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Posted

The inter department hate towards the basketball team has to be off the charts at this point. I remember other athletes used to be upset at how much priority mens basketball had back when I was there. This has to be 10x worse. 

Imagine your program having made the elite 8 and you are watching a team who hasnt placed top 3 in the conference get paid millions and you aren't making a penny. Or having won what 7 conference titles back to back 😂😂. Id hold a grudge forsure.

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Posted
4 hours ago, TheA_Bomb said:

Anyone catch the tidbit from Stu that there's no Soccer NIL $ at SLU?

Isn't one of our biggest boosters a big time soccer supporter?

I think soccer and most women's sports are places a little NIL money can go a long way. We actually care about Men's soccer at SLU.

That comment was specific to the transfer portal. There are individual and team soccer deals. In order to recruit in the Men’s or Women’s Soccer transfer portal, players often want to know how much money you have for them. The Women’s Soccer program for example has landed just 2 transfers without a local connection in the past 4 seasons under the current transfer format. It’s very competitive to land a high level national level player from another geography. It’s a priority to be more competitive in that space.

I gave a recent example in the WBB thread that a top 25 coach lost a portal recruiting battle for a player because the other school paid $300k for the player. He thought he could land that particular player for low $100k-$125k. He was surprised at the numbers.

That brings up the related topic of the new 28 roster limit. Both soccer teams are currently 2 over the limit, not counting the Spring portal. SLU has done well with it compared to others. Some other programs have been a mess with rosters in order to meet the new 28 limit. Many players have been scrambling to find a new school this past year.

The federal judge on the $2.8 billion antitrust settlement, said today she would not approve the settlement unless the NCAA would change its proposal regarding roster limits. This judge has taken a big interest in the roster limits part of the case. She wants the limits to be gradually phased in over a number of years. P4 programs want roster limits to make it more difficult for players to transfer elsewhere. It appears that after previously ignoring the judge multiple times regarding roster limits, the NCAA will allow for the gradual phasing of them in order to complete the settlement. As that would be the only thing holding up the agreement.

All 28 roster players may receive full scholarships, unlike before when the limits were 9.9 and 14 and money was spread around. Some high level programs expected to he in the 70% plus range of fulfilling that. Previously there have been other types of scholarship money and financial aid, academic, other, etc…to help offset the scholarship limits.

There have been 3 new portal transfers playing this Spring. (2 were mentioned)

In order to be more successful, all of SLU’s programs need to primarily recruit multi year players, and develop, retain them. The portal is a necessary place to be to supplement the base recruiting with a few impact transfers. And it helps to add multi year transfers. Analytics show that that success is often greater than 1 year transfers. This applies to other programs as well such as Men’s basketball. 

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted
15 minutes ago, courtside said:


2025 Fall Non-Conference Schedule with 2024 RPI:


SMU 7

Missouri State 19

Indiana 23

Akron 35

SIUE 65

Portland 83

Seton Hall 88

South Florida 100

Blackburn N/A

Exhibition:  Notre Dame 49 DePaul 101

Of note, several opponents have strong recruiting classes for 2025. Both Portland USF have top 15 classes. 

https://slubillikens.com/sports/mens-soccer/schedule/2025

No Bronze Boot game at a City Park.   Crap!!!   The Women's schedule shows that they play at SIUE the same day.  Hoping this gets adjusted 

Posted
54 minutes ago, OkieBilliken said:

No Bronze Boot game at a City Park.   Crap!!!   The Women's schedule shows that they play at SIUE the same day.  Hoping this gets adjusted 

They didn’t even fill CityPark (now Energizer Park) halfway. While I would like to see it there, I understand if it’s not.  City is using the place Saturday night, and City2 is off that weekend, this is the Sunday following, so still maybe it could be done.

What I would like to see is the SLU-City2 match in the spring open to the public

Posted
1 hour ago, OkieBilliken said:

No Bronze Boot game at a City Park.   Crap!!!   The Women's schedule shows that they play at SIUE the same day.  Hoping this gets adjusted 

It usually gets announced a little later in the Summer. When you see location, you are seeing who is designated as the home team, which alternates annually. Even at City Park, one team is designated as the home team each year and has to give up an on campus game for it.

Also note that SLU Women Soccer are hosting Missouri and SLU Men’s Soccer are hosting SMU, as part pf a doubleheader on Sunday August 24th. 

Posted
Just now, courtside said:

It usually gets announced a little later in the Summer. When you see location, you are seeing who is designated as the home team, which alternates annually. Even at City Park, one team is designated as the home team each year and has to give up an on campus game for it.

Also note that SLU Women Soccer are hosting Missouri and SLU Men’s Soccer are hosting SMU, as part pf a doubleheader on Sunday August 24th. 

I hope that is correct.   There is no reason at all why the SLU Women should be wasting a road game at Edwardsville.  Doesn't help the RPI one bit.   

Posted
4 hours ago, OkieBilliken said:

I hope that is correct.   There is no reason at all why the SLU Women should be wasting a road game at Edwardsville.  Doesn't help the RPI one bit.   

Including 2025, SLU will have played SIUE 10 of the 13 seasons Katie Shields has been Head Coach, and, in each of the past 4 seasons. Twice it has been an exhibition game in addition to that.

SLU knows how to schedule. They consult with someone in soccer analytics to make their schedule and much of it is about predictive RPI. They have data going back two decades. They are very good.

In recent years, SLU has had an RPI of 21, 10, 10, 7. etc…

Overall record. Your opponent’s overall record, and a few other things matter most. The NCAA Tourney looks at wins against the RPI top 50 the most with bubble teams and with some of the seeding beyond the top four or so seeds. SLU will schedule 4-5 good opponent/top league non-conference games. They will also try to schedule a few RPI top 100 teams. And they will have 1 or 2 or a few easier games that aren’t good RPI games. Getting results against the top teams is what they need the most. 

And these are mostly home and home games vs the better/top teams and leagues. Long gone are the days where SLU would have to go on the road to play top level programs. If they won’t play SLU home and home, plenty of other good programs will do it. That took a long time and a lot winning but it arrived a few years back. 

SLU will play the game annually with SIUE as long as they get to play it at City Park. It’s also a good sell to players and recruits.

if and when that ever changes, SLU may move it to an exhibition game depending on that year’s schedule. Lindenwood currently has the better program. They won the OVC last year. They were not eligible for the NCAA Tourney due to the silly rule about postseason eligibility moving from D2 to D1. Teams have to wait 3 years. 

And, it actually hurts SLU’s RPI more to defeat SIUE at home vs on the road. 

SLU Men’s Soccer also schedules well using analytics and data. SIUE is much more competitive on the Men’s side at this time. 

  • 3 weeks later...
Posted

SLU alum Max Floriani played all 120 minutes helping to lead San Jose to a 1-0 shutout win over Portland, and, a place in the U.S. Open Cup Quarterfinals in July.

Max has started 4 of the last 7 games for San Jose, playing at a high level in his rookie season. He is mostly playing right back next to St. Louisan Daniel Munie in a 3-4-3 formation. 

Max had the opportunity to play with Lionel Messi. Pretty fun. (from his youth club coach Srgjan Smileski)

https://x.com/fc1974glsa/status/1923110880318808332?s=46

Max also had the opportunity to start snd play the full 90 against former Billiken teammate Patrick Schulte:

https://x.com/slumenssoccer/status/1916640678873825784?s=46

 

Posted

Former Billiken Max Floriani might be in line for either a start or playing time Saturday in Energizer Park against City SC. San Jose just played Wed night, so player rotation seems to favor that. We’ll see.

Posted
On 5/23/2025 at 1:20 PM, courtside said:

SLU alum Max Floriani played all 120 minutes helping to lead San Jose to a 1-0 shutout win over Portland, and, a place in the U.S. Open Cup Quarterfinals in July.

Max has started 4 of the last 7 games for San Jose, playing at a high level in his rookie season. He is mostly playing right back next to St. Louisan Daniel Munie in a 3-4-3 formation. 

Max had the opportunity to play with Lionel Messi. Pretty fun. (from his youth club coach Srgjan Smileski)

https://x.com/fc1974glsa/status/1923110880318808332?s=46

Max also had the opportunity to start snd play the full 90 against former Billiken teammate Patrick Schulte:

https://x.com/slumenssoccer/status/1916640678873825784?s=46

 

Max has come a long way. And, he’s just getting started at the professional level. SLU wasn’t recruiting Max. They were recruiting his high school classmate (Warren Township) and friend, Anthony Parker. They played on different club teams. Max rose up the ranks in high school ball, and at FC 1974 Libertyville. He was the Illinois Gatorade Player of the Year that also played some midfield. 

Max was another redshirt success story at SLU. He developed into an elite level center back and outside back during his college career. He then became the 2nd overall MLS draft pick in the 1st round. 

As for Warren Township, FC Libertyville, etc….the SLU Women’s Soccer team is keeping that train going with 3 players. Sarah Sarnowski played for the same coaches at FC Libertyville. 2025 SLU player Addison Stanciak broke the school record for goals in a season this year at Warren Township. And 2025 Sydney Dulak has helped lead her Libertyville High School team to a deep playoff run this season in Illinois Class 3A.

It took Max 2 months to become the majority starter at right back for San Jose in a 3 back system which is what they often play when he plays. (They have also used a 4 back system.) Rodrigues has played there 2 full seasons and part of a 3rd season. Max had a big gash under his eye in a game last week. But he is fine and he’s ready to go.

Posted
1 hour ago, Lord Elrond said:

Max Floriani announced as starting for San Jose here in Energizer Park. Simon Becher on the substitute list for City SC

Just got a yellow 

Posted
1 hour ago, billikenfan05 said:

The Soccer Tournament starts today. A handful of Billiken alums, including Chad Vandegriffe playing for Dortmund, are in the field. Streaming on Youtube. 

https://tst7v7.com/mens-bracket/

Looks like a really fun event and would probably be great to attend. 

Boca Dallas has a  former Ambush player

Fordham has a player. 

City Football FC is all former Colombian pros, sadly none from my favorite team the Millionarios. 

Bumpy Pitch FC makes me laugh.

Posted
2 minutes ago, TheA_Bomb said:

https://tst7v7.com/mens-bracket/

Looks like a really fun event and would probably be great to attend. 

Boca Dallas has a  former Ambush player

Fordham has a player. 

City Football FC is all former Colombian pros, sadly none from my favorite team the Millionarios. 

Bumpy Pitch FC makes me laugh.

Dueling For Lincoln is a St. Louis based team. Some of them have played for the Ambush briefly as well.. 

There are a ton of former Ambush players in the field Vandegriffe, Will Eskay, Christian Briggs are ones I know of. 

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