Very telling things about the current state of college soccer

Didn't an Akron player (Luke Something) a decade or so ago transfer from ND college.

 

Luke Holmes

 

One to watch will be the current situation on a merger with the University of Findlay (DII) and Bluffton University (DIII) in Ohio.

I’ve seen these in the past, it’s not really worked out regularly for both athletic departments to keep operating. As of right now, they are and merger is supposed to be in full operations in 2025.

 

Any idea who else operates with two athletic departments for what is supposed to be a single school (albeit with two campuses)?

Unrelated to sports, but each of these schools maintains a wild number of degree programs for a combined 4,700 students. I'm guessing that's going to change.
https://www.limaohio.com/top-storie...or-bluffton-university-university-of-findlay/

 

It can be argued that the regional campuses for state schools operate in a manner like this — University of Wisconsin, University of North Carolina, etc.

This setup is definitely abnormal, but has been seen in mergers/acquisitions before: Wheelock, UTRGV, LIU-Post, Nebraska Christian, Urbana, just to name a few. In the end, it eventually closes the doors of one of the institutions and moves operations to the bigger entity.

I do not think this will end up positively for Bluffton. And, rumor has it another nearby is close to shuttering as well.

 

The university systems model (like the Wisconsin system or the other big ones) I get. Those schools are separate universities with fairly distinct missions, even if there's some overlap in what they do academically at a lot of the smaller ones (and to some degree overlap athletically, I guess, even if the flagship operates at a different scale than its smaller cousins).

But I'd never heard of what you mention with the merged small schools. It's interesting but I can see it being tough to make that work long term, as you say. Operating two athletic programs for one school is awkward, to say the least, but I wish them all luck. So many of the small privates are in tough shape. It's sad to watch them close.

 

The proximity of Findlay and Bluffton is so close as well (15-20 minutes), it does not make tons of sense. In that area, there’s 5 small-ish schools that all are trying to coexist.

Expand it by 25-30 more minutes, and you’ve got another 4+ schools. In the current environment, there’s definitely going to be some collapses.

 

https://www.al.com/educationlab/202...ay-31-as-loan-bill-fails-to-gain-support.html

Another school closing

 

That one was inevitable. Was waiting for the official announcement. There was just no way it was going to be saved.

 

I saw on another board that Birmingham Southern men's soccer just started announcing it's 2024 commitments on Instagram last week. There were a couple of MLS Next kids from Hoover-Vestavia who are going to be scrambling now after they though they were staying local.

 

UAB?

 

I think that there's a NAIA school that played in Hoover (or at least I saw the NAIA tourney in Hoover, years ago).

 

My guess is that if they were going DIII Birmingham Southern, they probably weren't being recruited by DI UAB (although it's possible they just preferred a smaller school or the academics at BSC). Only other DIII is Huntingdon in Montgomery. They could obviously leave the state or find an NAIA/DII too. It's just late in the year and there are fewer options if they wanted to stay in the south or in AL.

 

College soccer needs division sanctioning, which would hopefully bring a year-round schedule.