Welcome to Innovily Sports Academy
Your journey with us begins by the desire for professional athletic development for your young athlete. Our goal is to build athletes from the ground up through activities specializing in a wide range of themes including: motor skills, coordination, cognitive & mental development, and social skills. We believe this heightened focus on foundational development and multi-sport athleticism sets us apart from others and results in greater performing athletes at older ages.
At Innovily Sports we firmly believe that specializing too early in a sport or position is a pathway towards inhibiting long-term development. There are early specialization sports, such as those involving great acrobatics (gymnastics & figure skating) or high kinesthetics (snow/water skiing & horse-riding), but the overwhelming majority of sports do not fall into these categories. Specializing too early contributes to lack of fundamentals, poor basic movements, underprepared coordinations, overuse injuries, and burnout. Multi-sport athleticism going into puberty allows for the most diverse and athletically-sound foundation to be built which will notably improve and accelerate sport-specific specialization later through an athlete’s teenage years.
Innovily Sports Academy Staff
Craig Vincent
Program Director & Futsal Director
Craig began his soccer journey as both a field player and goalkeeper, growing up playing youth soccer in Tacoma and Gig Harbor, WA. Influenced by his father's extensive coaching experience, Craig started coaching in high school, obtaining his USSF 'E' Coaching License at just 16. His head coaching career took off in 2011 with NorTac Sparta, and he played a key role in the creation of FC Tacoma in 2014, a youth club partnered with Serie A’s ACF Fiorentina. Craig's efforts led him to join AC Seattle, a women’s WPSL program blending American and Italian soccer, before returning to Tacoma to develop a women's program for South Sound FC. After two years with South Sound FC and assisting Washington Premier FC in absorbing both the men's and women's programs, Craig moved to Houston, TX, in November 2017. In Houston Craig, coached for Challenge SC until the creation of Innovily Sports Academy.
Craig holds many soccer, futsal, and goalkeeper coaching credentials from various organizations, including methodology diplomas from La Liga and ACF Fiorentina.
He has coached all ages and all levels, from young rec players to adult international women players through club, school, and college settings; and he’s worked as a coach, director, and club administrator.
Craig’s coaching philosophy strongly emphasizes individual player growth, and Innovily’s comprehensive methodology is a product of his nearly 25 years of coaching and administration experience.