It’s never a bad thing to associate yourself with another local powerhouse.
Stanford men’s soccer has become an elite collegiate program, winning three national championships since 2015. The program has turned out professionals like Chad Marshall, Jordan Morris and Corey Baird, among others.
After not having a significant First Team connection to the school in several years, the Quakes suddenly find themselves with three players who helped the Cardinal reach the semifinals of the 2019 Division I Men’s Soccer Tournament.[
Tanner Beason joined the club as the 12th overall selection in 2020 and has since made 33 total appearances and 31 starts. He contributed right away with nine starts during his pandemic-shortened rookie season and was one of the team’s most reliable and called upon defenders in 2021.
On Monday, the team signed Will Richmond to a Homegrown Player contract, the first such signing from Stanford in club history. Richmond is a fleet-footed winger that will likely need time to develop but possesses projectable traits, speed to burn, and a deep connection to the club since joining the Quakes Academy way back in 2016.
The following day, San Jose celebrated the selection of Ousseni Bouda with the eighth overall pick in the SuperDraft. Bouda was widely projected as a top-five pick and is considered among the most skillful and electric attacking players in this year’s class. Bouda was at Stanford for three years, although he missed the 2020 season to injury, and was a First Team All-Pac-12 Conference selection in each of the two years he featured. He was also the Gatorade Boys Soccer National High School Player of the Year for 2017-18, an honor that has been bestowed on some of the most accomplished athletes including baseball’s Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke, basketball’s LeBron James and Kobe Bryant, and football’s Kyler Murray and Peyton Manning.
San Jose has routinely sent players from its Academy to Stanford and the present is no different. The Cardinal currently have two players heading into their senior season in defender/midfielder Keegan Tingey and midfielder Cam Cilley.
