Posted by

Aaron Nielsen ,

September 3, 2014 Email

Aaron Nielsen



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@ENBSports

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It's time for NCAA ‘football’ and even though schools such as North Carolina, UCLA and Notre Dame are the schools to look for, I'm not talking about the Pass, Run, Kick version. It is the first week of September which means the start of a new NCAA soccer season.



There has been talk recently about making soccer last the entire school year, with a break in the winter to try and give the game a higher profile. The idea is to also give the players a bit of breathing room, as currently schools will play up to 20 games from now to December in deciding the 2014 National Champion. See also: ENBSports' Top 100 NCAA Prospects list



Last year Notre Dame beat Maryland for the 2013 National Championship and both schools have players who have made an impact this MLS season with Harrison Ship now at Chicago from Notre Dame and Patrick Mullins now with New England from Maryland.



Both teams are strong this season with Notre Dame bringing back Patrick Wall, Leon Brown and Andrew O'Malley. All are seniors who have already graduated, and although most likely are not to be on MLS radars, they provide a strong spine to the team. Maryland has had a strong recruiting class and the transfer of Mael Corboz, who is a former New York Red Bull academy player and was a dominant performer at Rutgers the last two seasons. However, I am not yet sure they have a player who can replace Patrick Mullins goal totals.



My preseason top 10 for this season is:



1. North Carolina

2. UCLA

3. Connecticut

4. Notre Dame

5. Michigan State

6. Virginia

7. Louisville

8. Marquette

9. Stanford

10. Coastal Carolina



Other schools to watch including Maryland, Georgetown, California, UC Santa Barabra, Akron, Clemson, Duke, New Mexico and Washington.



My rankings are based as much on professional talent, and the teams in the top 10 are well represented in my 2015 MLS Top 100 prospect list. The top 10 list is also well represented by Canadian players with Connecticut being the Canadian school to watch, especially for those in Ontario with four players, including Cyle Larin and Allando Matheson, who should be high draft picks in the next MLS draft.



Michigan State are led by Jay Chapman who has Toronto FC academy experience. Meanwhile Coastal Carolina has Sergio Camargo who played with Chapman both at TFC Academy and in the PDL with KW United.



The top 100 player list this season is heavily influenced by MLS Academy and U-23 PDL clubs, which means I now refer to my work as MLS Draft and Homegrown signing period prospects. This is because many top prospects will be forgoing the draft to sign with the MLS club they have academy experience with.



The New York Red Bulls have the highest number of players in my top 100, with six including Brandon Allen, who I regard as my top prospect going into this season. The Red Bulls have been one of the most successful academy programs in the US Soccer Development Academy league since it has started and it will be interesting to see the influence it will have on their MLS club in the near future.



Another interesting Academy player is Seattle Sounders prospect Jordan Morris, who has great skill and potential but who wasn't as dominant as he could have been in college during his freshman season. It will be interesting to see if he can take advantage of his recent US National Team senior call up and play to that quality during this college season and force Seattle to sign him to a professional contract.



Of the non-academy players, Nick Besler might be the most interesting as he is the younger brother to Sporting KC and US National Team player Matt Besler, and he was also a key player in Notre Dame’s championship run last season.



The other major influence on this year’s top 100 list is the amount of non-American players, including four Canadians in Cyle Larin, Allando Matheson, Jay Chapman and Wright State's Emeka Ononye. There is also a number of younger Canadian players playing US college soccer who should be MLS players in the next few years.



Of note, my list also includes players from Jamaica, Sweden, Germany, Israel, Ghana, Spain, Nigeria, England, Ecuador, New Zealand and France. I think skill-wise these players deserve to be in my top 100 prospects, but it will be interesting how many make the transition to the MLS partly because of foreign player rules as well as in some cases players might wish to return home.



I have Axel Sjoberg after Cyle Larin as my top foreign prospect. He is a 6'7 central defender at Marquette and has dominated players at the college level with his size. This includes scoring 9 career headed goals. Sjoberg is only a junior after redshirting his freshman season, so he would only be draft eligible like Larin if the MLS offered him a GA contract.



Meanwhile, the name many have been talking about is Leo Stolz, who played with German youth teams and 1860 Munich’s academy team. Stolz is a quality player but I'm not sure he would have the same influence on a MLS club that he has at UCLA as he played a more holding midfield role in Germany.



Throughout the college season I will provide updates for general interest as well as going into more detail on the players who I expect can be influential in future MLS seasons.



I should also mention that CIS soccer will be starting shortly with York University and UBC being the schools to watch. Meanwhile, Simon Fraser University are ranked 3rd in the preseason NCAA Division 2 polls and were the top scoring school in that division last season. With the success of Tesho Akindele, people shouldn't ignore soccer at this level, with James Pucci a name to look out for.



Overall, the quality of players playing college and university soccer this upcoming year is quite good and I feel it shows the influence that ML,S and soccer in general, is having on North Americans. The sport isn't yet taking athletes from other sports and many player surnames in college soccer have interesting spelling, but the brand of soccer should be given huge credit, especially going directly up against the juggernaut of NCAA American Football.



I'm in favor of the longer college soccer season, despite the conflicts it might create for the MLS draft and the start of the MLS season. However, like professional baseball, I think a transition of draft, minor league soccer and then playing MLS when the player is ready, is the best way of preparing a player for a long and successful professional career.