In August 2007, Western New York’s top soccer clubs, the Rochester Junior Rhinos, Syracuse Football Club and Buffalo United Soccer Club joined together to form the Empire United Soccer Academy.  In the Spring of 2009, Crown City FC from the Cortland/Homer area joined the Academy.  The unification of these clubs, acknowledges their strong working relationship and shared vision of the development of youth soccer.  This combined organization will enable soccer players at all levels to attain their individual goals and maximize their potential.  In fact, the strength of the new club was recognized when Empire USA received one of the sixty-four initial memberships in the U.S. Soccer Development Academy..

Brenna has been playing soccer at some level, for most of her life.  From high school to Empire United to the Olympic Development Program, Brenna has competed at some of the highest levels of the youth game.  Now, about to graduate from Webster Thomas High School, she’s ready to take on a new challenge and the next level of competition ... playing in college at NCAA Division I Colgate University.

If you ask her about her youth career, Brenna will probably tell you about playing in the high school sectional and state tournaments, or reaching State Cup Finals three years in a row, or about games against some of the best teams in the country in the Region 1 Premier League and the National League, and about representing Western New York and Region 1 in the Olympic Development Program.  But, what you probably won’t hear is a list of awards and accomplishments (though there have been many along the way).  There’s no denying the impact she has on each of her teams, but with Brenna, it’s all about the team.

And, don’t think Brenna has forgotten the "student" in "student-athlete".  Brenna’s accomplishments in the classroom are every bit as impressive as her accomplishments on the soccer field.  Brenna has been a high honor roll and high honor roll with distinction student and maintains a 94 grade point average at Webster Thomas, where she has been a Principal’s Award winner, and AP World History Award winner, a Thomas HS Link Leader and a member of the National Spanish Honors Society.  Brenna was also elected as one of two students, to serve on a committee to change the way the school district honors its students, and to evaluate the current graduation system.

Student, athlete, role model ... Brenna is all of these, and a great ambassador for the game.  We are proud to call her one of our own.  We would like to thank Brenna and her family for everything they have done for Empire over the years they have been involved with the Club, and we wish her all the best as she moves on to Colgate University for the next chapter in her career.  Keep an eye on the Patriot Conference next Fall!

So, if you’ve got a young girl (or boy) and are looking for some inspiration, stop by one of Brenna’s training sessions and watch her for a while ... you won’t be disappointed!

Since you won’t hear about them from Brenna, we’re going to take this opportunity to share a list of some of her rewards and accomplishments:

ODP and Empire United Team Accomplishments

• 2012: ODP Region I Tournament Finals
• 2011: Empire Team Participated in the National League
• 2011: NYSW State Cup Champions
• 2010: NEWSS Showcase GU16 Elite Champions
• 2010: NYSW State Cup Champions
• 2010: US Club Soccer Regional Finalists (LaGrangeville, NY)
• 2010: Colonial League Champions
• 2010: ODP Regional International Tournament Finalist (Costa Rica)
• 2010: Jefferson Cup Semifinalists
• 2009: Disney Showcase Finalist
• 2009: South County Seaside Classic Champions (GU16)
• 2009: NYSW State Cup Champions

High School Team Accomplishments

• 2012: NYS Class AA State Finalists
• 2012: NYS Western Regional Class AA Champions
• 2012: NYS Section 5 Class AA Champions
• 2010: NYS Class AA State Finalists
• 2010: NYS Western Regional Class AA Champions
• 2010: NYS Section 5 Class AA Champions
• 2010: Monroe County Division 1 Champions
• 2009: Monroe County Division 1 Champions  

Individual Accomplishments

• 2012: NSCAA All–American
• 2012: NSCAA New York State Player of the Year
• 2012: NSCAA High School Girls All-Region II Team
• 2012: New York State All State 1^st Team
• 2012: All Greater Rochester Player of the Year
• 2012: 1^st Team Monroe All-County
• 2012: Captain of the Webster Thomas Varsity team
• 2011: Captain for the Empire United GU17 State Academy Team
• 2011: ODP State Team
• 2011: NSCAA High School Girls All-Region II Team
• 2011: 4^th Team All-State
• 2011: First Team All-County
• 2011: 2^nd Team AGR
• 2011: U.S. National Training Camp (April)
• 2011: #97 in the Top Drawer Soccer National Top 100 Girls to Watch for the class of 2013
• 2011: ODP Inter-Regional Development Camp (California)
• 2010: NSCAA High School Girls All-Region II Team
• 2010: All Greater Rochester, 2nd Team
• 2010: Monroe County, 2nd Team
• 2010: 193 saves, 15 Goals Against, 1610 Minutes Played, .745% Goals Per Game, and a 92.788 Save Percentage during the 2010-2011 High School Season 
• 2010: Captain for the Empire United Gu-16 State Academy Team
• 2010: ODP ’95 Regional Pool
• 2010: Captain of the GU15 Empire United Girls Select Team
• 2010: Captain of the NYW ’95 State ODP Team
• 2010: NYW ’95 State ODP Tournament Team
• 2010: Region I ODP International Trip to Costa Rica   
• 2010: Captain of the Empire United GU15 Rochester Team
• 2009: ODP Inter-Regional Tournament in Coral Springs FL
• 2009: ODP ’95 Regional Team
• 2009: NYW ’95 State ODP Tournament Team
• 2008: ODP ’95 Regional Pool
• 2008: NYW ’95 State ODP Tournament Team
• 2007: NYW ’95 State ODP Tournament Team

The IMG Academy Top 150 Rankings update for boys in the 2016 graduating class is out today, and several members of the U.S. U15 Boys National Team have made their mark in the top 25. PDA’s Daniel Barbir climbs from #15 to #6 after a superb showing at the January camp in the center back position, while Real So Cal Development Academy midfielder Eric Calvillo climbs from #22 to #14.

National team players aren’t the only ones making moves, however, and Santa Barbara SC’s Chairat Puengrad’s move from #85 to #67 is a prime example. Puengrad is a huge asset for coach Rudy Ybarra’s 2012 U.S. Youth Soccer National Champion team as he can play virtually any position on the field, and he received multiple recommendations for this quarter’s update.
 
Players new to the rankings with this update include Revolution Empire defender Nikkye de Point, CUP Crew Junior midfielder Gary Zhao Mason, and Charlotte Soccer Academy midfielder Ollie Leo. De Point, who debuts at #50, is a full-time player for the Empire Revolution USSDA U16 team and received a call-up to the January U15 BNT camp. Zhao Mason, at #51, is a member of the CUP Crew Juniors Gold National Premier League team and was a best XI selection at November’s ODP Interregional, and Leo, at #95, is a full-time player on CSA’s U16 USSDA squad with six starts and a goal to his credit midway through the season.
 
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 CUP Crew Juniors midfielder Bryce Curran, Potomac midfielder/forward Carlos Piedrasanta, Minnesota Thunder goalkeeper Duncan Weirling, Revolution Empire defender George Dise, and South Central Premier midfielder Luke Popenette. 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 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.

Session Duration: 90 minutes of training per night for nine (9) weeks.  Ages 9-14.  Cost: $265.

2013 Winter Location:

• Brighton Sports Zone
• 3195 Brighton-Henrietta Townline Rd.
  Rochester, NY 14623
• Fridays for nine (9) weeks
  February 8th - April 26th (NO SESSIONS on February 22nd, March 29th or April 5th)
• Session 1 - Ages 9-11: 6:00 - 7:30 PM
• Session 2 - Ages 12-14: 6:00 - 7:30 PM

All participants will receive an Adidas training shirt and 2 tickets to a New England Revolution game.

REGISTER NOW!  Spaces will fill up quickly!

View RDS video

Agbossoumonde (pronounced gah-LAY ag-BOSS-ooh-mon-day) had spent 2012 in the NASL with the Carolina RailHawks but injuries limited him to 17 appearances.

That is still more than he got in Europe, where he spent time at Sporting Braga, Estoril, Djurgarden and Eintracht Frankfurt II, but the most he played was eight games in Sweden with Djurgarden in 2011.

Boss was born in Togo and raised in a refugee camp in Benin, where his family fled after it was targeted following a military coup in which his father, Koku, was involved. The conditions at the refugee camp were harsh, but Gale learned to play soccer with his brothers, who made balls out of socks and newspapers.

A boxer in his youth, Koku did not approve of his sons playing soccer -- he worried that they would stand out for their soccer talents and be pulled into the military like he had been -- and he never got to see them play. Shortly before the family moved in 2000 to Syracuse, N.Y., through the Catholic Charities Refugee Resettlement program, Koku died of cancer.

The youngest of six brothers, Gale was 8 years old when he arrived in Syracuse and he quickly made a name for himself in soccer. He enrolled at Christian Brothers Academy, which he helped lead to the state semifinals -- as an 8th grader. By the next year, he was off to the U-17 residency program in Bradenton, Fla.

Agbossoumonde was too young to make in the U.S. Under-17 World Cup team in 2007, but he started on the 2009 U-20 World Cup team at the age of 17. He was on the 2011 U-20 team that failed to qualify for the world championship and missed Olympic qualifying with the under-23s in 2012 with a foot injury.

Few U.S. central defenders have come along with his combination of size -- he’s 6-foot-2 -- and skill on the ball.

This what Thomas Rongen, Agbossoumonde’s coach on the U-20 national team, had to say about him in an interview with ESPN.com:

That was 2010, right before Agbossoumonde debuted for the senior national team in a friendly against South Africa.

Rongen is now the Toronto FC academy director, so it was natural that the Canadian club, desperate for help on his backline, would want Agbossoumonde. It won Thursday’s lottery in which it held a 57.3 percent chance of acquiring Agbossoumonde.

Thursday’s signing of Agbossoumonde only adds to the intrigue surrounding Toronto’s plans for the 2013 MLS SuperDraft in which holds the No. 1 pick and No. 3 pick -- acquired from Portland in the deal that sent Ryan Johnson to the Timbers.

Defenders Andrew Farrell (Louisville) and Walker Zimmerman (Furman) are considered the top prospects in the draft and both have reportedly agreed to Generation adidas contracts. Toronto would unlikely want to sign a second defender but surely wouldn’t want to sign a second and third defender to go along with Agbossoumonde.

TFC might deal the No. 1 pick and then take one of the three Jamaicans (Ashton Bennett, J.J. Johnson or Deshorn Brown) considered the top forwards in the draft with the No. 3 pick. (Chivas USA is expected to take Mikey Lopez with the No. 2 -- if he signs with MLS and if Chivas USA, now under new management, doesn’t punt on the draft.)

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – The New England Revolution has formed a strategic partnership with New York-based Empire United, a youth development program that also plays in the U.S. Soccer Development Academy. Beginning with the 2012-13 season, Empire United will become “Revolution Empire, A New England Revolution Soccer Club.”
 
Revolution Empire will be the Revolution’s first affiliate youth club, allowing its Academy players, coaches and development-level players access and involvement in the Revolution Academy development and competition system, with the ultimate goal to produce Revolution Home Grown players.
 
“We’re very excited and eager to announce Empire United as our first youth development affiliate club,” New England Revolution General Manager Michael Burns said. “This year, we’ve already expanded our development model by adding an Under-14 team. Now with this partnership with Empire United, we’re expanding our geographic footprint. On top of the successful system we already have in place, we expect this new integrated organization will allow us to identify and develop more players who will one day represent the New England Revolution in Major League Soccer.”
 
On the competitive side, the Revolution Academy and Revolution Empire youth teams will continue to compete as separate teams in the U.S. Soccer Development Academy. However, both teams will train and develop under a similar system and Empire’s youth teams will be afforded the same training opportunities with the New England Revolution senior team as the Revs’ youth teams.
 
Empire’s elite youth team players will have the opportunity to train with the Revolution first team during the summer months. They can also earn call-ups to the Revolution Reserve team during its 10-game season and Empire’s players will get first-hand coaching from the Revolution Academy coaches at home in Western New York throughout the year.
 
“This promises to be an exciting and fruitful relationship for both Empire United and the New England Revolution,” Revolution Director of Youth Development Bryan Scales said. “When we started having conversations about affiliates, it was very important that we found the right people and the right development model to partner with. We feel we’ve found a perfect fit with Jim Mort, Chris Apple and the entire Empire United family.”
 
Empire’s coaches will have opportunities for ongoing coaching and personal development through the Revolution Academy, including training and education sessions with the Revolution first team and youth technical staffs. Additionally, the Revolution and Empire youth technical staffs will collaborate to introduce a consistent training system for both clubs’ development systems.
 
“Our New England Revolution partnership will provide an exceptional resource that will help Empire improve the standard of youth soccer in Central and Western New York,” Jim Mort, Executive Director of Empire United, said. “We want to be a primary asset to identify young players that have the potential of playing at a professional level and give them the training, facilities, resources and professional coaching in an extraordinary learning environment. We are dedicated to creating opportunities for our young players to excel.”
 
On the development side, the Revolution Academy Regional Development School will establish training programs – both week-long and residential, similar to its New England-based programs – in the Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo markets in partnership with Empire. These training and identification courses for all age groups provide young players the opportunity to get professional coaching and evaluation.
 
Additionally, the Empire Training Center (previously the Market Training Center) will expand with support from the Revolution Academy’s coaching staff. The ETC is an early identification program that allows elite players to be evaluated by Empire’s technical staff for consideration for the club’s Development Academy teams, similar to the Revolution Training Centers with the same mission.
 
“Partnering with the New England Revolution is an incredible opportunity for Empire United and I could not be more excited,” Chris Apple, Director of Coaching for Empire United, said. “Similar to a European club, our players and coaches will now have access to the knowledge, training program and innovation of a professional soccer team. This is a huge step forward for Empire and one that will keep us on the cutting edge of the game and enhance our ability to provide our players with the best developmental experience possible.”
 
For more information about the Revolution Academy - both the competitive youth teams (Under-18, Under-16 and Under-14) and Player Development Programs (including the Regional Development School and residential academy among other programs) – please visit revolutionsoccer.net/academy. For up-to-the-minute information on the Revolution, visit the team’s official web site at revolutionsoccer.net, or follow the team on Twitter at @NERevolution, or on Facebook at facebook.com/NERevolution. For more information about Revolution tickets, special packages and 2012 season tickets, call 1-877-GET-REVS or visit revolutionsoccer.net.
 
For more information about Empire United, please visit empireunitedsa.org.

Now with 14 seasons as the head coach of the Cavaliers under his belt, Gelnovatch has seen his player selection process undergo a major overhaul since the inception of the U.S. Soccer Development Academy.

“I think the Academy program is still relatively young, but already I think there are some benefits,” said Gelnovatch, who won his first NCAA College Cup championship in 2009. “The standards that have been set by U.S. Soccer for these clubs are good standards, but the biggest change I have seen is in the identification process.”

With Development Academy scouts in attendance at a majority of regular season games and every game during Showcase events, players are identified and tracked more closely and consistently than in the past.

The coaching staff at Virginia takes advantage of both the Richmond Strikers and the Richmond Kickers proximity to Charlottesville. Not only does Gelnovatch keep a close eye on local talent, but he has a full slate of quality teams coming in from across the country on a weekly basis.

Gelnovatch and his staff are also among nearly 300 college coaches in attendance at every Development Academy Showcase.

“For college programs, those Showcase events make it easier to get into a four-day environment and watch all of the Academy teams,” he said. “To come out to three events a year and see all these players shouldn’t be an issue for any major program.”

Keeping a close eye on the Academy talent, Gelnovatch has definitely seen a change in the type of players coming out of the member clubs.

In 2009, the Cavaliers brought in Will Bates from the Richmond Strikers, D.C. United’s Marcus Douglas, Sean Murnane and Shane Cooke, and BW Gottschee NYC’s Ahkeel Rodney, meaning all but one freshman on the team hailed from an Academy club. On Feb. 3, three more Academy players signed National Letters of Intent to play for Virginia as they attempt to defend their national championship.

The 2007 NCAA Champion Wake Forest will add no fewer than six former Academy players to the Demon Deacons squad for 2010. The 2008 and 2005 NCAA Champion University of Maryland also continues to bring Academy players into its highly-regarded program, building on six first-year Academy alums who helped the Terrapins advance to the tournament quarterfinals in 2009.

“The impact of the level of play in the Academy has been tremendous for our program,” said Sasho Cirovski, head coach at Maryland. “Every time you see a game, it’s highly competitive, good spirited and played a very high level with a great deal of accountability. That’s something you want to see as a college coach, how players deal with that kind of environment and it’s more clear when you watch an Academy game than maybe another youth game that isn’t as meaningful.”

In addition, the structure of the program, which includes training at least three times per week and playing games on the weekend, mirrors that of a college season.

“The regimen of playing other Academy teams and traveling with some consistency has definitely added some structure and development that makes the transition from a youth club to a high-level college soccer team a little bit easier,” said Gelnovatch.

As college programs continue spring training in preparation for the 2010 season, Development Academy players continue to train with their respective clubs, hoping for a taste of the NCAA tournament. The current Academy season will conclude at Finals Weeks at The Home Depot Center in July.

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