The G5 wants the NCAA to allow schools to cut sports such as volleyball, fencing, soccer, baseball and tennis to allocate an even larger share of the remaining money for sports such as football and basketball.
What if soccer was taken out of the NCAA indefinitely, and why could this happen?
Recently the Group of Five (G5) Commissioners—a coalition of athletic departments representing half of the conferences in the NCAA Division I—proposed a bleak solution to the pandemic-induced budget shortfalls looming over college sports: Allow a waiver to conferences and schools that would enable them to slash the current number of programs (16) that must be offered to retain Division I membership status.
In the simplest terms, this means the G5 wants the NCAA to allow schools to cut sports such as volleyball, fencing, soccer, baseball and tennis to allocate an even larger share of the remaining money for sports such as football and basketball.
While many people may find this devastating as this is a route for many student-athletes to get an athletic scholarship to pay for his or her’s education, but, would it really be a low blow?
Let’s take a look into why we are questioning it.
There has been many discussions about the college system messing up the point of development of the sport. By removing soccer from the NCAA, this can allow many clubs across the United States to restructure and create a more indepth academy for the players. Many clubs in the USA usually train 2 maybe 3 times a week, in other words, this is not enough time to develop players. As you may see in other countries, many clubs are training at least 5 times a week, sometimes twice a day.
Imagine if a youth club restructured and implemented a school education system within the club. Players wake up early in the morning and train, shower, attend school, train in the evening, and then go home.
By doing this 5 days a week, this can create future opportunities for recruitment as many professional clubs are looking for the next big superstar. What if the player does not want to play professionally and wants to go to college? Assuming the athlete is a good student and scores well on his or her’s ACT/SAT exam then there is an opportunity to receive an academic scholarship.
Summary:
While this could be a long shot before it will actually happen, I personally believe that this would not be catastrophic to the soccer community should we lose soccer within the NCAA. If anything, this will improve the overall development of the sport and within the states for the long-run potentially make the USA a contender at both the club and international level.
