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Overall, it’s been a pretty good year for the Colorado Rapids Development Academy. There are a number of promising players in the pipeline, Sam Vines and Cole Bassett signed with the senior team, all three youth teams from U15, U16/17, and U18/19 finished in the top four of their division and made the playoffs (the U15s were actually first in the Frontier Division of the Central Conference), and now the U12s have won the Generation Adidas Cup.
Fourteen MLS teams took part in the competition in Atlanta over Thanksgiving weekend. The Rapids played seven games over three days, scoring 16 goals total (including three clean sheets), with their opponents scoring just five goals in all. After winning a hard-fought match against Houston Dynamo that went into penalty kicks, the U12s beat FC Dallas 3-0 to take the cup.
There are still a few DA games left in 2018 (including the Winter Showcase that is happening now in Florida), but all age groups resume in February 2019.