2017 Boys IMG Academy 150 rankings update

by Caroline Yort

February 8, 2016

The IMG Academy Top 150 fall update for boys in the 2017 graduating class is out today, and New York Red Bulls’ Tyler Adams remains No. 1. Adams signed a senior contract with New York Red Bulls last fall. Nos. 1-9 remain unchanged, but there is a new No. 10 in LA Galaxy II goalkeeper Eric Lopez. Lopez was recognized as one of the top MLS prospects at the Development Academy showcase in December, and spent the last week of January as part of the U.S. U18 Men’s National Team camp with its new coach Omid Namazi.

Players moving up the ranks with this update include Chicago Fire midfielder Djordjie Mihalovic, Philadelphia Union center back Mark McKenzie, St. Louis Scott Gallagher goalkeeper Seth Stiebel, and North Carolina Fusion goalkeeper Alec Smir. Mihalovic, a North Carolina recruit, has six goals this season with the Fire’s U18 Development Academy, and has spent time training with Chicago Fire’s first team. He participated in Copa Del Atlantico with the U19 MNT in January. McKenzie and Smir were both part of the recent U18 MNT camp in Florida. McKenzie is verbally committed to Wake Forest, and Smir is committed to North Carolina. Stiebel was a member of the U15 Boys National Team in 2014, but has been invited back to his first national team camp in two years with the U18s.

More: TDS Unsigned Showcases | Commitments

New to the rankings are several players who have made an impact at the club level during the fall season. Among those added are Weston FC midfielder Alberto Luna, Real Colorado forward Rhys De Soto, Pateadores midfielder Giovanni Migletti, and Seattle Sounders midfielder Stirling Russell. Luna commands the midfield for Weston’s U16 Development Academy that sits on the top of the Southeast Division standings with a 13-2-2 record. De Soto finished the fall Development Academy season as the league’s top scorer at the U16 age group with 15 goals in 11 matches. The U18 MNT member has led his team to an 8-1-2 record good enough for second in Frontier Division. Russell has had an outstanding season with the Sounders U16 DA, culminating in a selection for January’s U18 MNT camp, while Migletti has scored seven goals for Teddy Chronopoulos’ U16s.

Click here to see where these players as well as all the members of the IMG Academy 150 are ranked.

In addition to the IMG Academy 150 update, we have made key changes to the regional rankings which will be unveiled throughout the week. Some of the additions include Shattuck St. Mary’s defender Jacob Gutierrez, Chicago Fire right back Eduardo Garcia, Pateadores midfielder Jonathan Mayen, Charlotte Soccer Academy defender Damon Youmans, and many more. Keep checking back to see who else made the lists.

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 at least three times per year. 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.

Related Topics: IMG Academy Top 150, Atlantic Coast