“It’s just a shift in women’s sports,” Wadsworth said. “You see it more and more now where women’s soccer is catching up to the men’s side, and there’s more opportunities for them.”

Moultrie has already drawn worldwide attention for her prodigious technical skills and her family’s nontraditional approach to her nascent career. She has long played with older girls on the United States youth national team and with boys’ clubs near her family’s home in Canyon Country, Calif.

Last year, Moultrie made multiple trips to Europe to meet and train with some of the continent’s biggest clubs: Olympique Lyon and Paris St.-Germain in France, and Bayern Munich in Germany. And with the help of her father, K.C., she has maintained an active presence on social media, often posting highlight clips to more than 87,000 followers on Instagram.

“I feel for literally almost every kid in girls’ soccer, you should go to college; there’s not a million dollars at the end of the rainbow,” K.C. Moultrie said in an interview with The New York Times last year. “I think if you’re truly, truly elite, if your goal is to be a world-class player and a pro and, in Olivia’s case, to be the best player in the world, there’s no way it’s better to play college than it is to play full time.”