Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We were looking at the roster of a top college men's soccer team during a game that was recently on TV. A lot of the players, maybe even most, had played in the USL for a couple of years prior to joining the college team. I don't think redshirting is going to make much of a difference if the key to getting recruited is playing in a pro league first.

That's what my kid did.

+1 mine was accepted to the college, played USL and then joined the Varsity team a year later. He was lucky there were a lot of UPSL and a USL team in the area so he could keep playing at a high level.

They miss to many kids the way recruiting process works. And a lot of the junior year HS commits (which are getting more rare anyhow) turn out not to perform by the time they arrive at college 2 years later. A lot happens in that time.

But, the pps are correct the male college soccer rosters are getting older and older.

I think it will start decreasing in the next 4~5 years, the main challenge is the extra year of COVID eligibility paired with an extra year of redshirt eligibility - so that's why students are staying in college for 5~6 years right now . You see it in other NCAA sports, so it's not just unique to soccer - heck there's a 26 y/o TE from Miami that's been enrolled in college for 8 years

Hopefully some degrees after 8 years. When I played soccer way too many years ago, a girl on our team was from Canada with extra year of highschool 19, took a 4 year gap before college. Was a 23 year old freshman.

8 years in college he better be leaving with a MD, PhD or law degree

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We were looking at the roster of a top college men's soccer team during a game that was recently on TV. A lot of the players, maybe even most, had played in the USL for a couple of years prior to joining the college team. I don't think redshirting is going to make much of a difference if the key to getting recruited is playing in a pro league first.

That's what my kid did.

+1 mine was accepted to the college, played USL and then joined the Varsity team a year later. He was lucky there were a lot of UPSL and a USL team in the area so he could keep playing at a high level.

They miss to many kids the way recruiting process works. And a lot of the junior year HS commits (which are getting more rare anyhow) turn out not to perform by the time they arrive at college 2 years later. A lot happens in that time.

But, the pps are correct the male college soccer rosters are getting older and older.

I think it will start decreasing in the next 4~5 years, the main challenge is the extra year of COVID eligibility paired with an extra year of redshirt eligibility - so that's why students are staying in college for 5~6 years right now . You see it in other NCAA sports, so it's not just unique to soccer - heck there's a 26 y/o TE from Miami that's been enrolled in college for 8 years

Hopefully some degrees after 8 years. When I played soccer way too many years ago, a girl on our team was from Canada with extra year of highschool 19, took a 4 year gap before college. Was a 23 year old freshman.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We were looking at the roster of a top college men's soccer team during a game that was recently on TV. A lot of the players, maybe even most, had played in the USL for a couple of years prior to joining the college team. I don't think redshirting is going to make much of a difference if the key to getting recruited is playing in a pro league first.

That's what my kid did.

+1 mine was accepted to the college, played USL and then joined the Varsity team a year later. He was lucky there were a lot of UPSL and a USL team in the area so he could keep playing at a high level.

They miss to many kids the way recruiting process works. And a lot of the junior year HS commits (which are getting more rare anyhow) turn out not to perform by the time they arrive at college 2 years later. A lot happens in that time.

But, the pps are correct the male college soccer rosters are getting older and older.

I think it will start decreasing in the next 4~5 years, the main challenge is the extra year of COVID eligibility paired with an extra year of redshirt eligibility - so that's why students are staying in college for 5~6 years right now . You see it in other NCAA sports, so it's not just unique to soccer - heck there's a 26 y/o TE from Miami that's been enrolled in college for 8 years

I believe with redshirt you are still allowed 4 years of play within 5 years of starting college. So there will still be 5th years and many stay while going the extra year in the many 5-year master programs colleges offer.

On the topic of redshirting -- does anybody have definitive knowledge of how it works for NCAA soccer? I understand the rules for DI football changed and players can still redshirt even if they played in 4 games (but not more).

I've seen mixed information about NCAA soccer redshirt rules. Some information indicates that 1 minute of playing still removes any possibility of redshirting that season while other information indicates the less-than-4-games redshirt rule applies to NCAA soccer too.

Anybody know? Is it different for men's and women's? DI and DII?

(I know there are rules for medical redshirts too; not interested in that for purposes of this discussion.)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We were looking at the roster of a top college men's soccer team during a game that was recently on TV. A lot of the players, maybe even most, had played in the USL for a couple of years prior to joining the college team. I don't think redshirting is going to make much of a difference if the key to getting recruited is playing in a pro league first.

That's what my kid did.

+1 mine was accepted to the college, played USL and then joined the Varsity team a year later. He was lucky there were a lot of UPSL and a USL team in the area so he could keep playing at a high level.

They miss to many kids the way recruiting process works. And a lot of the junior year HS commits (which are getting more rare anyhow) turn out not to perform by the time they arrive at college 2 years later. A lot happens in that time.

But, the pps are correct the male college soccer rosters are getting older and older.

I think it will start decreasing in the next 4~5 years, the main challenge is the extra year of COVID eligibility paired with an extra year of redshirt eligibility - so that's why students are staying in college for 5~6 years right now . You see it in other NCAA sports, so it's not just unique to soccer - heck there's a 26 y/o TE from Miami that's been enrolled in college for 8 years

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We were looking at the roster of a top college men's soccer team during a game that was recently on TV. A lot of the players, maybe even most, had played in the USL for a couple of years prior to joining the college team. I don't think redshirting is going to make much of a difference if the key to getting recruited is playing in a pro league first.

That's what my kid did.

+1 mine was accepted to the college, played USL and then joined the Varsity team a year later. He was lucky there were a lot of UPSL and a USL team in the area so he could keep playing at a high level.

They miss to many kids the way recruiting process works. And a lot of the junior year HS commits (which are getting more rare anyhow) turn out not to perform by the time they arrive at college 2 years later. A lot happens in that time.

But, the pps are correct the male college soccer rosters are getting older and older.

Anonymous wrote:We were looking at the roster of a top college men's soccer team during a game that was recently on TV. A lot of the players, maybe even most, had played in the USL for a couple of years prior to joining the college team. I don't think redshirting is going to make much of a difference if the key to getting recruited is playing in a pro league first.

That's what my kid did.

This is the most unhinged question on here ... If you have to consider this then your kid isn't that great. Take that dose of reality and stop blaming it on their birthday.