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MLS' top rookie Edu has shot at Team USA

As Maurice Edu prepared for his first professional season one year ago, he wore an imaginary red bull's-eye that is affixed to every No. 1 draft pick.

He left the University of Maryland with a year's eligibility remaining to enter the Major League Soccer SuperDraft. Mo Johnston, a former Scottish international who was coach at Toronto FC, had no trouble justifying his decision to draft the talented midfielder.

"He's not just a cruncher. He can pass the ball. He can play on the right, he can play in the middle, he can play on the left, he can play right back.

"He's a clever kid. He's had that No. 1 target on his back and he'll handle that easily."

Edu proved the coach was right. Last year, he won the Major League Soccer Rookie of the Year award and was called up to play for the U.S. national team for the first time.

He's played the last four U.S. internationals and in the first three — against Switzerland, South Africa, and Sweden — he started and played the full 90 minutes. The U.S team won all three without conceding a goal.

This month he's been handed another task: Help the U.S. men's Olympic team win a ticket to Beijing this summer.

"At the beginning of last season I had goals, and one of those goals was being called to the national team," says Edu, who traveled to China with the under-23 Olympic team in December for two matches. The USA tied China 0-0 and 3-3.

"But I never thought it would happen so soon. I thought maybe I get called to the 23s and hopefully do well there, and that might lead to a call-up. But I was lucky enough to get called into camp for the Switzerland game (last October), and I did decently over there."

Edu, 21, of Fontana, Calif., is one of 24 Americans training in Florida for the CONCACAF Olympic qualifying tournament beginning next week. The Olympic men's soccer competition is limited to players 23 and younger (for players born on or after Jan. 1, 1985). But each team can field up to three over-age players at the Olympic tournament.

So a player could help his country qualify and not make the squad for the Olympics, depending on which over-age players are chosen.

But first the Americans have to get to Beijing. Two finalists of an eight-team field advance, and qualification is anything but a formality. The U.S. team is in Group A with Cuba, Honduras and Panama. Group B is Canada, Guatemala, Haiti and Mexico.

Four years ago at the Olympic qualifying tournament in Mexico, the U.S. team found itself matched against its fiercest rival with an Olympic spot on the line. Mexico thumped the USA 4-0 to earn a trip to the Athens Games. The Americans stayed home, missing the Olympics for the first time since the USA boycotted the 1980 Moscow Games.

"First things first — we have to qualify," says U.S. under-23 coach Peter Nowak, who growing up in Poland watched his country's team win the gold medal at the 1972 Munich Olympics and silver four years later in Montreal. "With a country that has so much tradition and success in the Olympics, for me it is very important that we represent the United States well."

Edu has a history of adjusting quickly. As a sophomore, he played 23 games as Maryland won the NCAA Division I title, which earned the Terps a trip to the White House to meet President Bush. Edu was the first No. 1 draft pick to earn MLS Rookie of the Year honors. And in his four games with the U.S. national team and two appearances for the U-23s, the Americans have yet to lose.

Normally, elite soccer players climb the ladder of the U.S. Soccer youth teams — U-17s, U-20s, U-23s — and those that survive eventually reach the national team. Landon Donovan, DaMarcus Beasley, Freddy Adu and Jozy Altidore have followed this path.

Edu has taken a different approach.

"I like to look at it as a small victory for college soccer," says Maryland coach Sasho Cirovski, who first saw Edu as a 5-8, 135-pound teen playing club ball for Pateadores in Southern California. Edu, now 6-0, 170, is mature enough that Nowak is trying him out as a defender as well as in midfield.

"He was kind of a smaller kid who grew and developed. The first thing you notice about Maurice is he looks you straight in the eye," Cirovski says. "He can recognize the substance of the information. He's a very sharp, shrewd kid, and yet he's very, very humble."

Not all No. 1 draft picks are as well-grounded as Edu, who has qualities coaches and teammates appreciate. He started his rookie MLS season on the bench recovering from pelvic surgery. Once he got fit, he seldom missed a match and scored four goals in his 25 appearances while struggling Toronto used more than two dozen field players and lost 17 of its 30 games.

"I was definitely raised to be humble and modest, and I've tried to continue that mindset and outlook on things," Edu says. "Sasho encouraged you, but at the same time he kept you grounded. He was quick to point out your bright spots and help you improve those, but at the same time he was also quick to point out your weak spots and help you develop those and get better."