Why everybody should care about what just happened to men's college soccer

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The idea that men’s college soccer could dramatically change its calendar is not a new one. I first covered efforts to move the men’s college season from the fall to a two-semester model way back in 2022, interviewing Maryland coach Sasho Cirovski, a major supporter of the proposal.

In early 2025, I wrote about a much larger proposed reform via US Soccer, which would have created a two-semester model and abolished the traditional conference system in favor of more regional play.

Then, in May, it looked as if the years of lobbying might finally pay off. The NCAA men’s soccer oversight committee approved a proposal that would have moved men’s soccer to a two-semester sport, but last week, things changed again. From ESPN:

I think it’s important to point out that while Division I schools that do not sponsor men’s soccer were allowed to vote on this proposal — much to the chagrin of many supporters of the two-semester model — the Athletic reports that 67 percent of schools that do sponsor men’s college soccer also voted to kill the model. I’m aware of at least three schools in the current top 25 that voted against it.

I think this debate is actually about questions much larger than “When should we play college soccer matches?” or “How much administrative power should be given to power conference coaches?” I think this is the first public skirmish of what could be a very long (and potentially very ugly) debate over who should control college sports and whose voices matter.

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This is a summary and not an exhaustive recounting of the arguments, but generally, coaches and supporters of the largest and most well-resourced athletic departments have pushed the most to move men’s soccer to a two-semester sport.

The thinking goes that the current model forces athletes to play far too many games in too condensed a time, stunting the growth (and fitness) of athletes who could later potentially play in the MLS or in the US Soccer development pool. Plus, a fall-only model means a championship game in early December, competing with football, basketball and lousy weather for attention. The NCAA men’s soccer tournament has not traditionally been a rousing commercial success, after all.

Sounds relatively reasonable, right? Or at least, I think that sounds pretty reasonable.

But there’s a catch. Not every D-I school has a dedicated soccer facility, and moving men’s soccer to the fall and spring would mean some schools may not have room to practice and play if lacrosse or other sports need access to those same fields. A two-semester system also would mean more work for athletic trainers, communications professionals, nutritionists, bus drivers and everybody else who actually makes college sports work on a day-to-day basis. Those operations staffers are already spread thin. Moving to a two-sport model — even for schools with the facilities to accommodate it, and even for schools that care quite a bit about soccer — could be prohibitively expensive.

That’s the other interesting wrinkle: Men’s college soccer is a rare NCAA sport where schools outside major conferences compete for national championships. Vermont beat Marshall for the title in 2024, and Marshall won in 2020. Akron played for a title in 2018, and it’s fifth in the latest United Soccer Coaches poll. Schools with athletic department budgets under $25 million make the tournament and win matches all of the time.

It’s also worth pointing out that nobody is really generating big bucks from college soccer, even big-budget Power 4 programs like Washington, Indiana, UNC and Clemson. Nobody is selling out 10,000-seat stadiums or generating meaningful TV revenue or even selling out corporate MMR inventory.

Do you know how many men’s soccer programs reported generating at least $200,000 in ticket revenue in FY25? Zero. And only six generated at least six figures, according to data from the Extra Points Library.

So trying to apply the P4-versus-the-world rhetoric or math that might make some sense for FBS football or men’s basketball doesn’t really work. There’s no commercial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, and the big boys aren’t dominating everybody else … yet.

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The question that has come up again and again, both in my conversations and in reading coverage of the debate, centers on precedent.

Unlike some other NCAA sports, colleges don’t have a near-monopoly on elite opportunities for athletes in the 18-23 age range. The US Soccer Federation exists completely outside the scope of the NCAA, and it, unlike other sport federations, has a budget, power and influence.

If a group of larger-budget programs, supported by organizations outside the NCAA, can successfully push for such a major change without the broad-based support of the rank and file, what’s to stop hockey from doing something similar in a year or two? Or other sports? And if that does occur, what happens to the Woffords or Utah Valleys of the universe? Would the major corporate and administrative bodies looking to rebuild athletic governance care about them the way the NCAA has?

I also understand the potential self-interest from institutions that might not sponsor men’s soccer but that benefit from the way the calendar is laid out now. For instance, more spring soccer matches could make it harder for lacrosse, beach volleyball, softball and other spring sports to get as much TV time or field space.

You can read the statements from schools (both soccer-sponsoring and non-soccer-sponsoring) that voted against the proposal here.

If the No. 1 goal of American college soccer is to prepare American college players for careers in American professional soccer, then aligning the college calendar (and rules, and budgets) with the rest of the American soccer pyramid probably does make sense, even if that comes as a significant institutional cost.

If the No. 1 goal of American college soccer is to further institutional goals (enrollment management, providing local entertainment, graduating athletes, competing for meaningful championships) that may or may not align with the professional ranks, then keeping the calendar the way it is probably makes the most sense. It’s in the best interest of college soccer to have La Salle and FGCU and Stetson field programs. Is it in the best interest of US Soccer? I don’t think it cares that much, to be honest.

So which goal should take precedent? That’s not an easy question to adjudicate. And without knowing or being able to clearly articulate the answer, I imagine these fights will continue.

Men and women of good faith could probably resolve some of the problems in college soccer without having to blow up the entire D-I model. The season could always be shortened. The finale could be played somewhere warmer than Cary, North Carolina. US Soccer could put its money where its mouth is and fund more of the operations staff needed to sponsor and run high-level college programs.

But who should get to be in charge, and what the system is for? Those are tougher questions … and they’re not unique to men’s college soccer.

And when the institutional investors come to try and reform college football or basketball, I suspect they will use some of the same logic and arguments as the folks pushing for soccer change today. The industry better figure out a good response.