MAX Field Hockey is excited to release our first ever Class of 2021 Player Rankings! We have been working hard over the last two months or so compiling our list of the Top 150 players for the freshmen class. In our first go around with this class we are releasing the Top 5 players in the class, the Top 50 players in the class (#6-50), the Next 50 players in the class (#51-100)- who we also refer to as Top 100 players, and an additional Watch List (#101-150). Players are not designated as a specific ranking number (#1, #60, etc.)- we rank players within a grouping. So a player is a “Top 5 Player” or a “Top 50 Player,” etc.
A reminder on how players were considered– we compiled a list of players based on criteria such as NFC selections, AAU Junior Olympics, Junior National Teams, STX Select participants, Stars & Stripes selections, Under Armour Select Game participants, MAX Field Hockey’s High School All-Region teams and players who just missed the cut for those awards, and some High School All-State and major award selections (when possible). We have this info for all the players on our list for the last 2 years. We then added all 2021 Players who created a MAX Field Hockey Player Profile, and any player that a High School or Club Coach submitted a recommendation for. This larger list is roughly 300 players for the Class of 2021 at this time. We then sorted through all the information we have on the players and sorted them into our final groupings. For freshmen in High School who are new to the scene, who don’t do futures, who we didn’t have a recommendation for, you may have missed out on this go around simply because we didn’t feel like we had enough information on you in comparison to the other players on our list.
A note on recommendations we receive and our final ranking of players– When a coach or club submits a recommendation for a player and suggests a grouping of Top 5, Top 50, Top 100, Watch List- this is their recommendation based on their experience and knowledge. It is our task to look at the entire grouping of players and decide who the Top 5 players are or who the Top 50 players are in comparison to the whole group. In addition, rankings are always subjective. We do our best to make these as good and fair as possible- we are VERY thorough in our research! There are many instances where a certain player could have been ranked or could have been ranked higher than another player, especially this first time around. We had to make some tough decisions based on our knowledge and experience covering the youth, club, and high school game over the last 4-5 years.
We will be updating these Class of 2021 Player Rankings after the summer’s major events, so there is always room for players to become ranked or move up in the rankings. If you were not considered for the Class of 2021 Player Rankings this time around, please make sure to create a MAX Field Hockey Player Profile and keep it up-to-date with as much information as you can. Many players created profiles but gave us barely any information. We looked through every single one of the 2021 Player’s Profiles in doing these rankings and added notes on each player based on their profile information (over 200 profiles!). We will do the same thing after the summer’s events and before our second round of rankings. We will communicate early and clearly on when we will begin working on these (sometime in July), when your profile should be updated by, and when we will be welcoming recommendations. Make sure to follow us on social media and download our new mobile app The Field Hockey Network to keep up-to-date with where we are at in the process.
Class of 2018, 2019, and 2020 Player Rankings will also be updated again after this summer’s major events and then the Class of 2021 Player Rankings will be on track with the rest of the classes.
Congratulations to MAX Field Hockey’s Top 150 players in the Class of 2021!
