Michigan Soccer Training
Team Sheet
Pick your position — the armband marks where you are.
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The top of the boys pyramid — where MLS academies and youth national teams scout.
MLS NEXT is one platform with two divisions, and the difference matters. The Allstate Homegrown Division is the top tier: every MLS club academy plus the most elite independent academies, in strict birth-year age groups (Jan 1 - Dec 31), with a national competition calendar. That birth-year detail matters more than it used to: when the rest of American youth soccer moved back to school-year age groups for 2026-27, the Homegrown Division stayed on birth year to match FIFA and the youth national teams, while the Academy Division moved with everyone else. A club running both is operating two age calendars at once. This is the division scouts mean when they say 'MLS NEXT.' The second tier, the Academy Division, is a separate listing on this page. Note that MLS NEXT Pro is something else entirely — a professional lower-division league for players who have already graduated the academy stage.
Effectively year-round. Playing high school soccer requires a formal waiver signed by the principal, club director, and a parent — and many MLS NEXT boys skip high school soccer entirely.
The parent takeaway
If your son is targeting the professional pathway or top-25 college programs, this is the platform scouts watch. It demands a year-round commitment and often the high school question answered with 'no.'