An invitation to the Midwest Region Olympic Development Program ID Soccer Camp came this summer for four Jamestown High School soccer players. Evan Harty, Grady Eckart, Liam Becker and Layla Becker were selected after the state-level evaluation cycle that runs through local camps across North and South Dakota, according to reporting by the Jamestown Sun. Three of the four are returning to the regional stage; one is going for the first time. The invitation lands the four names in a region-wide funnel that feeds a Florida inter-regional event and, beyond that, the U.S. youth national team pool.
The four names also illustrate where competitive North Dakota soccer has come from over the past decade: family pipelines built into coaching careers, club infrastructure raised outside the biggest cities, and a willingness to keep showing up at the regional camp year after year. None of the four has reached the end of the ODP funnel yet. For one of them, this is the first invitation; the others are coming back, and each player’s history with the camp will shape what the next three days in Rockford mean.
Four Invitations from One Locker Room
Evan Harty is going for the first time. Grady Eckart is going for the third. Layla Becker is going for the fifth. Liam Becker rounds out the quartet of Jamestown High School players on the invite list.
“This will be my first time attending this camp. To get selected, you attend little camps throughout the Dakotas and get evaluated by the coaches there. After the camps are over, they decide and only select a certain amount of kids from each age group to go to the region ID camp. I feel I got selected because of my work ethic and my ability to play the game of soccer at a high level.”
Evan Harty, a Jamestown High School senior who started in goal for the Blue Jays last fall, said the words to the Jamestown Sun. He posted four shutouts during the fall season. He is the son of Brandi Harty, the JHS boys soccer head coach. The invitation also carries a state-pride motive: he wants to “show that kids from North Dakota can play soccer.”
As a younger kid, Harty played both soccer and baseball, a load that grew harder to carry through high school. He chose soccer for the next-level pathway and said giving up baseball was the sacrifice he had to make.
Layla Becker’s Fifth Camp Has U.S. National Team Stakes
Layla Becker, the only girl in the Jamestown group, will be a junior at Jamestown High School this fall. She has been on the JHS varsity girls soccer team since seventh grade. She led the Jays in scoring this spring with six goals and six assists for 12 total points. Her dad, Nick, has been helping run the regional ODP camp for the past few years and has passed on tips about the format. This is her fifth regional invite, the longest-running track in the Jamestown four.
Becker is candid about the small-town problem the camp is set up to surface. “It’s harder to get opportunities when I live in a small town with not much soccer competition as the other girls have,” she said. Her stated end goal this year is to make the inter-regionals camp and compete for a U.S. Youth National Soccer team spot. “My end goal is to perform well enough to make the inter-regionals camp in Florida later at the end of the year to compete for a spot on the U.S. Youth National Soccer team,” she said.
How the ODP Talent Pipeline Runs from Tryouts to Inter-Regionals
ODP began in the late 1970s as a format to identify the best soccer talent in the country. Each US Youth Soccer member state association runs at least one state team built from the strongest registered players in its state. State teams then square off against each other before each state forwards its top players to the regional event.
The ODP pipeline runs through three selection gates, each narrower than the last. State-level evaluations pull the strongest players from each US Youth Soccer member state into state pools. Regional camps then absorb the state-by-state top of those pools and forward their own selections to inter-regional identification events at the Omni hotel in ChampionsGate, Florida. The Midwest Summer ID event page with dates and Mercyhealth Sportscore Two venue.
Each of the four Jamestown players is now somewhere on that pipeline. Harty’s first invite, Becker’s fifth invite and Eckart’s third invite all arrived through the same state-association call.
The Harty Family Built a Soccer Pipeline Through ODP
Brandi Harty coached at Minot and Bismarck before taking over as head coach of the Blue Jay boys soccer program. She played collegiate soccer at the University of Jamestown. Brandi’s influence on Evan’s game is direct. The family pipeline runs through her oldest son first.
Brady Harty, Evan’s older brother and a Jamestown High School Class of 2025 grad who played for the Blue Jays from 2019 to 2024, moved on to the Steven Gerrard Academy in England. He then continued his career at the collegiate level in Alabama. Harty attended the ODP camp five times during his Jamestown High School run, the same door his younger brother is walking through this summer. “Brady got more exposure and learned a lot more about the game, and I believe that I could benefit the same way,” Evan said.
Evan now has the family template laid out in his brother’s path. Eckart’s third appearance in the regional camp is his own slow build. Each boy arrives at the Midwest Region camp with a different timeline behind him.
For Evan as a first-year invitee, the regional camp is the first rung of a ladder that runs to the U.S. Youth National Team stage. The invitation is the first measurable step in a process that rewards showing up across multiple summers.
What Three Days in Rockford Will Look Like
Campers play five soccer sessions across three days at the regional event. Each session runs approximately two hours, according to Layla Becker. The Midwest Region formats the camp as an evaluation cycle.
The Midwest Region runs its identification cycle at Mercyhealth Sportscore Two in Loves Park, in the Rockford, Illinois, area, the venue US Youth Soccer lists for the 2026 Midwest Summer ID. The Olympic Development Program page describing its identification purpose and structure. After the regional window closes, each state releases its selected players on a published date. Selected players then travel to an inter-regional event.
The same opportunity pipeline runs in larger and better-funded markets, where celebrity-name camps and club academies move through the same age group with bigger youth rosters behind them. For Harty, Eckart and the Becker siblings, the next stop is the inter-regional stage in Florida, where boys and girls train on separate windows.
- July 6-8, 2026 are the dates for the girls’ sessions at the Midwest Summer ID
- July 10-12, 2026 are the dates for the boys’ sessions at the Midwest Summer ID
- November 21-25, 2026 are the girls’ Inter-Regional dates
- January 14-18, 2027 are the boys’ Inter-Regional dates
Frequently Asked Questions
When is the 2026 Midwest Region ODP ID Soccer Camp held?
The 2026 Midwest Summer ID is the regional identification camp the four Jamestown players joined this summer. The camp cycles through girls’ and boys’ sessions in July. US Youth Soccer posts the official dates and venue on its event listing page.
What is the Olympic Development Program?
US Youth Soccer’s published purpose for ODP is to identify and provide opportunities for high-potential players, facilitate their development, and expose them to the next level of their chosen pathway. The program began in the late 1970s as a national selection format and now operates through state teams, regional identification events, and inter-regional selection windows.
How are players chosen for the regional ID Camp?
Each US Youth Soccer state association runs open tryouts in the months before the regional camp window. State coaches then pick a limited number of players from each age group to forward. The decision is made by state coaches, not by club coaches, after open evaluation.
What’s the next step after the Midwest Region ID Camp?
Selected players are invited to the USYS ODP Inter-Regional Event, the formal audition for the U.S. Youth National Team pool. Becker has named the inter-regional as her stated end goal for the 2026 cycle.
How often can a player attend the regional ODP Camp?
Players often attend the regional ID camp multiple times; state associations re-evaluate each year. Becker’s fifth appearance this summer is among the longer runs through ODP for any Jamestown invitee. Harty’s older brother, Brady, logged five ODP camp stints across his Jamestown High School career.
