W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team

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W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - oldalum - 12-28-2019

she must have been very impressive in the December "hopefuls" training camp. The only college player to make the training camp team.

USWNT camp roster

5 former Cardinal as well: Tierna, Andi, Jane, Christen, Kelley

Sakibomb25 - Sakibomb25 - 12-28-2019

Still really surprised she didn’t make an All-American team. Definitely one of the best players in the country.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - ColoradoTree - 01-06-2020

If this is right, Smith's time in a Stanford jersey may have come to an end:

https://twitter.com/SoccerInsider/status/1214205341824684037

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - oldalum - 01-06-2020

always the potential drawback (for Stanford fans) of our players doing so well.

Along those lines, Macario was named Hermann trophy winner, for second year in a row. She can't play for the USWNT yet, but it's notable that there seems to be no speculation that she may be turning pro now. She's an academic all-American so she apparently loves her classes, and she loves her team, so makes sense.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - Farm93 - 01-06-2020

(01-06-2020, 11:25 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: If this is right, Smith's time in a Stanford jersey may have come to an end:

https://twitter.com/SoccerInsider/status/1214205341824684037

Hope she stays, but understand why she might go.

Will wonder what impact the new compensation laws would have in this type of situation. Sophia's scoring ability, clean play, and joyful appearance would all be major assets in the promotion game.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - cardfan77 - 01-06-2020

Selfishly, I hope she stays for another year, at least. She is so fun to watch as well as Macario and Haley. Another championship is quite likely with the 3 them and Girma.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - ColoradoTree - 01-06-2020

(01-06-2020, 11:45 AM)oldalum Wrote: always the potential drawback (for Stanford fans) of our players doing so well.

Along those lines, Macario was named Hermann trophy winner, for second year in a row. She can't play for the USWNT yet, but it's notable that there seems to be no speculation that she may be turning pro now. She's an academic all-American so she apparently loves her classes, and she loves her team, so makes sense.

My hunch is that if Macario were eligible for the USWNT now, she'd have already been called into multiple camps and would be very likely to make the Olympic roster over, say, Morgan Brian or Allie Long. If an Olympic roster spot seemed likely, then leaving early like Davidson did last year makes sense. If not, then the non-USWNT NWSL salary doesn't seem like a big enough inducement to come out early.

Smith isn't a shoo-in to make the Olympic roster, of course. We have to remember that it's very, very difficult for a player to make the 18-player Olympic roster who wasn't on the 23-player roster at the World Cup the year before. Going into the 2012 Olympics, only Sydney Leroux did it. Going into the 2016 Olympics, a few more players did it (Crystal Dunn, Mallory Pugh, Lindsey Horan, and Allie Long), but there was significant roster turnover after the 2015 World Cup: Abby Wambach, Lori Chalupny, Lauren Holiday, and Shannon Boxx retired. Christie Rampone was hurt. And Leroux and Amy Rodriguez were both pregnant. This year, we don't have any retirements from the forward group, and the pregnant Alex Morgan has stated her intent to be ready to go by the time the Olympics come around. (More on that in a bit, but if Morgan pulls that off, it would be nothing short of a amazing.)

You can probably bring 5 forwards as part of an 18-player roster. Maybe 6. (I'm assuming 2 GKs, 6 defenders, 5 MFs, and 5 forwards.) You have the following list of forwards from the 2019 World Cup roster, all of whom are currently healthy and expect to be available for the Olympics:

* Megan Rapinoe
* Alex Morgan
* Tobin Heath
* Christen Press
* Mallory Pugh
* Carli Lloyd
* Jessica McDonald

And also in camp is NWSL star Lynn Williams. It's incredibly hard to imagine Rapinoe, Heath, Press, or Pugh being left off this team. And if Morgan is match-fit, then she's obviously coming, too, and there's your five. That includes leaving off USWNT legend Carli Lloyd and two players who have scored at will in the NWSL, McDonald and Williams. If you want to bring a sixth forward, is new head coach Vlatko Andonovski going to pick Smith over the proven Lloyd? But even if she doesn't make the team, she could still be considered a federation player for salary purposes if she's considered sufficiently important in the player pool. If she is, then the max salary of $50,000 becomes more like $170,000, and it makes more financial sense for her to go.

I just don't quite think it's Smith's time, unless Morgan doesn't make it back, Vlatko still wants six forwards, and there's a desire to start building for the future at forward instead of maintaining an aging roster or having a proven NWSL scorer as your last forward (Lloyd is 37, Rapinoe is 34, and Press, Heath, and McDonald are all 31).

And while I wouldn't put anything past an athlete of Morgan's caliber, she's due just 3 months before the Olympics start. Getting match fitness back and syncing back up with the rest of the team in just 3 months is a massive undertaking. She'll miss all of Olympic qualifying (which wouldn't necessarily provide the best test anyway in CONCACAF), so she'd be getting a couple of warmup matches right before the tournament starts. The stories I've seen of women accomplishing incredible athletic feats soon after childbirth are usually in the several-month range (like Kara Goucher in the 2011 Boston Marathon, setting a PR and finishing 5th seven months after giving birth, or Paula Radcliffe winning the NYC Marathon nine months after giving birth). Not saying she can't do it; I'm just saying I don't think that short of a turnaround has been done before. So, does Smith leave school on the bet that Morgan doesn't quite make it back in time? This isn't like a few years ago, where Dunn and Pugh being left off the 2015 World Cup roster was seen as something of a snub. They'd been in the mix, playing regularly for the USWNT, but had been left off that WC roster before making the Olympics the following year. We don't have any sort of track record like that for Smith.

Tl;dr -- if Smith is leaving early betting that she'll be on the Olympics, it's a questionable bet. If she's leaving early because she thinks she'll be a federation player for salary purposes and will have a leg up on a firm roster spot for the next World Cup/Olympics cycle, then it makes more sense.

Following up on that, here are some thoughts on the roster math for the Olympics. The Olympic qualifying roster will have 20 players, with a final cut to the 18 going to Tokyo. So, with only 7 backups on the roster, I figure you'd want to have one backup goalkeeper, one backup center back, one backup outside back, one backup center mid, one backup wide mid, one backup center forward, and one backup winger. You can fudge that a little bit, and maybe skimp on a backup center back because you could shift Ertz back there in a pinch, or skip a backup wide midfielder because you might play Press there if someone goes down. With that in mind, here's a guess at the roster, assuming Morgan doesn't make it back in time:

GK (2): Naeher, Franch
DF (6): O'Hara, Sauerbrunn, Dahlkemper, Dunn, Davidson, Sonnett
MF (5): Mewis, Ertz, Horan, Lavelle, Andi Sullivan
F (5): Lloyd, Rapinoe, Press, Heath, Pugh

That would mean leaving Morgan Brian, Allie Long, Jessica McDonald, Ashlyn Harris, Ali Krieger, and Alex Morgan off the roster.

If Vlatko is comfortable with Davidson as a backup at both center back and outside back, though, then it might make more sense leaving off Sonnett in favor of a sixth forward, unless you're worried about O'Hara's health. (Or if Vlatko prefers Davidson to Dahlkemper in the middle, in which case it's Dahlkemper's spot that might be at risk, with the idea being you'd move Ertz to center back in case of injury.) But the bottom line is that it's really hard to make this Olympic roster, and there will likely be some household names left out.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - oldalum - 01-06-2020

In other W Soccer news, former Stanford Associate Head Coach Nicole Van Dyke has been named head coach at UW, replacing Lesle Gallimore who retired. (She has been head coach at Penn since leaving Stanford). So we'll be seeing her back on the sideline again, but on the other side.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - ca245 - 01-08-2020

More WSoc news: Oregon has hired USWNT assistant Graeme Abel as its new WSoc coach.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - ColoradoTree - 01-08-2020

Massive NWSL action the last couple of days, with today bringing Portland trading USWNT member Emily Sonnett and Australian national teamer Caitlin Foord to Orlando for the #1 pick. Apparently the scuttlebutt has been that if Portland gets the #1 pick, Smith will declare for the draft. Well, the first part has now happened, so we'll see about Smith very shortly.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - oldalum - 01-16-2020

Smith is in the draft, which is Thursday at 8 a.m. Pacific.

(Bummer for us though!)

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - BobK - 01-16-2020

Smith drafted # 1 by Portland just now

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - Treefence - 01-16-2020

(01-16-2020, 09:42 AM)BobK Wrote: Smith drafted # 1 by Portland just now

With Macario all but guaranteed to go 1st overall next year, that'll be 4 straight years with the first pick being from Stanford...

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - ColoradoTree - 01-16-2020

Still no guarantee that Smith makes the USWNT Olympic roster, of course. (Man, if she were just one year older, I would've said she's a shoo-in for the World Cup roster, but with the roster shrinking from 23 to 18, and with forward already the hardest position at which to make this team? Uff da.)

She's obviously not going to root for someone ahead of her to get injured, but I think that's what it'll take to make the team. Heck, if it's me? I roll with Rapinoe, Heath, Press, and Pugh, with Smith being the last forward on the roster, in an effort to start building that Pugh-Smith strike partnership for the future. I'd leave off McDonald, Williams, and yes, Carli Lloyd, but I'm unsentimental like that. The "She Believes Cup" is in early March, though, so we'll see soon enough whether Vlatko sees Lloyd as an indispensable center forward with Morgan out, or if Smith is getting significant minutes and has a real shot to make it.

Having Lloyd on the team is the easy thing to do, and you wouldn't get criticized for it. She's demonstrated she can score goals as a sub, so the fact that she's lost a step doesn't matter as much when she still puts the ball in the back of the net when called upon. If he leaves Lloyd off and the U.S. doesn't bring home Gold, I think Vlatko gets more criticism than if he takes Lloyd but doesn't bring home Gold.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - teejers1 - 01-16-2020

(01-16-2020, 10:39 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: Still no guarantee that Smith makes the USWNT Olympic roster, of course. (Man, if she were just one year older, I would've said she's a shoo-in for the World Cup roster, but with the roster shrinking from 23 to 18, and with forward already the hardest position at which to make this team? Uff da.)

She's obviously not going to root for someone ahead of her to get injured, but I think that's what it'll take to make the team. Heck, if it's me? I roll with Rapinoe, Heath, Press, and Pugh, with Smith being the last forward on the roster, in an effort to start building that Pugh-Smith strike partnership for the future. I'd leave off McDonald, Williams, and yes, Carli Lloyd, but I'm unsentimental like that. The "She Believes Cup" is in early March, though, so we'll see soon enough whether Vlatko sees Lloyd as an indispensable center forward with Morgan out, or if Smith is getting significant minutes and has a real shot to make it.

Having Lloyd on the team is the easy thing to do, and you wouldn't get criticized for it. She's demonstrated she can score goals as a sub, so the fact that she's lost a step doesn't matter as much when she still puts the ball in the back of the net when called upon. If he leaves Lloyd off and the U.S. doesn't bring home Gold, I think Vlatko gets more criticism than if he takes Lloyd but doesn't bring home Gold.

Is Rapinoe all that, or a little long in the tooth?
When watching the WC last time, I thought Press looked better - more speed, pushed the action more, etc. - throughout the tourney.

Give me the Youth Movement and Smith (and yes, I'm biased pro-Stanford).

P.S. For same reason, I agree with you re: Lloyd, though she might be the definition of "gamer."

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - BobK - 01-16-2020

Really doubt Smith can make the Olympic team. The next World Cup maybe

Collins the Stanford grad 5th year at Washington State was drafted 17th

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - Farm93 - 01-16-2020

(01-16-2020, 12:16 PM)teejers1 Wrote: Is Rapinoe all that, or a little long in the tooth?
When watching the WC last time, I thought Press looked better - more speed, pushed the action more, etc. - throughout the tourney.

Give me the Youth Movement and Smith (and yes, I'm biased pro-Stanford).

P.S. For same reason, I agree with you re: Lloyd, though she might be the definition of "gamer."

I thought the USWNT had more or less declared they would try to bring in some younger players now as they transition to 2023 prep. It is always a hard topic to discuss, but the USWNT was older than most in the 2019 World Cup. As they say...Father time is undefeated.

It will be hard. It will be political. Not sure if Sophia Smith needs to be part of the youth movement in 2020. I would expect that the 2023 team will have several players that were not part of the 2019 effort, and a few Stanford players will likely be part of that new generation.

Using the 2020 Olympics to start that transition is an option. It is also possible to let this current great group to have one last high profile tournament together.

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - Viking_Guy - 01-16-2020

One positive about Rapinoe is that she's still a deadly crosser; unfortunately, this year's team doesn't have a big aerial target in the front, unless the d-mids are up.

But as I said after the WC, she has a tendency to switch off a bit defensively (or conserve her energy for the offensive end, if you prefer.) That's why I thought Ertz or Lavelle should have won the Golden Ball.

I think Lloyd has a stronger case for inclusion, also, given she can play either up top or as attacking center mid, and still puts the ball on frame as well as almost anyone.

Will be interesting to see what formations Vlatko plays around with - that could have a strong impact as well on personnel decisions - Rapinoe in a 4-3-3 is much more viable than in a 4-2-3-1 or 4-4-2, given her disinterest in tracking back.

One other thing about Smith - her skill set is very similar to the other forwards, more ball at her feet attacking than say a back to goal target forward or great distributor from the end line.

VG

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - BobK - 01-16-2020

Hiatt drafted at 33

RE: W Soccer: Sophia Smith named to USWNT training camp team - oldalum - 01-16-2020

First 4 picks in the draft are from the Pac-12, which was the best conference this year. We've seen a lot of picks 2-4, glad they're moving on!

1. Portland Thorns FC – Sophia Smith, Stanford University
2. Portland Thorns FC – Morgan Weaver, Washington State University
3. Orlando Pride – Taylor Kornieck, University of Colorado, Boulder
4. Washington Spirit – Ashley Sanchez, UCLA