This article discussing the history of ASU’s soccer program involved many of the themes from other articles from this semester. The most obvious being the article on Howard University’s soccer team that was dominant at the same time as App. In the 1970s Howard was stripped of a national championship due to concerns over “eligibility” of certain players, these certain players being people of color from Africa and the Caribbean. The article regarding ASU’s soccer team is eerily similar to Howard getting its championship stripped, but in our case a whole history has been erased. It’s hard to look at any store that sells app state apparel on King Street and not see something referencing the Michigan game in 2007, but no one seems to know how dominant our soccer program was in the 1970s and 1980s. Although it isn’t addressed at all in the article, there is some conversation to be had on the impact of race and the fall of ASU soccer. Most of the star players mentioned in the article such as Usiyan, Somnazu (both from Nigeria), David Mor (from Israel), and Udogu (also from Nigeria), were all minorities and top tier soccer players. While maybe not the only reason for its fall, race had to have had a huge impact on the view held by administration regarding App State Soccer. I think it is clear to see why App State was not pressed to forget the success of soccer and move their attention to mainstream collegiate sports like Football and Basketball. Connecting to the ideas found in Gridiron University, football was considered by many to be a white sport and also provided an easy way to provide the university with income from their sports programs. Seeing the fall from a collegiate soccer powerhouse, to not even having a team brings to question why the soccer program was really pushed to the wayside.
