Top Stories

Maryland wins NCAA Title

 MarylandChamps (AP) 

Graham Zusi had enough magic for two game-winners in the NCAA Final Four.

After his stunning free-kick winner on Friday to beat St. John's, Zusi stepped up yet again on Sunday, pouncing on a loose ball in the 67th minute for his second goal in three days to help Maryland beat North Carolina, 1-0, in the NCAA final. The victory gave the Terrapins their third NCAA Title and second during Zusi's four-year career.

Maryland created more chances and played the better soccer, but much like they did on Friday against St. John's, the Terrapins struggled to convert chances. At least before Zusi pounced on a deflected shot and slipped a left-footed shot past UNC goalkeeper Brooks Haggerty.

Zusi earned Final Four MVP honors for his two game-winning goals.

What did you think of the final? Share your thoughts below.

With the m

Comments

  1. I don’t think college soccer is going to regularly produce a ton of top talent. However, to completely throw it out the window is a bit extreme. There are guys such as Eddie Pope, Maurice Edu, Gregg Berhalter, Brian McBride, etc. that all got their starts in college. These soccer schools have their drawbacks, as well. Many of them produce hyper-competitive *%@holes that don’t pan out either.

    Someone above made the point that the U.S. is a huge country. The MNT program needs to keep it’s eye on ALL available talent pools, because in a nation this size, there will be people that choose different development paths, or fly under the radar all together.

    Reply
  2. I tried to watch the final but after 15 min I had to turn it off. I did see one creative player, Schuster(sp?) of NC. However I do agree with Northzax that the college game does have its place.

    MLS picks off some of the better players with their Generation Addidas contracts well before they reach 22. These GA contracts pay well above the $13K/yr. My opinion is that they must increase the number of those GA contracts in the future . We can all agree that a senior at 22 is late coming into the pro ranks.

    In the meantime that college education guaranteed by the GA contract is quite valuable especially if they dont make it in the pros.

    Reply
  3. college soccer has it’s place. was this a great game? not at all. but it serves a valuable purpose for MLS and US Soccer in general (let alone USL) the US is too big, and the professional infrastructure too small, to catch the developing talent and potential talent in the US (let alone the smaller financial rewards of going pro versus getting a degree.)

    think of the extensive industrial college and professional scouting for basketball. colleges have potential players on the board by the age ten, there are magazines and websites devoted to players in middle school. and yet Michael Beasley ends up at Kansas State, not Kansas, Carolina, Duke, UCLA, Michigan State, or one of the other prestige programs? how does a great quarterback end up off the radar at Hawaii?

    now imagine that instead of having 70 college soccer programs (plus some good DIV-II and DIV-III teams searching every high school from Hilo to Bangor, each of them looking for 4-5 players a year, you had only the 14 MLS teams looking for 4-5 players a year. that’s a lot of potential talent missed. maybe not pure worldbeating talent, but certainly good, solid, professionals.

    what we need at the NCAA level is to continue to develop strong coaches and strong rivalries. having a strong ACC is good, it puts pressure on all the teams to continue to develop.

    Reply
  4. People like Alex and Pete should be running our leagues and associations…. they seem to have ALL the answers… atleast in a comment space on the internet they do. Quality!

    Reply
  5. Pete,

    Please feel free to hop on the next one-way plane to Argentina if you can’t live without exciting Argentine soccer news. Don’t bother sending any of it back to me, I couldn’t care less about a three-way tie in Argentina unless it involves some fine women of the land and it doesn’t involve soccer.

    Reply
  6. In a less extreme way than Pete, i have to say i agree.

    If MLS thinks the NCAA is going to be some major feeder of talent to the league it should give it’s head a shake. Running proper academies (not the ones they have now) is the way to go.

    NCAA produces a few top players, the most exciting of which skip MLS entirely for europe and other than a few exceptions each draft year, are mostly terrible.

    Reply
  7. no pete, i’m with you….i can’t watch it. i love soccer but US college soccer is pretty unwatchable. for young men their inability to have any tactical knowledge is frightening

    Reply
  8. and btw love the site and its one that i frequent several times a day, but college soccer to me (and apparently just to me) is a waste of time.

    Reply
  9. Any of you bother to watch the pathetic display of St. Johns vs your beloved Champion? to me its mind boggling how St. Johns made it that far, but that’s college soccer. Its terrible to watch with the exception of very players, the most haven’t a shot in hell and they aren’t even interesting to watch.

    And yes 99.9% will go back into the shadows, Your naming 6 people from one team, ok good for the Terps, but that’s not all of college soccer.

    FYI, its not that i dislike college sports, i just think that posting this POS story over something more interesting than for example a three way tie in Argentina is a waste. Yes, i know the Argentina story is up there now but it doesn’t change the fact that it got second billing to a bunch of guys that most of us will never see again (except for those 6, of which 2 might make it).

    Reply
  10. I’m not a big college soccer fan. But Pete, you’re talking out of a piece of your anatomy. The last U.Md. Champion team produced Edu, Garey, Burch, Rogers and Seitz–all of who were at least multi-season MLS players with Edu, Rogers and Seitz earning reps as guys with real futures with the USNT. This current U.Md side probably has 6 players who’ll play some MLS soccer (unless they jump to Europe first). Not all of them will go pro this coming year (like perhaps Kassel for instance). But the point is: there was a fair amount of talent on the field. And that doesn’t even include Wake Forrest who could have as many as 3 players go in the first round of the MLS Draft.

    I used to be one of those people who derided college soccer as being a wasteland, a terrible place to develop skills and how if you were any good, you needed to turn pro at 16. Except, there were these guys who kept emerging that weren’t such great shakes as youth players but just seemed to mature later and were well served by college. Guys like Dempsey and Ibesevic have turned out to be first-rate pros and they were not on anyone’s radar at 16 or 17 or even 18. I don’t want college to be the primary means of developing US soccer talent. But without college, we’ll lose a lot of talent–guys who either mature later OR, if faced with a choice of going pro at 16 or getting a college degree, will go to college and give up soccer (unless playing college soccer is a viable route to the pros).

    Reply
  11. Ives, keep the college soccer posts coming. People like Pete only come out of the shadows of fandom to talk down on things that they don’t understand.

    Reply
  12. half of the USA U-17 residency program will “fall back into the shadows”, while I’m at it, most D-1 basketball or football players will too. whats your point Pete? get rid of college sports because they aren’t good enough? You might be an idiot. You prolly watch BCS football, do you whine because some of them wont go pro?

    Reply
  13. I think these types of posts are a waste of time, who gives a rats ass who wins college soccer? 99.9% of those playing will go back into the shadows

    Reply

Leave a Comment