Will the SEC ever get Men's Soccer?

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Will the SEC ever get Men's Soccer?

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No.

I've been told by those involved with the decisions that it will never happen.

Exactly

It would only help.

You've gotta pick a men's sport to cut or some more women's sports to add to make that happen.

I know South Carolina has women's beach volleyball and women's cross country (not a men's team) to give them the space that allows them to play men's soccer.

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It would suck

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Florida would become a powerhouse overnight.

Georgia and Texas A&M would be able to recruit extremely well, based on where the league's women's teams usually get their players.

I always find it funny that a dude who went to [ahem] the University of West Virginia is such an elitist on here.

The SEC makes so much more money than anybody else that if the school commit the resources to it — get the best coaches, build the right facilities — it would do well in time. It's happened in plenty of other sports.

I'm not saying the Alabama or the Mississippi schools would ever be title winners, but some schools would make a natural progression to contention with the right financial support. Auburn made the Elite 8 in the women's tournament last year, and they've only been around since 1993. Heck, UAB is a decent CUSA soccer program that makes the tournament regularly.

I don't think he's being a elitist. I don't think college soccer will help us at this point. The argument is that limiting players to 20 hours a week of practice with one game a week is detrimental to their development at an important stage of their career. Players literally everywhere else are playing professionally.

I think the impetus for college soccer does a couple of things. It continues our idiotic need to pair sports with education, and it waters down the player pool. That the pairing with education is a necessity in America might be a good argument to help grow the sport and attract world class athletes, but I'd wish we would invest in regional training centers instead. That the burden of investment moves to schools is also something I oppose, as with that investment comes the risk of running players into the ground, at great potential cost to amateur players. It's the wrong way to design a system to support players, but it is the system we have.

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I don't think he's being a elitist. I don't think college soccer will help us at this point.

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I'm not saying the SEC adding men's soccer is going to transform the USMNT picture at all.

I'm just saying if other conferences can do it, the SEC would be able to at a high level because of their money.

He's just saying the SEC would suck at it from a purely college soccer perspective.

I agree that college soccer isn't the way to go for developing the talent in our country. It's OK for finding a Jordan Morris or a Darlington Nagbe that fell through the cracks or a real late bloomer. But you're right, college isn't the setup for real development.

I'm just against the idea that — purely inside the context of college soccer — that the SEC wouldn't be good at it.

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I'm just against the idea that — purely inside the context of college soccer — that the SEC wouldn't be good at it.

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The SEC would be good at it, and again, if pairing sports with education expands interest, that should have a trickle-down effect so that you should get good players.

I honestly wish we could get small nodes of organization to start producing players at the rates we should. I mean, if Iceland produces the amount of players they do from such a small population, theoretically, there should be nothing stopping a similar sized American city from producing good players.