What is a reasonable expectation for Florida? I project them to finish #76 in the NCAA RPI rankings, my Balanced RPI projects them to finish #74, and Massey currently ranks them #75. All three that close is very unusual. Looking at what the coach inherited -- a program in decline -- where they're projected to end up doesn't seem so bad. But, losing to Georgia State does not look good, although a look at 1 game ordinarily is not a good basis for evaluation.
I think so much of "reasonable expectations" goes along with what type story you can tell around your time in the job. Have you stabilized a dumpster fire of a program? Even if you have, did your AD believe it was a dumpster fire when you got there? If so, maybe just putting out the flames is progress. If not, this is a hard case to make. What metrics can you point to that prove that storyline out? Are you improving results? Can you point to more wins than before you arrived? No? Ok, maybe you've boosted the scoring output of the team by 50% over the season before you arrived? No? Ok, maybe the team's goals against have declined each year of your tenure? None of that is true? Ok, are you trying to establish a more attractive style of play that will bear fruit given enough time? More wins is the easiest story to tell. Everything else is a lot harder to rest your contract renewal on, even if it's true. I don't know if a top 100 RPI will be enough of a story to keep the job. I think Florida was in a rough spot when she got the job. Prior coach was abusive in whatever way got him fired. Before that, I think Becky had mailed it in for a couple years coasting to retirement. So the cupboard was pretty bare so to speak. She's probably improved the culture I would guess. But results haven't shown much, if any, improvement. And they don't seem to be trying to play a particularly sparkling brand of soccer, even for the SEC. If she gets them into the conference tournament this year or next, I imagine she'll keep the job. If not, I imagine she'll be moved along. At a school like Florida, I would think they expect to make the conference tournament every year in everything. Whether that's realistic is almost an irrelevance.
I feel like Florida as a department has championship expectations. As a soccer program, they’re used to competing for titles annually. Now, they’re scrambling to make it to the conference tournament for the first time under this current staff. I feel like if we are putting A&M on hot seat, Florida has to be there too.
Mississippi Valley State cancels the rest of their season. What a nightmare that place is. What’s terrible even more, in my opinion, is the SWAC and NCAA are completely silent on how this takes place and any ramifications on it.
One thing that should be added is that Florida will probably be on the hook for ~$20 million to buyout their football coach (~$10 million due within 30 days). Not sure the contract situation of the Florida soccer coach, but would the AD want to or care about buying out a non revenue sport while hiring a football coach. If the contract is up, it may happen, but, if not, I doubt they make a change if they do indeed fire their football coach which everyone assumes they will.
"What the coach inherited - a program in decline" while may be true but has clearly gone worse than expected. 3 SEC wins in her first three seasons for a program such as FL with the money they have is awful. While they may have stabilized a culture, unfortunately Florida should be at least competing in the SEC tournament year after year as a minimum standard. If they do not make it this year, then questions surely have to be asked. It is her own recruits now and can't pass any of the blame. Conference opens up tomorrow and I think that will give us a better idea of where they will stand come the end of October.
Here is Florida's rank history since 2007. I've included Massey because once we get out of the very tops of the rankings, the NCAA RPI rankings start discriminating against teams from stronger conferences, whereas Massey doesn't. You can see that Florida started into a decline in 2017 and never has recovered. I think there's a big question whether it is realistic to think that Florida will return to the 2016 and earlier era or whether it is more likely they will have a new "mean" that is significantly poorer than that.
For example, will the two games Mississippi Valley already played count? I suspect they will. I feel for SWAC because of all the historic underfunding they've faced. In practical terms, however, so far as women's soccer is concerned, they cannot compete at the Division I level, in fact cannot come close to being competitive. This is obvious from their performance statistics over the years. It is really unfortunate for them.
This part. For those unaware of or ignoring context: States owe HBCUs ~$13 Billion in funding they withheld for literal decades. We talk about coaches doing more with less... but fail to apply that logic to HBCUs, which have done more with less since their inception. If an HBCU finally succumbs to decades of systemic inequity (many call it theft) and isn't able to compete for a year or two, we should concern ourselves a lot more with the factors that created that situation and a lot less with the conference and the NCAA not responding quickly enough to punish them further (to satisfy our own, personal, arbitrary timeline). I'm not saying we should treat HBCUs as second-class institutions. I'm pointing out the fact that their states always have and still do.
Good insight MrIpo on your post. Alabama State won a lawsuit this decade for the same. States were paying out the other State Universities at higher rates per students than at their HBCU colleges with no justification other than they wanted to give it to the PWI schools and not to HBCUs. So Alabama State won that lawsuit and some $6 million in back pay. The other HBCU's need to file suits too and win to get back pay from state legislators to upgrade facilities, scholarships, and overall college funding. There are whispers of MVSU cutting soccer as a sport for good. That'd be sad if it happens, but not surprising as they only have 3-4 total scholarships for players and poor facilities. All of their sports are underfunded. This is where Jerry Rice played his college ball and a ton of other pro's. Can they not form a coalition and give back? Just sayin.
Anyone here familiar with Angie’s contract status at Texas? One of the biggest upset losses to Northwestern St, pounded in a loss to Houston, and now a loss to Missouri to start off SEC play (a Mizzou program rightfully mentioned on the hot seat here). She must have a pretty decent paycheck and that program is woefully underachieving. At one of the best funded athletic departments, they could just recruit the top kids in state and just by doing that with a little bit of coaching and direction they should be top 10. Talk about a severely underperforming situation
I caught a few Alcorn games on ESPN and I will defer with they cannot compete in D1. For a program that didnt play well, I assume are underfunded and probably have poor facilities, they are going neck to neck with some decent teams. They just drew with Tarleton, gave a last minute goal due to lack of depth and mixed PK. Also saw them against Northwestern St & Jax, they were the more dominant team in both matches, just unlucky and probably inexperienced since their entire roster is new. I also watched a few other HBCU's and even though your statement is somewhat correct, we cant say ALL SWAC teams can't compete at the D1 level. I think they are outdoing themselves considering the underfunding and whatever else may be going on there. With the right coach, who can recruit like Alcorn's, I think MVSU can also resurrect. The sad part is I believe the new MVSU AD & Deputy AD just got there from Alcorn, probably brought bad luck.
Yes, I have been watching Alcorn this year and after not playing last year, their renaissance has been remarkable. Nevertheless, if you look at the history of SWAC's teams as a group, not only have their ratings been far poorer than any other conferece, their teams actually have underperformed their ratings. Simply put, as a group they are playing at the wrong level. Now and then a team stands out from the other SWAC teams and gets some better than normal non-conference results, but those are exceptional cases. On the other hand, the SWAC teams do seem, to me, to be slowly improving relative to the rest of Division I. I always am rooting for SWAC teams to be competitive.
TRIVIA TIME Only THREE teams (excl MVSU) have failed to score a single goal so far in the 2025 season. Can you name them?* *and is this an auto-nomination for the Hot Seat?
So, what's the story at MVSU that caused them to cancel the season? I was very close to a couple of SWAC teams in the late 00s. I remember playing Grambling, who had some really good players. but they only had 11 players that game. I know they'd beaten ULM that season with only 11 and they did well in conference. THey were able to borrow a couple of players from the Volleyball team to have some subs also.
Speaking of, Temple? 2-17 in his first season last year and headed that way again with losses to LIU, Saint Peter's, and (*gulp*) Delaware St......
Here are what the end-of-regular-season ACC point standings will be if all teams perform in conference games exactly in accord with their current NCAA RPI ratings. These are based on (1) teams' actual conference schedules, (2) adjustments to teams' ratings to take home field advantage into consideration, and (3) assigning each team, for each game, a win, loss, and tie value (the three adding up to 1) based on the location-adjusted rating difference between the team and its opponent: VirginiaU 28.3 WakeForest 24.7 Duke 23.2 Stanford 22.2 NorthCarolinaU 21.7 FloridaState 21.5 NotreDame 16.7 Louisville 16.2 CaliforniaU 12.8 SMU 12.4 Clemson 10.7 MiamiFL 7.2 Pittsburgh 7.1 Syracuse 5.4 BostonCollege 4.7 VirginiaTech 4.5 NCState 1.2 Of course, each game is an entire win, or loss, or tie, but the list doesn't look too bad, for now. And also of course, as teams get results that don't match their current NCAA RPI ratings, the numbers will change.
Any rumblings about this? Just saw this on Twitter Ongoing police investigation at a D1 WSOC program with a well known coach we heard about this afternoon and will share more details when it becomes public. Very large 2026 recruiting class will be impacted as well.