Dayne St. Clair was frustrated.
Drafted seventh overall in the 2019 MLS SuperDraft, the former Maryland standout goalkeeper had spent his first three seasons mostly on the margins with the expansion Minnesota United FC. By the end of the 2021 season, aside from a few exhibition appearances, two loan spells and a magical but fleeting late-season playoff run in 2020, St. Clair hadn’t yet seen the regular minutes expected of a highly-touted draft prospect.
St. Clair thought he had finally made it in late 2020 when Minnesota starter Tyler Miller was lost for the season with an injury. St. Clair posted a shutout in his MLS debut, a 4-0 win against Real Salt Lake. He played the last 16 games of the season, including three MLS Cup playoff games, allowing just 15 goals and snagging eight clean sheets.
Miller returned in 2021 and again St. Clair returned to the bench after four early regular-season starts, bookended by another playoff appearance that fall. But instead of letting that frustration consume him, St. Clair remembered that he had faced similar adversity not that long ago and had used it to fuel his eventual success.
Two years later, the 26-year-old Pickering, Ontario, native is now the undisputed No. 1 keeper in Minnesota after claiming the top job early in the 2022 campaign. The 6-foot-3, 174-pound goalie has blossomed into one of the brightest young talents in Major League Soccer while making a case that he could one be the top keepers for his home country.
“When there’s pressure, you can either rise or you can fall,” St. Clair said recently. “And I’ve always chosen to rise in those situations because you have nothing to lose.”
“Dayne Stuck It Out”
Heading into the fall of 2016, Maryland men’s soccer head coach Sasho Cirovski was looking for a No. 1 goalkeeper. Zack Steffen had left for Europe two years prior. St. Clair had redshirted in 2015 and was ready to become the next great Terp shot-stopper.
Steffen’s replacement, senior Cody Niedermeier, was coming off a strong junior campaign and had no interest in giving up his job.
“We’ve always done a good job of having two starters at Maryland compete for positions and pushing each other,” Cirovski said. “Which is exactly what they’ll get in the pros.”
After a fierce preseason competition, Cirovski picked Niedermeier, who went on to earn Big Ten Goalkeeper of the Year honors and help the Terps win a conference championship in 2016.
“I have to give Dayne a tremendous amount of credit,” Cirovski said. “He continued to put his head down, work and support Cody. … In today’s world, young men when they’re not the starters, or they go through a little bit of a challenge, they leave. Dayne stuck it out.”
St. Clair took over the starting job as a redshirt sophomore in 2017, playing every minute in goal across 19 matches. He followed that up a year later with one of the best college seasons by a goalie in recent memory. He recorded 13 shutouts and didn’t give up a goal in the final 500 minutes of the season, including the entire NCAA Tournament, on the way to a national championship.
“Things like transferring definitely crossed my mind in those first two years,” St. Clair said. “They weren’t easy times, but in my position [goalkeeping] you are going to go through those times.”
More than four years on from his historic final college season, St. Clair still uses those struggles to fuel his competitive fire for his club and national teams.
Losing the starting job to Niedermeier “helped me apply it to when I had a similar scenario in my pro career,” St. Clair said. “Because I’ve been in that situation before. And although it’s definitely not a situation that you want to find yourself in, it’s about fighting and digging deep and believing.”
“This Will Be Canada’s No. 1”
Every so often, Carmine Isacco would get a call from Sasho Cirvoski asking for leads on the top young talent coming out of Canada.
Cirovski, a Macedonian-Canadian raised in Windsor, Ontario, would pester Isacco, the former Maryland goalkeeper (1989-1992) who was coaching with Vaughan Soccer Club outside of Toronto.
“Are you gonna send me one soon?” Cirovski would say.
Around 2014, Isacco finally came through. He had discovered a lanky 16-year-old from Pickering, a city east of Toronto on the shores of Lake Ontario.
St. Clair, born to a Trinidadian father and Canadian-Scottish mother, started as an outfield player on youth teams in neighborhoods around Toronto such as North Scarborough, Ajax and Pickering, but filled in for an absent goalie one day and decided never to leave. As a 15-year-old, he made his debut in the Canadian youth program, representing Canada in the 2017 CONCACAF Men’s U-20 championship.
By the time he arrived at Vaughan, St. Clair was already near his 6-foot-3 height and oozing with talent. He helped the team win a League 1 Ontario title in the fall of 2014 despite barely being able to legally drive a car.
“He fits the mold of a Maryland player. He’s gonna be a pro,” Isacco told Cirovski, who flew to Toronto to watch St. Clair in person.
“Dayne always had that swagger. It was never cocky. It was confident humility,” Isacco said in explaining his initial impression.
St. Clair briefly considered turning pro, a path he saw other Canadian players take, but decided Maryland was his best chance at developing into a professional goalie. Plus his parents wanted him to stay in school.
“Every kid wants to go pro, but for me, my parents really valued education so we decided to go that [college] route early on,” St. Clair said.
When St. Clair became the Terps’ full-time starter in 2017 and notched a 0.99 goals-against average, Cirovski was certain his keeper would not only become a Maryland great but someone who would one day play in goal for his country.
“Back when he was a sophomore, I would say, ‘Hey, I think this will be Canada’s No. 1 at some point,'” Cirovski said. “I couldn’t be happier for him and do still think he’s going to be Canada’s No. 1 in the very near future.”
Seizing The Opportunity
When the opportunity came knocking during the 2022 MLS season, St. Clair was ready.
Miller, who had started 30 games in 2021, went out with the flu after two starts. St. Clair promptly recorded two clean sheets in his first two games, including an eight-save masterclass against the New York Red Bulls March 13.
After suiting up for Canada in three late March World Cup qualifiers, St. Clair returned to Minnesota and kept the top job for the rest of the season. For his stellar play, St. Clair was invited to the MLS All-Star Game and was named All-Star MVP for helping the MLS secure a 2-1 victory against Liga MX All-Stars in front of his home crowd at Allianz Field.
In mid-November, about a month after a disappointing first-round exit in the MLS playoffs, St. Clair got a call he had dreamed about for years. He was named to Canada’s 26-man squad as a reserve keeper for the FIFA World Cup later that month.
“Prideful” is the word St. Clair used to describe the feeling of representing his country in Qatar. It was the first time in 36 years Canada had qualified for the tournament.
Despite Canada getting eliminated in group play of the tournament, St. Clair saw the experience as a building block for what’s to come, considering that Canada will co-host the 2026 World Cup with the U.S. and Mexico.
“It took us a long time to get there. We took a lot of pride in fighting to be there and being pioneers to fight for our nation,” St. Clair said.
And while the next World Cup is still three years away, St. Clair, who will be 29 that summer, isn’t shy about the possibility of being Canada’s No. 1 keeper.
“That’s definitely the goal for 2026. I got a taste in 2022 of being there and being a part of it. But I definitely want to play a bigger role for the country. And I think that I’m capable of doing it,” St. Clair said, flashing the trademark confidence Isacco saw nearly a decade ago on the fields of Vaughan. “To play a World Cup alone, not many people get to say that, but to play one on home soil, it’s even fewer.”
There’s no telling what the rest of St. Clair’s career will hold, but what is certain is he won’t back down from the challenge.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of Minnesota United FC
Originally published June 15, 2023