and U.S. Youth Soccer National League event and season awards, plus U.S. Soccer Training Centers, ODP, id2 and other player identification programs.

From there we look at additional signs of top player performance in a club environment, with the help of an extensive network of observers around the country. The priority here is for club, college, national team and other select team coaches on the ground, but especially when we can gain corroborating opinions. The more layers of opinions we can gain accumulate the better, as our role is primarily to aggregate those viewpoints, rather than making our own determination as to a player’s quality.

As a matter of policy, we never share which coaches said what about whom so that coaches will be freer to share their assessments. Another policy is that parents’ opinions about their own children are not considered, but you are welcome to provide feedback about honors and other details that may be of help to us in keeping their profiles up to date as well as our challenge of sifting through thousands of players nationwide. That kind of data can be helpful, but the: “How can you not have rated my kid? He is awesome” communique, while compelling, will be consigned to the virtual trash.

In the end, there’s always some level of subjectivity about players, because after all, how good someone is relative to someone else is largely a matter of opinion, but we do our best to make our rankings as educated an opinion as can be.

The rankings will be updated every quarter. Keeping current rankings for 8 classes of 150 players each is no small task, and it is counterintuitive to think the rankings would change daily or weekly. We will announce each update.

So that’s it. You can see the newest version of the rankings here.

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