The increasingly foreign flavor in men's D1 soccer

Discussion in 'College & Amateur Soccer' started by scoachd1, Feb 14, 2014.

  1. TimB4Last

    TimB4Last Member+

    May 5, 2006
    Dystopia
    It's a question of degree.
     
  2. First Time Finish

    Nov 4, 2016
    Every school, without exception, has the ability to "relax" both their normal admissions and financial aid standards and it happens at every single level (but not every institution) of college soccer. I know this from both first hand experience and rumors about other institutions that are both plausible and seem likely, even if embellished, from an outsider's perspective. Your experience in college soccer is clearly not universal.
     
  3. Terrier1966

    Terrier1966 Member

    Nov 19, 2016
    Club:
    Aston Villa FC
    This i do know for a fact, having been on the receiving end of that conversation with D1 coaches for one current D1 athlete and one future D1 athlete. There is no written chart saying "you must be this tall" for all schools. Some have minimum ACT/SAT numbers that are well below the average for accepted students. Since GPA can be on 5 point scales, 4 point scales, at challenging prep schools or at sub-par public schools that number is open to a lot of interpretation. Let's face it, if the player in question could play like Messi they would find a way to get him in.

    Coaches typically describe two arrangements with admissions, one - the team needs to average out to some acceptable level of test and GPA and there is a floor on both; two - they have maybe 2-3 cases in which they can get some flexibility but the rest of the team is going to more tightly align with expectations. In my experience, it varies from school to school and can pivot on something as simple as does the coach have a good relationship with the admissions person or how have the last few 'exceptions' turned out.

    If Notre Dame and Duke said every athlete had to meet the standard admission criteria they'd struggle to field football and basketball teams. And soccer teams.

    Some of the top club soccer teams have multiple players who are D1 commits and several other players who have been recruited and visited D1 schools. The age groups above and below are the same. Sometimes they attend a high school with a national ranking and there are kids there who are also D1 athletes. Due to social media the kids know each other.

    Because some kids join or leave academy teams during the years it isn't unusual for top players to have current and ex teammates that are going to top 10 D1 programs. They know who is a 'genius' and who got into a school based on 'flexibility'.

    Take a look at the brochures teams hand out at showcase tournaments. Often they include GPA. When you see a kid with a 3.3 GPA going to a Duke, Notre Dame, Syracuse etc. it is unlikely their ACT score was a 34.

    Going back a few posts, what are the odds Hofstra found that many foreign players who all met the standard admission criteria? If there are only 9.9 scholarships per team, several of them are paying full boat without some other kind of aid, scholarship etc. Or, 18 guys are splitting 9 scholarships and they all have to pay have the freight.

    Why wouldn't they have gone to another school and gotten a larger award? If the conference wants teams to compete for NC's or wants to have 3-4 teams qualify for the tournament then things need to happen. Coaching staffs need to be funded, fields need to be excellent, fitness and locker rooms need to be competitive and the money needs to be there. (one way or another)

    I'm not suggesting anything unethical, just that athletes are given some room when it comes to criteria and financial aid officers can be just as creative as admissions officers.
     
  4. ThePonchat

    ThePonchat Member+

    #ProRelForUSA
    United States
    Jan 10, 2013
    I've Been Everywhere Man
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    It doesn't matter what the university's "average" is. But, every university has a required academic standard for acceptance. In order for there to be an "average," there will be all kinds of people above it AND below it.

    So, to think that athletes are the only ones being admitted "below" the average, is a massive assumption.
     
  5. ThePonchat

    ThePonchat Member+

    #ProRelForUSA
    United States
    Jan 10, 2013
    I've Been Everywhere Man
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I get this suggestion...and that's what @First Time Finish is getting at too. Those same admission criteria can be (and are) used for the general student body too. It happens for a variety of reasons. Schools try to meet a whole variety of standards, percentages, and demographics.

    It's sort of funny that Ivy League is brought up when their admission standards (or suggestions) are pretty notable -- and easy to find.
    https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for
    https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/application-requirements
    https://admissions.dartmouth.edu/apply/choose-your-path/regular-decision/testing

     
  6. WolverineFutbol

    Aug 1, 2012
    I just got off the phone with a friend who is well versed in NCAA compliance. He says an individual school is free to admit any athlete, regardless of his or her academic record, so long as he or she clears the initial NCAA Eligibility Center requirements. The NCAA does not monitor an athletic program's average high school GPA or average SAT/ACT score. The NCAA does, of course, monitor academic progress and graduation rates after the athletes are admitted.
     
    OverseasView and ThePonchat repped this.
  7. ThePonchat

    ThePonchat Member+

    #ProRelForUSA
    United States
    Jan 10, 2013
    I've Been Everywhere Man
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Absolutely on all of it. And, what I've said, is colleges/universities typically have the same standard for all students and it's freely available for all to see. I would venture to say students are typically admitted by the same standards, regardless of athlete or not.

    Many times, school admission requirements are based (or start with) the NCAA EC. Same goes for NAIA schools, they start with the PlayNAIA and go from there.

    I've not seen it happen, or heard of it happening, where an athlete gets in with a specific admission "requirement" while general students ARE NOT admitted. Sure, there may be some students that miss, but there will be other students that are admitted.
     
  8. scoachd1

    scoachd1 Member+

    Jun 2, 2004
    Southern California
    He didn't write athlete - he wrote foreign students. One example of a modified standard is language. Non-native speakers very frequently have relaxed standards. There also might be relaxed standards to get someone from a particular country, just like there may be relaxed standards to get someone from Alaska in some schools, or to admit Native American students, or many other myriad reasons. Schools are looking for kids that have what it takes to be successful at their University, and for students to bring something to the school in terms of excellence or unique qualities.

    He wrote athletes are often have relaxed standards which is absolutely true. If you have one kid that spends 4 hours of free time practicing the academic decathlon, one kid practicing 4 hours a night for the school musical, one kid practicing 4 hours a night on playing soccer. You'd expect the first kid to have higher scores in academic related areas even if all three were of equal ability in academics. But since schools are more than academics, if all 3 are able to do well in a school, then one school might choose a kid with great grades if they felt needed more people that are likely to pursue research and advanced degrees, a kid in music if they were struggling to get enough people interested in their arts activities or the soccer player if they were struggling to find qualified students that could play at the level of their competition. Perfect SAT scores aren't necessarily going to get you into a particular and neither will having champions league level soccer skills. But the higher the degree of excellence in a particular area, the tolerate schools will be of lack of excellence in other areas. The greater the emphasis on excellence in a particular areas, the more that area will be weighted.
     
  9. scoachd1

    scoachd1 Member+

    Jun 2, 2004
    Southern California
    Based on conversations I had with coaches of elite academic programs (Ivy league and schools of the ilk) - coaches tend to get "5 golden tickets" and their recruits average scores need to be in line with the schools average. The recruits admissions package is reviewed with other preferences rather than the general population. A bigger school such as the UC' (Cal, UCLA) will be able to get a wider range of ability than say smaller private institution like Notre Dame or Princeton.

    This seemed to be less the case, but very plausible. Certainly the relationship and past performance are very important. The latter often drives the former, but so does things like following procedures.
     
  10. Terrier1966

    Terrier1966 Member

    Nov 19, 2016
    Club:
    Aston Villa FC
    Not all of my experience is soccer specific.

    I've had a coach tell me he gets 3 exceptions a year, but that was not soccer. I've personally attended more than a dozen official and unofficial visits with D1 coaches and I'd say they were all in the same neighborhood but none had the identical situation with their admissions office. My wife attended the other visits and generally heard the same range of situations. Most decent camps include a section or Q&A on recruiting etc. for parents so that is another place to get info on how that school 'works'.

    My sentence above about Messi originally said LeBron, and I shouldn't have changed it...I agree, soccer players don't get that kind of sway when it comes to admissions.

    Ivy league hockey players however are a segment unto themselves.
     
  11. scoachd1

    scoachd1 Member+

    Jun 2, 2004
    Southern California
    Agree - every school is different, but within a certain profile of schools things are very similar. In California you'll see UC's, State schools, Catholic school (WCC) all have similar requirements. But even within those programs there will be differences Cal will be different than Riverside and Cal Poly will be different than San Jose State.

    Even a kid with Lebran type skills wouldn't fly in many schools, while of limited academic qualifications would with far less basketball skills would get accepted at others.

    I'd agree - hockey is a pretty unique sport. There are only about 75 D1 teams. Included in the total are all the Ivy League programs along with some highly selective to very selective academic schools that compete at D3 in all other sports like RPI (the engineering school - not the thing that many people misunderstand in this forum). Add in a couple of Military academies, Big 10 schools, Notre Dame - you have a large proportion of high end schools recruiting the same limited talent pool. MIT used to be a D1 hockey program until 2009 when they dropped out in part because they were not competitive. As a result to stay competitive these schools need to adjust their standards much more so than for other sports. My cousin's kid was recruited by schools ranging from Harvard to North Dakota (he was actually considering the latter) which is something your not going to see in any other sport.
     
  12. espola

    espola Member+

    Feb 12, 2006
    MIT used to have D3 hockey teams. Now the students operate club teams.
     
  13. scoachd1

    scoachd1 Member+

    Jun 2, 2004
    Southern California
    They were once in the ECAC but that was in the 60's but I thought they dropped the program much more recently. I recall them playing D1 teams and incorrectly assumed they were D1 at the time.
     
  14. espola

    espola Member+

    Feb 12, 2006
    From the time of the D1-D2-D3 split they have been D3.
     
  15. scoachd1

    scoachd1 Member+

    Jun 2, 2004
    Southern California
    I think the NCAA does interesting reclassification retroactively but I don't doubt you on this. Unlike soccer, your knowledge of college hockey seems to have been spot on from the few times you've posted on it. In contrast I really don't have a clue about college hockey other than watching some games a couple decades ago and a 15 second glance at wiki. But the original point remains, you have a lot of super elite (Ivy's), elite (Notre Dame, RPI, Army, Colgate, etc ) and highly selective (Bentley, Colorado college, Michigan, Wisconsin etc) all chasing the same very small pool of players.
     
  16. espola

    espola Member+

    Feb 12, 2006
    When the NCAA created the Divisions, hockey and lacrosse didn't fit very well because of competition history. Some schools were allowed to keep D1 programs in a single sport (hockey for Colorado College, Clarkson, St. Lawrence, RPI, and Union, and lacrosse for Johns Hopkins). When those schools started women's programs in those sports, they were made D1 also (think Title IX). There have been some tuneups to the rules, such as athletes on a D1 scholarship are not allowed to compete with D3 teams in other sports, and the grandfathered exemption has survived at least one vote in the D3 Council attempting to terminate the arrangement.
     

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