9/13/2020 other sports Edit

NCAA Soccer Gaining Momentum for Spring Season

Jordan Gould • TheHoosier

Staff

Jordan Gould is an incoming senior and sports media student at Indiana University. Gould is interested in video production and broadcasting, in addition to writing.

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Soccer fans, rejoice— a college soccer season could be on the horizon, set to start in the spring.

College soccer coaches across Division I programs submitted a recommendation plan to begin the season on Feb. 3. The proposed dates, including the start time, will be determined by a vote from the Division I Board of Directors on Wednesday.

Under the recommendation, each program would be able to begin practicing in preparation for the season at their own discretion. The NCAA Tournament would be set for Apr. 30, with the College Cup taking place between May 13-17.

However, the tournament will be more competitive and difficult to be selected for, after the Division I Oversight Committee agreed to decrease the number of teams in the men’s tournament to 36 from the original 48 teams, while the number of teams in the women’s tournament would shrink to 48 from the original 64 teams. The amount of auto-bids would remain the same for each tournament, but the number of at-large bids would be reduced (12 for men, 17 for women).

A model for a spring soccer season has been an idea that has been pushed by some of the top head coaches in the game, long before the novel coronavirus pandemic caused a disruption in initial plans.

Back in October from last year, Indiana men’s soccer head coach Todd Yeagley spoke to the media about a letter that eight national championship coaches signed off for, pushing for a change to the current collegiate soccer format.

“Well this has been a long, long project in the works and one that’s been talked about for 15 to 20 years, honestly,” Yeagley said. “I think really in the last three to four years we’ve really started to get the momentum and the backing, the understanding of the sports science and the medical background of what our sport is required to put our athletes through and when you dissect that and you look at what the NCAA has worked towards — trying to find more balance for the student-athlete — it just makes sense.”

With the current state of the Big Ten, and every fall sport (aside from football) in jeopardy of losing its season completely, a spring season could be an unexpected positive change that would ultimately be better for the sport.

“It just makes sense to spread our season longer and the survey that we’ve done with the student-athletes, Division-I, was nearly 90 percent that wanted this particular model, the coaches were over 90 percent, everybody has spoken that they want this,” Yeagley said. “Change is difficult for people and there are challenges with anything, but the overall good of our sport, there’s more positives than any obstacles that might get in the way so that’s why I feel strongly about it.”