My name is Santiago Almada, I am a local soccer player who played four years of varsity soccer in which I graduated Magna Cum Laude with a degree in Business Administration, was a three-year USCAA Academic All American, and winner of the Alumni Award in 2015 at Cleary University.

My story starts in May of 2012, before starting Grade 12 at Cameron Heights. I was in the IB program and our soccer season had just ended. We had turned the season around but lost out in the semi-finals to a tough WCI team and failed to make CWOSSA. Our local club team Waterloo had been promoted that year from L3 to OYSL so things were looking very good. We debuted strong and ended up beating the #4 ranked OSU Force and #2 ranked Ajax FC and somehow made the Ontario Cup final. Before playing that elusive Ontario Cup final, a few of us started to dream about maybe a future beyond just club and high school soccer. Our club careers continued but we did not have any direct opportunity for post-secondary scholarships as it was very uncommon in this area. So our coaching staff made it their purpose to get us the exposure that we needed in order to be scouted and for some of us to play college/university soccer.

That winter, myself and two friends Justin Ferreira and Noah Schneider attended a soccer showcase combine in Pontiac, Michigan. Using what we picked up from Waterloo, our experience of being #2 in Ontario, and our high school soccer careers as well, we were all offered full rides on the spot to a brand new program at Cleary University (NAIA) in Howell, Michigan. Justin and I took the opportunity and ran with it while Noah still wanted to take a year to see how things went. In our first year, we really struggled as we went 2-16 and traveled across all of the Midwest with only 14 guys. Once our season ended, we started contacting players we knew to come down and try out and from that Ryan Neceski came to Cleary in the winter of 2014, another player from our Waterloo team. The following year, Noah Schneider, Jordan Veiga, and Daniel Benavides, again all from the Waterloo team, had individual tryouts with our Cleary team based on our recommendations and stuck around. Our second year, we went from 2-17 to 11-5 and were ranked 8th in the country and making the National Tournament in our second year.

Since then, the guys have all had great careers. Noah Schneider was MVP last season and brought the Cougars to a second National Tournament. Jordan Veiga was named the captain of the team this year and again contributed on the field and off the field. Justin Ferreira has graduated and has picked up a job at a powerful mortgage company in Troy, Michigan. Ryan Neceski has graduated and started his own company trying to share his experience by recruiting local athletic talents and connecting them with over 100 college/university coaches in North America. Myself, I have since graduated and started a local soccer academy named Berlin Football Academy that focuses a lot on post-secondary opportunities for all of our athletes. I am working closely with Ryan to provide local kids with the connections that we did not have growing up. 

If there is anyone myself and my teammates would agree on thanking it would be Gabriel Almada (my father) for pushing us to find opportunities and look beyond just playing club soccer. He believed in us and knew that we could do something special and prove to people that KW athletes belong on full scholarships. Anyone can do it, you just have to believe there really is something out there for high school soccer players and it is all just a matter of putting yourself out there and taking some risks.

One piece of advice I would give to the grade 9s, 10s, 11s and 12s in high school this year, is that take your academics as seriously as possible. Academic scholarships are very real and could really benefit you in the long run! The reason I had a full scholarship was partially due to how I finished in Cameron Heights IB Program! 

Santiago Almada - December 2017