Making History with U.S. College Soccer

Just a week after Stanford University captured the women’s soccer title, four teams gather in Hoover, Ala., for the College Cup to decide the NCAA Division I Men’s Soccer Champion for 2011. Today, top-seeded University of North Carolina will meet the UCLA in one semifinal, while UNC-Charlotte will square off against Creighton in the other. By Sunday night, we will have new kings of college soccer.

However, there was a period when the NCAA – formally known as National Collegiate Athletic Association – was not the king of amateur sports in the United States. In the late 19th century, soccer teams (using the accepted American vernacular) popped up across the country, but mostly in the Northeast. After primarily playing against local amateur clubs, universities began to compete with each other and champions were determined.

At first, champions were determined on the field through a very limited league, called the Intercollegiate Soccer Football League. However, as the sport grew, it was obvious that there needed to be a broader consideration of which collegiate team was “the best.” To do this, the Intercollegiate Soccer Football Association (ISFA) polled college administrators and their votes decided which team would be anointed college champion.

Except for interruptions due to war and a period when the ISFA simply decided not to name a single champion, the ISFA used this method from 1926 to 1958. However, in a move reminiscent of the controversial process still used to determine the college champion of American football, the ISFA held a “Soccer Bowl” from 1949 to 1951 with two teams selected to play in a single match and the winner named champion.

Throughout these early days, the Ivy League schools made a mark with Columbia, Harvard, Princeton and Penn each claiming more than four titles. Penn lead the way with 10 championships, which was second only to Penn State’s 11 titles. This  pattern demonstrated the  heavy concentration of East Coast college soccer teams, but also showed that – with voting  determining the title – there was likely a biases against Midwest and  West Coast teams, if only because they were so rarely seen by many voters.

However, that was all about to change. With continuing growth and more colleges adopting soccer programs every year, there was an increase in interregional competition and greater interest in determining a clear champion.

According to an article in the NSCAA Soccer Journal by Mickey Cochrane and Len Oliver, the move to a united champion was driven and devised by Jack Squires, the University of Connecticut coach and chair of the NCAA Rules Committee. Undertaking the first NCAA Soccer Championship in 1959, four collegiate teams met after surviving their conference tournaments. It still had an East Coast flavor with Bridgeport University of Connecticut, West Chester University of Pennsylvania, and City College of New York (CCNY) joining St. Louis University from the Midwest at the University of Connecticut to for the forerunner of the College Cup.

Despite being viewed as underdogs entering the championship tourney, St. Louis dismantled CCNY 6-2 in the semifinal and then followed with an equally impressive 5-2 win over Bridgeport. The authors noted that St. Louis victory represented not only shift in recognizing Midwest and West Coast teams, but also greater recognition of U.S. born players.

“The Saint Louis team was composed of American players from the St. Louis CYC league, and 1959 represented the school's first season of varsity play after playing club soccer for several years. The Billikens matched up well against the more highly-touted teams loaded with foreign-born players,” Cochrane and Oliver write.

Additionally, it was the birth of a dynasty and the most storied program in American college soccer. St. Louis University would claim 10 titles and finish runner up three times between 1959 and 1974. Regardless of the outcome of this year’s College Cup, it is a period of dominance the college game is unlikely to ever see again.