Since national signing day was a week or so ago, I've gotten a few emails from people asking about where certain Juniors players were heading for college. Instead of directing people to 5 different places, I figured I'd post a list of players that have signed or at least have verbally committed. So with all apologies to Alex and his former Juniors update, here's some commitments for you.

Stats for all division one NCAA schools that have had at least 10 players play a game in MLS. Ranked by average games played.
Players Avg GP Median GP Avg Goals 1 FIU CUSA 11 118.1 28 10.0 2 UCLA P12 57 101.5 75 8.9 3 Indiana B10 29 98.

Photo by ISIPhotos.com

The latest Fox Soccer MLS Draft Big Board is out, and with six weeks to go, there have been plenty of changes to the list of Top 25 prospects heading into Janaury's MLS Draft.

The very top of the Big Board is largely unchanged, with Duke's Andrew Wenger and Akron's Darren Mattocks remaining at the top, with UCLA's Kelyn Rowe and North Carolina's Billy Schuler following them.

When last we checked on the Sounders Academy alumni in their first year of college soccer, we learned that three would be continuing their seasons into the NCAA Tournament along with a couple moving into the postseason in lower divisions. But a week later, only one remains.

NCAA Division I

After a bit of a slide (by their standards) in the second half of the season, the defending national champion Akron Zips - featuring Sounder DeAndre Yedlin at fullback - missed out on a bye in the NCAA Tournament and instead had to face Northwestern in the first round.

UConn might have had its perfect run and extended shutout streak both come to an end, but the Huskies are still the top team in the country.

UConn settled for a draw against Notre Dame last weekend but improved to 12-0-1 after a 2-1 win over Providence on Wednesday to maintain its place at the No.

Creighton hopes to slow down Maryland. (Photo via Creighton Athletics Department)

In men's college soccer this weekend there is yet another big match that pits two of the top teams in the country against one another. A defensive powerhouse against an offensive juggernaut. For those who are keeping tabs of course I am talking about Maryland and Creighton's match tonight.

UConn had a bit of a scare, but still managed to maintain its hold on the top spot in the latest Fox Soccer/SBI NCAA Top 25.

The Huskies posted an impressive victory over St. John's last weekend, but nearly ruined their perfect record against Yale, but avoided the upset courtesy of a last-minute overtime game-winning goal.

By JOHN BOSCHINI

No. 1 Connecticut stayed perfect with a win over quality opposition after a 2-0 victory over No. 11 St. John's on Saturday.

More than 5,000 were on hand for the Big East conference opener for both teams. St. John's staved off numerous chances from UConn (8-0), but Allando Matheson finally broke through in the 74th minute, snapping St.

We've reached week 2 of the college soccer season and despite their all being freshmen, some of our Sounders Academy players are already making an impact on the college game. Last week's edition had a little intro to each player for those who didn't watch the Academy season, so refer back to that if you aren't sure who some of the players are.

By JOHN BOSCHINI

After a 2010 that saw the top spot change only once, the number one seed seems to be a cursed position this time around.

No. 1 North Carolina followed up a win over former top seed Louisville with a double overtime loss against unranked Virginia Tech.

Some more involved coverage of both the Huskies men's and women's soccer teams is on the to-do list here at the Heart, but in the meantime I thought it was worth highlighting the fact that the men's team has entered the NSCAA national rankings at #23 after starting the season 2-0-1. The last time the Huskies were ranked was a brief period in October last season when the Huskies were also ranked #23rd after a big win over Portland.

Photo by ISIphotos.com

After an impressive victory over another championship contender, it's no wonder that Louisville maintained its perch atop the Fox Soccer/SBI NCAA Top 25 rankings.

The Cardinals topped UCLA in an early-season battle of national powers to justify their preseason No.

The Miami Hurricanes college football program is in a lot of trouble. There's even talk of the NCAA coming down with an SMU-like death penalty on the school. Recently, the first penalties were announced. In all, 12 current players were reprimanded. Of those 12, eight of the players are suspended for at least one game.

Tribe's Nicolas Abrigo Earns National Honors Courtesy TribeAthletics.com Mon, August 29, 2011 WILLIAMSBURG, Va. - After scoring a pair of goals in the College's upset win at No. 5-ranked SMU...
[[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more!

[Editor's note: We welcome back contributing writer and longtime friend Ryan Reft. He's kindly allowed us to repost this essay from his groupblog Tropics of Meta. For some of his past contributions to CultFootball see here, here and here.]

Over the past fifteen to twenty years, historians have increasingly emphasized the role of sports as both a driver and reflection of society.

That was the dismayed, slightly disbelieving, question posed by a fan of a Mexico team last night to the North Carolinian worker at the food stand getting him a beer and hot dog. We were at the Carolina Panthers stadium (actually named, of course, after a large financial institution, the Bank of America), and it was clear that the phenomenon of tens of thousands of people needed to go to the bathroom and buy food during a sharply circumscribed fifteen-minute period was strange and overwhelming to a system set up for U.

On a busy soccer Saturday (Champions League Final, Mexico v Ecuador at Qwest, Sounders v Real Salt Lake) the University of Washington released its soccer schedule for the coming fall. It is a schedule that should help their RPI come tournament selection time with Dawgs playing 2010's #4 (Cal), #6 (SMU), #8 (UCLA), #21 (Tulsa) and #34 (Florida Gulf Coast) all ranked higher than they were.

A look at the Houston Dynamo preseason, with some audio from after the Dynamo's 5-0 victory over SMU.

Marvin Chavez / Photo by Harlan Bowling

Just a few days after making the trek up to Frisco to catch FCD against Houston Baptist University, I once again found myself on that familiar field 4, this time for a night scrimmage that saw FCD cruise past SMU 3-1. During the Schellas Hyndman regime, SMU has become a sort of minor league farm system for FCD recruits, so I was interested in catching this one.

Marvin Chavez / Photo by Harlan Bowling

Just a few days after making the trek up to Frisco to catch FCD against Houston Baptist University, I once again found myself on that familiar field 4, this time for a night scrimmage that saw FCD cruise past SMU 3-1. During the Schellas Hyndman regime, SMU has become a sort of minor league farm system for FCD recruits, so I was interested in catching this one.

Certain college programs are associated with certain coaches in MLS. Here we are used to Sigi Schmid picking UCLA or other southern California kids. FC Dallas has gotten used to their coach picking guys from Southern Methodist University. In both cases this is because the coach used to be there. The Seattle Sounders went a little off the board with their 2nd pick, when they picked Juan Cruz out of SMU.

With MLS' drafting season nearly complete (the Supplemental Draft is tomorrow...more on that after the jump) we can start to get a better picture of what the Houston Dynamo roster will look like in 2011. The most obvious change is the youth movement, with several veterans not returning including Pat Onstad, Richard Mulrooney and Adrian Serioux.

The Houston Dynamo have exercised their right to offer a contract to academy product Josue Soto under the league's newly expanded "home grown" player rules. The 5-8, 180lb midfielder joined the Dynamo Academy in 2007 after high school at Prepa Tec in Monterrey, Mexico.

Soto played for Campbell College in 2007 and 2008, earning First Team All-Atlantic Sun Conference honors both seasons.

We'll update the combine news and notes as much as possible here during the day so stay tuned.
+ Per @MLS_Insider "Don't forget that Game One of the #MLS Combine will stream live at MLSsoccer.com today at 1:45 EST. Tell a friend." ~That's really outstanding news.
+ ESPN.com's Scott French talking about the six SoCal MLS Combine prospects
+ Meet SMU's Leone Cruz via MLSInsider
+ A Family Affair via MLSInsider
+ Dustin gets brotherly advice via MLSInsider

It's not every day you get to learn from the 2010 MLS Coach of the Year. But today was my day. The one and only Schellas Hyndman took center stage this morning, and it was awesome.

4-4-2 in the Classroom

The day started in the classroom, where Schellas took us through a tactical breakdown of the 4-4-2 system of play, a shape he knows well as that's what he employs with FC Dallas.