Athlete Spotlight: Cade Edwards, Auburn HS
“[Last season], I just missed all my friends. I missed playing with them, and they all wanted me to come back,” Edwards said. “So, I felt like I needed to come back and lead the team. I knew I’d fit right in.”
Auburn high senior midfielder Cade Edwards’ soccer journey has a wild ride, but it might have only just begun.
He started with the Tigers’ varsity squad as an eighth grader, and now No.17 has played with the best competition at the high school level. During his junior year, he broke away from school ball to play with MLS’s Next program with the Hoover Vestavia soccer team.
“[MLS Next] is just a higher level,” Edwards said. “You’re playing with some of the best players in the country. Very talented, very fast. If I can play with them, I can play with anyone in college, hopefully.”
With home games in Hoover, Alabama, Edwards competed with the best talent all across the Southeast: North Carolina, Florida, Georgia, “you name it.”
After three years of varsity soccer in Auburn, he felt playing for MLS was a change he needed to elevate his game, but there’s no where he’d rather spend his senior year than under the lights at Duck Samford Stadium in Auburn’s blue and white. When Edwards saw his team end a 16-win season with a loss to Davidson in the playoffs last season, he believed he could help lead the Tigers to a deeper playoff run in his senior year.
“[Last season], I just missed all my friends. I missed playing with them, and they all wanted me to come back,” Edwards said. “So, I felt like I needed to come back and lead the team. I knew I’d fit right in.”
While Auburn High soccer coach Bill Ferguson would’ve loved to have Edwards in the lineup last season, he fully encouraged and supported his decision to join MLS Next. He’s thrilled to have his veteran midfielder back while replacing his entire back six from last season, and according to Ferguson, playing in the Next program paid off.
“Cade is a high-caliber player and a high-caliber human being,” Ferguson said. “When he had the opportunity to play there, I definitely encouraged him because that was what was best for him in his playing journey. He took the opportunity to play in a really competitive league, and man, every year he’s gotten better.”
Edwards committed on March 16 to play soccer at Division I Evansville. His remarkable soccer journey is set to hit a new state: Indiana. But there’s a ring to win before that happens.
“I think we’re gonna end up going far if everything goes right,” Edwards said. “We’ve got a very deep team. Hopefully we can keep progressing throughout the season and when playoffs come, we’ll be ready.”
— Noah Griffith, The Auburn Advance
