We at High School On SI previously offered up a list of candidates for the Iowa high school boys soccer player of the year award.

Now, we take a look at some of the best girls high school soccer players in the state of Iowa.

Like with with the High School On SI Iowa High School Boys Soccer Player of the Year Award, the High School On SI Iowa High School Girls Soccer Player of the Year Award will be named in each class following the conclusion of the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union State Soccer Tournament in June.

Here are the nominees for the High School On SI Iowa High School Girls Soccer Player of The Year Award. Stats are official as of Sunday, May 24, 2026 from the Bound website.

High School On SI Iowa High School Girls Soccer Player Of The Year Candidates

Class 3A

• Ilana Vasconez, Ottumwa: The senior leads all players with 48 goals, averaging almost three per match.
• Sloane Moeller, Davenport Central: Moeller is just one goal behind the class lead, as the junior has tallied 47 with 10 assists.
• Callie Stanley, Iowa City Liberty: Both a scorer and distributor, Stanley has 24 goals and 13 assists in 16 matches.
• Izzy Simonini, Waukee Northwest: The top goalscorer on the No. 1 team is Simonini, as the senior has tallie dnine on the year.
• Andie Vanderschaaf, Pleasant Valley: A brick in net, the senior has allowed just five goals in 1,200 minutes, recording 94 saves.

Class 2A

• Nora Barnett, North Scott: Opponents have found it nearly impossible to score on Barnett, as she has allowed just nine goals in 1,145 minutes with 100 saves.
• Hadley Wolfe, Fort Madison: The senior has 38 goals and 13 assists in 15 matches played, as she is the leading goalscorer in the class.
• Addy Wood, Norwalk: Wood leads the No. 1 ranked team in Class 2A with 11 goals, adding six assists.
• Anaka Ott, Waverly-Shell Rock: The senior has registered 22 goals with eight assists this season for the Go-Hawks.
• Irelynn White, Lewis Central: White has put 28 shots into the net and assisted on 11 more for the Titans.

Class 1A

• Maelyn Kluever, Maquoketa: Among the leading players in goals scored this year is Kluever, as the senior has 47 and another 24 assists – which leads Class 1A.
• Morgan Crees, Panorama: Crees has been among the top scorers over the past few seasons, recording 46 this year with 14 assists.
• Meadow Lane, Colfax-Mingo: Just a sophomore, Lane has another 45 goals added to her resume.
• Addyson Shepard, Denver: The sophomore sits atop the Cyclones list with 26 goals in addition to her 17 assists.
• Addy Oetker, Des Moines Christian: One of the top athletes in the state, Oetker has 24 goals and 21 assists on the season.

The Iowa State Cyclones had to undergo some major changes with their men’s basketball roster this offseason.

Four key rotation players from their incredible 2025-26 team, Tamin Lipsey, Joshua Jefferson, Milan Momcilovic and Nate Heise, won’t be back with the team. However, the Cyclones were able to successfully fill those voids on the roster with five players in the transfer portal and three players in their Class of 2026.

Other programs that have spent the offseason upgrading their rosters may not be as fortunate. The new NCAA eligibility requirements could significantly alter the outlook of many teams across the country, with a particular focus on international players.

After virtually everyone was granted eligibility to play in the 2025-26 season, rule changes came down in May that will impact several programs. Kevin Sweeney of Sports Illustrated named a few players who may no longer be eligible to participate in the 2026-27 season: Quinn Ellis (St. John’s Red Storm), Saliou Niang (LSU Tigers), Márcio Santos (LSU Tigers) and Mantas Rubštavičius (Auburn Tigers).

NCAA eligiblity rules will have major impact on men’s college basketball

Some Iowa State fans will see that and wonder how this could impact players on their team. Head coach T.J. Otzelberger has done a great job with international recruiting in recent years, unearthing gems such as Killyan Toure and Dominykas Pleta in the Class of 2026.

In the Class of 2026, one of Toure’s former teammates, big man Dorian Rinaldo-Komlan, committed to the Cyclones.

Luckily for Iowa State, none of those players are going to be impacted by the new eligibility rules and should maintain their ability to suit up for the Cyclones during the 2026-27 campaign.

Toure played high school basketball at Brewster Academy before coming to Ames. Rinaldo-Komlan is currently with SPIRE Academy. Pleta played in the Porsche Ludwigsburg, which has a professional-level team, but he was with the academy team, which is the equivalent of high school basketball.

Cyclones won’t be impacted by eligibility rule changes

While the rules about international players are constantly changing, all of the players who have come from overseas who are with Iowa State should remain eligible. The focus of the new rules is on players who have professional experience internationally and are older prospects.

That isn’t an area of recruiting that Otzelberger has had to turn to during his tenure with the Cyclones, and thankfully so. He has excelled in finding high school players and anyone in the transfer portal who fit into the game plan they are looking to execute with a focus on defensive intensity.

Iowa State can proceed as they have been, knowing they won’t be losing any players to eligibility concerns because of international professional experience.

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The self-proclaimed largest truck stop in the world offers drivers just about everything they might need during a break. The Iowa 80 parking lots offer 900 spots for trucks and dozens more for passenger cars, while the varieties of snacks, drinks and souvenirs in the market are uncountable. Elsewhere on the premises is a dentist, a barber and a chiropractor, a weight room, a 24-hour diner and a movie theater. There is also a Truckomat, to wash your truck, and a Dogomat, to wash your dog.

But the one thing that Iowa 80 does not offer is relief from the price of gas, which has increased sharply ever since the US joined Israel in attacking Iran and sparking a global energy crisis. On a recent afternoon, a gallon of regular gasoline at the sprawling stop in eastern Iowa went for $4.26, and diesel $5.72.

“It’s a lot of money,” said Malvinder Grewal, as he gazed at a receipt showing he had just spent $809 to fill up his 18-wheeler, which was laden with a shipment of dog food that he expected would net him $2,550 for delivery to Ohio.

As the summer travel season kicks off in the United States, analysts expect the high gas prices precipitated by the war with Iran to stick around. Average gas prices are the highest they have been in four years, according to the American Automobile Association, and price tracker GasBuddy predicted this week that, if the strait remains closed, pump prices could break records in the months ahead.

It’s a perilous position for Donald Trump to be in before November’s midterm elections, when his Republican allies will be defending their control of Congress. His administration has responded by approving the sale of fuel with a higher ethanol content that can be cheaper but risks increasing smog, while the president has floated suspending the federal gas tax.

Evidence has meanwhile mounted that the price increases have enhanced voters’ discontent with his presidency. Recent polls have found Trump’s public approval ratings in the high 30-percentage point range, and sometimes lower. This week, Quinnipiac University reported voters’ views of how he has handled the economy hit an all-time low.

The pain is acute for those who drive for a living, plenty of whom pass through Iowa 80, which sits in the little town of Walcott just off Interstate 80, the second-longest interstate in the country, stretching from San Francisco to New Jersey.

Truck drivers who plop down in barber Angie Clark’s chair for a $25 cut mention gas prices plenty, she said, particularly the owner-operators who must cover their own fuel costs.

“When gas goes up, that makes everything else go up, because everything is transported by truck,” she said. “If this keeps up, all my other costs of goods will go up as well. Do I have to raise my price?”

Recently, she came back home after a three-week trip abroad, and went to fill up her car for what she expected to be $42. Instead, it was $76.

“I about fell over,” Clark said.

Conversations in her shop inevitably turn to the cause of the spike, and whether it was wise to wage war on Iran and bring about the closure of the strait of Hormuz, through which about 20% of the world’s oil supply travels.

“We’re over there and we don’t have any purpose being over there,” said Randall Hood, 55, an Oklahoma resident driving a load of pet supplies to Ohio, who stopped in to have his gray mullet shorn.

As he sat in the nearby Laundromat waiting for a load of clothes to finish, Joe Ernst, 51, quibbled with the conventional wisdom that the war had driven up prices, saying that market forces – “hedge funds, futures” – were instead to blame. The phenomenon affected him less than others – as a company driver, his fuel costs, in this case to drive a tanker of cabernet sauvignon from Bakersfield, California, to Chicago – were covered.

Still, he was torn over the wisdom of launching the war. On the one hand, Iran was the longstanding nemesis who had “punched us in the face” during the hostage crisis that began in 1979. On the other, it had become clear to him that the same government behind that outrage would remain in power after the conflict ended.

“Either finish it, or pick up and go home,” Ernst said. “It’s getting frustrating.”

Mary Stevens, who was driving an escort vehicle for a truck carrying a 226ft windmill blade from New Mexico to Indiana, blamed “the stupid war, or whatever, that’s going on overseas” for making a complicated journey even more expensive.

With such a massive load, her convoy couldn’t pull off just anywhere to get gas, meaning they couldn’t always stop where the prices were best. Filling up her diesel truck cost about $125 when it used to cost $80, while her boss was forced to spend hundreds of dollars to fill up his truck.

“It’s getting ridiculous,” Stevens said. “It’s taking all of our money. It’s taking all of the truckers’ money, too.”

What it was not doing, she said, was changing her positive opinion of Trump.

“It is what it is,” Stevens said.