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Post by Formerhcpops on Jan 13, 2023 9:07:56 GMT -6
NCAA D1 RPI site rpiupdatemenssoccer.blogspot.com/search/label/RPI%20Rank This is NOT the "official" NCAA calculation, this one is far more robust analytics-wise than anything you can find directly from the NCAA, including: Strength of Schedule (SOS), Opponent's Strength of Schedule (OSS), and shows team records based on Home and Away and against teams in tranches 1-25, 26-50, etc. Data geeks rejoice!
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Post by usasoccerboy on Jan 15, 2023 12:29:18 GMT -6
Great link for a resource of what is available.
Unfortunately, it shows what is available is limited. Even the Houston area, one of the largest youth soccer areas of the country has few to little Division I options.
Louisiana has a few small college options. Mississippi has more, but none are truly big universities. The men’s programs in the Deep South are few to none. It has been this way since they got rid of Nicholls State, UNO, and ULM programs in the late 1980s, which was before we even qualified for the 1990 World Cup.
The reason is not because of the expense of soccer programs. The reason is that the NCAA does not want competitive sports vying against football for fans. It is stupid.
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Post by Formerhcpops on Jan 16, 2023 11:33:22 GMT -6
Great link for a resource of what is available. Unfortunately, it shows what is available is limited. Even the Houston area, one of the largest youth soccer areas of the country has few to little Division I options. Louisiana has a few small college options. Mississippi has more, but none are truly big universities. The men’s programs in the Deep South are few to none. It has been this way since they got rid of Nicholls State, UNO, and ULM programs in the late 1980s, which was before we even qualified for the 1990 World Cup. The reason is not because of the expense of soccer programs. The reason is that the NCAA does not want competitive sports vying against football for fans. It is stupid. Correct. It's a gosh darn shame. I'm a firm believer that if Louisiana kids had visibility into next-level soccer, more would strive for it and play in college instead of hitting happy hours at LSU, ULL, etc. (not that there's anything wrong with that!). GCPL and USL2 are slowly changing that but the NCAA and the SEC schools in particular (except Kentucky & South Carolina) should be ashamed for not coming up with a few coins to fund Men's soccer. I don't want hear about Title IX restrictions, 212 D1 schools have figured it out. Avg annual budget for a men's college soccer program is about $1.2M, many teams get by with much less. SEC football programs probably have $1M in the couch cushions of their swanky, pro-style facilities. If there's a will, there's a way. |
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Post by usasoccerboy on Jan 19, 2023 10:46:54 GMT -6
Great link for a resource of what is available. Unfortunately, it shows what is available is limited. Even the Houston area, one of the largest youth soccer areas of the country has few to little Division I options. Louisiana has a few small college options. Mississippi has more, but none are truly big universities. The men’s programs in the Deep South are few to none. It has been this way since they got rid of Nicholls State, UNO, and ULM programs in the late 1980s, which was before we even qualified for the 1990 World Cup. The reason is not because of the expense of soccer programs. The reason is that the NCAA does not want competitive sports vying against football for fans. It is stupid. Correct. It's a gosh darn shame. I'm a firm believer that if Louisiana kids had visibility into next-level soccer, more would strive for it and play in college instead of hitting happy hours at LSU, ULL, etc. (not that there's anything wrong with that!). GCPL and USL2 are slowly changing that but the NCAA and the SEC schools in particular (except Kentucky & South Carolina) should be ashamed for not coming up with a few coins to fund Men's soccer. I don't want hear about Title IX restrictions, 212 D1 schools have figured it out. Avg annual budget for a men's college soccer program is about $1.2M, many teams get by with much less. SEC football programs probably have $1M in the couch cushions of their swanky, pro-style facilities. If there's a will, there's a way. While it would be great if the SEC held men’s soccer competitions, I would settle for Division IA schools to hold men’s teams. Nicholl’s had a decent following when they got rid of the men’s team because of budget cuts and title 9 restrictions. In terms of expenses, they brought in more in ticket sales than say the tennis or cross country teams which still exist. The team was very popular and this was before soccer got off the ground from the death of soccer days after the demise of the NASL. Yesterday, on my local coastal Mississppi news channel, I saw a report that USM is competing in Women’s Beach volleyball and is one of four in their conference. Title 9 supposedly is to have the equivalent mankind of men’s and women’s sports teams and they mentioned this would be USM’s 19th sport for women. Still no men’s team. I attended USM in the mid 90s and compared to Louisiana, they had a better adult and coed soccer competition for soccer than Louisiana. Yet with all this surrounding their campus, still no men’s teams. Virtually all the schools have women’s soccer teams in the Deep South. I have always said that if the USA wants to make real legitimate advancement at the national level, they must bring up the Deep South to match the rest of the country. What is missing the most is this post high school level. Now we have a little bit better of select club leagues than we did in the past, but even that is not sufficient as we should have leagues that feed into that and tat could be in our universities. But as usual, the old soccer prejudices continue to remain despite the sport being more popular than ever. My only conclusion I can make is that the non soccer fan is still in control of the powers that be that say if men can play or not. I believe they do not want it still, because of some perceived bias that it would interfere with American football as if all the kickers would leave and play soccer and that they would have to go for two points after touchdowns if soccer was played by the men in universities. It is stupid. |
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