Wisconsin Soccer Central

Changes are coming to the NCAA Division III soccer landscape in Wisconsin.

On Tuesday, it came to light that UW-Superior has applied to join the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference, possibly as early as the 2015-16 school year. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel was first to report the potential move, which in all likelihood would mean the end of Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference men's soccer.

Two days later, Carroll announced that it will leave the Midwest Conference and rejoin the Collegiate Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin starting in 2016-17. The Waukesha school previously was a member of the CCIW from 1955 to '92.

The UMAC currently has eight teams, with seven Minnesota schools and Northland College in Ashland. A UW-Superior statement cited several reasons behind the decision to change conferences, including competitive balance and travel – the latter involves consideration of both finances and missed class time for student-athletes.

Superior is easily the smallest school in the WIAC – its enrollment is roughly 2,800, with UW-River Falls the next-smallest at 6,800. All of the other seven league members have enrollments of at least 8,000, with three schools above 11,000. In the UMAC, Superior would be the third-largest school, behind St. Scholastica (4,200) and Northwestern-St. Paul (2,900). Three members have enrollments of less than 1,000.

A decision on Superior's UMAC membership application is expected no later than June 1.

The Yellowjackets' departure would mean the end of WIAC men's soccer because the NCAA requires at least five teams for a conference to sponsor a sport. Only UW-Oshkosh, UW-Platteville and UW-Whitewater have men's teams – Finlandia (Mich.) joined the WIAC as an associate member in 2009, giving the league the minimum five teams.

However, the requirement for a conference to receive an automatic NCAA tournament bid is seven teams – meaning that while the WIAC has been a conference for the past five years, the teams essentially were treated like independents when it came time to distributing postseason berths.

"I guess not much changes for us," UW-Platteville coach Enzo Fuschino wrote in a text message. "We did not have an (automatic bid) and we still won't have one. We probably won't have a conference anymore, which means no more conference honors for the athletes, which was nice to have."

UW-Oshkosh men's coach Wytse Molenaar said he hadn't heard of any potential teams in the Upper Midwest that could join the league to keep it at five teams, let alone to take it up to seven. Asked about any of the five other WIAC schools that have women's soccer programs potentially adding men's teams, he was blunt.

"With everything else that's going on, probably the last thing they're looking at is adding teams. They're probably looking at the opposite," Molenaar said. "Budgets are getting tighter. ... Would I applaud it? Absolutely. But do I see that happening, realistically, with everything else going on? Probably not."

Superior has been competitive in men's soccer, with a 10-12-2 record over the league's first five seasons – the Yellowjackets also won the inaugural WIAC tournament last fall. Molenaar said he will continue to schedule matches against Superior and the other state teams, regardless of what happens with the conference.

"They got better every year that I've been at Oshkosh," Molenaar said of the Yellowjackets. "From that perspective, yeah, you really hate to see them go. Do I understand it? Yeah, for sure. It probably makes sense for them."

However, it's a vastly different story for the Superior women's program. The Yellowjackets are 1-163-1 in their 21 seasons in the conference and have lost 142 consecutive WIAC regular-season matches since their lone win back in 1996. The league will be reduced to eight teams on the women's side.

Carroll, with an enrollment of 3,500, is the largest school in the Midwest Conference and also will be the largest member of the CCIW. However, while St. Norbert is the only other Midwest school larger than 2,000, North Park (Ill.) is the only CCIW member with an enrollment of less than 2,000. The Pioneers will join Kenosha school Carthage as Wisconsin schools in the league.

In soccer, Carroll has claimed a total of 20 Midwest titles in their 22 years in the conference – the men's program has three regular-season championships and five tournament titles, while the women have six of each.

• The Horizon League approved the addition of Belmont as an affiliate member of the league for men's soccer, starting next fall. The Bruins (6-10-2 in 2013) have been an independent for the past two seasons after moving from the Atlantic Sun Conference to the Ohio Valley Conference, which doesn't sponsor men's soccer. The addition of the school in Nashville, Tenn., gives the Horizon League nine teams for both men's and women's soccer – Youngstown State has only a women's team.
• Marquette junior goalkeeper Charlie Lyon was named the Big East Conference Men's Scholar-Athlete of the Year, becoming the first student-athlete from the school to earn the conference's top honor. Lyon, the Golden Eagles' starter in goal for the past two seasons, is a biomedical sciences major with a 3.856 cumulative grade-point average and was a first-team selection on the Capital One Academic All-America team last fall. On the field, he's posted a 29-11-3 record in helping lead Marquette to Big East titles and NCAA berths in 2012 and '13, and currently is the program's career leader in goals-against average (0.82) and save percentage (.823). Lyon will receive $4,000 in scholarships, which can be applied to graduate or professional studies.
• The format and schedule for Saturday's Wisconsin Division I Spring Cup men's tournament has been altered, with each of the four teams now playing just one match. Marquette will play host to the University of Wisconsin at 11 a.m. at Valley Fields, while UW-Milwaukee will host UW-Green Bay at 11:30 at Engelmann Stadium.
• Former UW-Parkside women's coach Ron Rainey left Iowa after eight years and took over at Dartmouth. Rainey was the first coach in Rangers' history, leading Parkside to a 10-6-2 record back in 1994. He's also led the Towson State and Ball State women's programs during his career.