Very often on this trendy period of faculty soccer, it feels just like the NCAA has misplaced the plot.
So lots of the latest adjustments to the game — such because the switch portal, NIL and income sharing — are lengthy overdue trendy updates which have helped put some well-deserved energy again within the gamers’ palms.
The NCAA, although, has refused to implement or take a stand on points which have arisen from these adjustments — issues like tampering, exceeding the roster wage cap and the like — insisting that it’s the authorities’s job to determine these guardrails.
Fortunately, the NCAA hasn’t completely given up on what actually issues in faculty soccer: the primary phrase within the sport’s title.
The NCAA secured an enormous win in courtroom final week with the ruling that Tennessee quarterback Joey Aguilar wouldn’t be receiving an additional yr of eligibility.
Fortunately, logic received out and Aguilar, who turns 25 this summer season, received’t be again for his eighth season in faculty soccer.
His argument for yet one more yr was an extension of Diego Pavia’s case final season which received him an extra yr of eligibility. Pavia argued, with Aguilar and a number of different faculty soccer gamers becoming a member of the lawsuit, that years performed at junior faculty shouldn’t depend in opposition to Division I eligibility.
There’s many the explanation why this argument doesn’t maintain water however most likely the most important is…the second phrase in junior faculty.
The injunction that allowed Pavia to play final season was a web constructive due to what he delivered to the 2025 season as a Heisman finalist who led Vanderbilt to its first 10-win season in program historical past.
It additionally set a harmful precedent, one which clearly made Aguilar assume he may equally get an additional yr.
In idea, I’m pleased with the occasional further yr of eligibility. When granted, they’re mainly all the time related to gamers who’ve missed intensive time to accidents all through their careers and whose professional prospects are low due to their harm historical past and age.
That doesn’t monitor with Aguilar’s path. He redshirted in 2019 at Metropolis School of San Francisco earlier than the 2020 season was canceled as a result of COVID-19 pandemic. He then transferred to a different JUCO program, Diablo Valley, taking part in in 16 video games over the 2021-22 seasons.
After that, he hopped to the FBS degree with a switch to App State, the place he began 25 video games over two seasons there, lacking minimal time.
The Pavia injunction made Aguilar eligible for the 2025 season so he landed at Tennessee after initially transferring to UCLA for what was basically his bonus yr.
It was a particularly profitable season. He began all 14 video games, racking up 3,565 passing yards and 24 touchdowns. He led the Southeastern Convention in passing yards throughout the common season.
However as soon as once more, it was a full season competitors — Aguilar’s fourth on the collegiate degree with 10-plus video games and fifth with six or extra. That’s a full profession after which some.
So it’s a reduction the NCAA fought the case in courtroom and much more that the Tennessee state decide sided with the group over the native athlete.
Don’t get my level twisted: Participant empowerment is nice for faculty sports activities.
However with that energy comes tasks. Amongst them, the accountability of realizing when it’s time to maneuver on to the following stage of soccer and/or life.
