Chloe Maize could have taken the easy route through her high school career. She could have gone to school, played competitive soccer at Baylor - where she attends school - and used her offseason to play club soccer and attempt to earn a college scholarship.
Instead, she's chose a much more difficult route, but it's still paid off her her.
The Baylor junior has committed to play soccer at the University of Georgia. She doesn't play for the Lady Red Raiders, instead choosing to concentrate full-time on her club team, Atlanta Top Hat.
It's not that she wouldn't mind playing high school soccer; she'd actually love it. But TSSAA rules prohibit a soccer player from playing at the prep level while being on a club roster.
Therefore her week consists of practice Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday in Atlanta. On those three days, one of her parents will drive her from school to practice, which starts at 7:30 on Tuesday and 6 on Wednesday and Thursday. She lives in Cleveland and doesn't get home until somewhere between 10-11 at night, only to shower, lay down, sleep until 6 a.m. and do it all the next day.
"It's overwhelming at times," Chloe said Wednesday evening, "but I've been blessed to have supportive parents that let me do my homework and sleep when we travel. Baylor also works with me, and I've been lucky to have such a large support system."
Chloe's mom, Danielle, agreed that there have been some crazy times. But they wouldn't trade any of those "crazy" times.
"I know a lot of parents that would never do what we do, but I think when it's your child and they have goals of getting to the next level, that you just do; you don't think," she said. "She's so motivated, that's it's easy to get in the car and just go.
"She's a 16-year old girl, but we're able to have a good time in the car on the road trips."
Maize, who has maintained a 4.0 GPA, chose Georgia over interest from Virginia Tech, Samford, Alabama, Vanderbilt, Baylor, Texas and California. Her style has been compared to those of some area greats: Paige Ledford, who starred at Boyd-Buchanan before a standout career at Clemson; McKenzie Thomas, a two-time all-stater at Baylor that signed with Samford; and most recently, Soddy-Daisy's Summer Lanter, who was the Gatorade Player of the Year in 2012 and is now a sophomore at Lee University.
"From a technique perspective, she's very polished already at a young age," Patrick Winecoff, who coached Maize with the Chattanooga Football Club this summer, said. "She strikes the ball well; she passes and receives well, and her first touch is usually pretty solid. The thing that distances her from other players is that her change of pace is just different.
"She has the ability to shake a defender and get a shot or a pass off, or find an opening to dribble through. She's strong on the ball, but she holds people off well."
When Maize does get to Athens in the fall of 2016, it will be the first time since she was a sixth-grader at Baylor.
"I would love to be a part of Baylor's team. Coach [Curtis] Blair is amazing, but I'm just so loyal to my Top Hat teammates," Maize said. "It's just a loyalty thing to them.
"One of the things I'm most excited about with college is being able to play for a school, with a jersey with a school name on it and the opportunity to represent a school."
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him at twitter.com/genehenleytfp.