Lexi Missimo: The record-breaking USWNT hopeful who has already impressed Man City & Arsenal

To go pro or to stay at college? That is the question so many top women’s soccer talents in the United States have pondered in the last few years.

It was back in 2012 that Lindsey Horan, now a world champion with the U.S. women's national team, became the first female soccer player to skip college and turn professional. In the years since, it has become a much more common theme.

After Mallory Pugh became the first player to skip college to sign in the NWSL, the country's top league, in 2017, every top pick in the last four editions of the NWSL Draft has left college early to go pro. Trinity Rodman, the second pick in 2021, never even played for a university.

Now, it’s the turn of Alexis Missimo to think about that conundrum.

Daughter of Derek, the all-time leading goalscorer at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, she’s already had an eye-catching college career herself, despite the second full year of it having not yet concluded.

Whether she decides to build on that in a professional sense in the coming months or she waits until she graduates college will eventually be trivial, as there are few doubts she has history to make when she gets there.

So, who is Missimo and what makes her so highly-rated? NXGN explains…