As of Wednesday morning, 15 players from the Chicago Fire and Indiana Fire Academies and a total of 87 players with ties to Fire development pathways are officially taking their talents to the next level after signing their collegiate letters of intent.
Seven Chicago Fire Academy players are set to graduate and move on to the collegiate level. Defender Jake Ronneberg will participate in the Big East as he joins up with Creighton. Heading north, defender Andrew Akindele continues the Fire pipeline to the University of Wisconsin while goalkeeper Kyle Orciuch blazes a trail west to Stanford, winners of three straight NCAA College Cup Championships.
Photo Gallery | The Chicago Fire Academy celebrates National Signing Day 2018
Local ties will additionally remain strong, as four players will embark on their collegiate careers within Windy City limits. Defender Eduardo Garcia and midfielder Aaron Nguyen will be teammates at the University of Illinois at Chicago, while defender Adrian Corona is headed to Northern Illinois and defender Jonathan Hernandez will look to catch on at Dominican.
Eight players on the Indiana Academy side signed national letters of intent as well. Four additional players will head to the Big East Conference, including Austin Koss (DePaul), Ethan Lee (Xavier), and teammates Eric Hollenkamp and Logan Lee (Butler).
Rounding out the Indiana Fire Academy signees are Isaac Sarosy (Indiana), Richie Bennett (Northwestern), Eli Quivey (IUPUI) and Keegan Lee (Denison).
On the women’s side, the Indiana Fire Juniors Girls U.S. Soccer Development Academy side will send 15 members to collegiate programs this year. Those players are: Ali Clodgo (Taylor University), Amelia Wampler (Grand Valley St.), Cassidy Lindley (Florida), Erin Patterson (Samford University), Hallie Pearson (Arizona), Katie Soderstrom (Butler), Kayla Amidon (IU - East), Kristina Lynch (Florida State), Lucy Lyon (Samford), Mackenzie Wood (Northwestern), Megan Wampler (Dayton), Molly McLaughlin (Xavier), Rachel Dewey (Xavier), Rachel Vernon (Belmont), and Sydney Genatempo (Marian).
Additionally, the Fire Juniors network saw 57 other student-athletes make their collegiate commitments on National Signing Day. Click here for the complete list of college commitments announced Wednesday from around the Chicago Fire Juniors, and follow @firejrs on Twitter.
