I am a former DI athlete at a school with a reputation as an elite academic institution. I am also a former professor at a major research university where I served on the faculty committee that oversees intercollegiate athletics. I certainly understand and accept the need to keep perspective on why we go to college and the place that athletics plays in the life of the university. Yet this decision to cut back on seasons worries me. My sport (not soccer) went from Sept to June (and we trained all summer). I did not have trouble keeping up with school. I am sure there are abusive situations out there, and it is reasonable to put in place protections (i.e., limits on competition and practice time) to insure that students do not have coaches who ask too much. But this is definitely nothing like the norm. And we already have these limits. There is nothing at present standing in the way of success on both the athletic field and the in the classroom. At the university where I was on the faculty, in a BCS conference, the athletes did extremely well in the classroom. In every sport but 2 (I will let you guess which those are), the athletes had better GPA's than the average student, and not just a few but many teams had absolutely remarkable grades. There simply is no inconsistency between being an accomplished athlete and an accomplished student. If you want to be. The athletes do not need additional "protection" beyond what they already have. I know as a student, I would have deeply resented the NCAA taking away from training and competition time. I wanted more, not less. And I was a completely dedicated student as well. Let's not punish all student athletes for the sins of (just a segment of) athletes on two high-profile teams. I suspect this is more about money than anything else, but I am sure it will be presented, at least in part, as a protection for athletes. The result in soccer will be that fewer top players will choose to play college soccer - which would be a perverse result for an institution supposedly motivated by the desire to promote the welfare of student athletes.

I agree with Super Man. I to believe that our best soccer players should go pro. College soccer should take on a division 3 philosophical approach and that is the players are mainly in college to get an education. Once that approach kicks in at all levels of college soccer than US soccer at the pro level will improve because you will have more players who have the talent to go pro early and bypass college soccer.

TO PROF. B. FLOW: As a former College Director of Athletics and recently retired professor, I am sincerely grateful for your keen insight on what is being planned by the NCAA as you could not have been more accurate. What galls me is that I am sure that the NCAA is fraught with staffers who more than likely never put on a college athletic uniform of any kind, and thus really do not understand just what is required of student-athletes. For the uninformed or misinformed, to be eligible for intercollegiate athletics the recruiting process in and of itself is also regulated by the NCAA, however, all student-athletes must be enrolled in a full-time program of study of at least a minimum of 12 quarter or semester units and the "rule of thumb" is that they must study at least 3 hours for each unit of study, and must demonstrate they're making progress towards their degree and eventual graduation. Second, they must devote x-number of hours for practice depending on their sport, and thirdly, they must make themselves available for game time - home or away, which takes up to at least six hours for home games, and for away games, anywhere from 12 - 24 hours. As for the two unmentioned sports, I do believe that it should be three: football, basketball, and baseball, each sport having quite a lengthy season, and even baseball's post-season play takes one into early summer way after the spring semester is over. All in all I completely agree with you in your last sentences, though I am supportive of young soccer players go to college, BUT play on an outside team, amateur semi-pro or pro, in order to continue developing their skills. Lastly, Cony Konstin also hit the nail on the head and collegiate soccer MUST adopt the NCAA Division 3 model, and so if it works for D3, then they must be doing something right and so if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Ric, sorry for bothering but would you please share with all of us uninformed what is the model for division 3 ?