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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/TripleFinish on 2024-07-06 20:40:01+00:00.

Thesis

Someone has compared the USMNT to Texas A&M. That doesn’t work for a number of reasons; instead, the closest college football equivalent to the United States Men’s National Team is the University of Central Florida.

Why A&M doesn’t work

  1. A&M plays in the most renowned conference in the world. The USA plays in a much more maligned confederation, and has had to join forces with another confederation (CONMEBOL) to try to earn some respect this cycle–though it didn’t go so well this first time around! UCF has much more in common with the United States on this front, beleaguered in lower conferences for decades only to finally now be working with the Big XII. A European country (England, for instance) would be a much better A&M comparison in this regard.
  2. A&M is storied as a perpetual… definitely not “blue blood”, but at least somewhat close to it. This reputation doesn’t match what they’ve actually accomplished at all; no conference championships in something like 7000 years (granted, that’s an exaggeration). The USA isn’t close to that echelon, much closer to UCF in general “football” reputation, though both of them have plenty of actual titles. For A&M, think something more like England, with its ties to the history of the sport and utter lack of recent trophies.
  3. The Aggies are wildly popular within their sizable fan base–it’s very clear that A&M fans love their team more than, IDK, Florida or Michigan or USC fans love theirs. (Note to these fan bases: this is good for you. It’s definitely not healthy to love a team this much.) Or, you know, more than UCF fans love UCF. USA soccer fans aren’t all that stir-crazy about the team, and match UCF much better. A better comparison to A&M football fever would be, IDK, England.
  4. Ooh, but one place the USA does go off? Twitter! The United States is the birthplace of Twitter, but more to the point, we harass, malign, and post incessantly on Twitter about everything, up to and including men’s soccer. What fanbase is known for its overuse of Twitter to the max? I’ll let you see for yourself who the Twitter Mafia is. A&M fans use Twitter as well, obviously, but not disproportionately to other sources of fandom, so they compare to more typical countries, like England.
  5. A&M’s fan base is also large, but they don’t have the enrollment to support it being the absolute largest. The USA has the opposite problem; even though our population is huge compared to literally any other country besides China and India, we don’t have the hugest fanbase, failing to even be #1 in our own continent behind a much smaller country. Similarly, UCF’s enrollment dwarfs your school’s enrollment unless you attend the literally only school with more students than use (Liberty!), but our fanbase, while vibrant and growing, isn’t even top two in our own state yet, falling behind two much smaller universities. For A&M comparisons, I think you’d want to be looking at something like England.
  6. A&M has a horrifically bitter rival, who (while not exactly dominating the head-to-head matchup) has achieved far more success than they have, much to A&M’s chagrin. (And that bitter rival isn’t even satisfied with the objectively impressive successes they have had!) Oh, and that rival notably got the better of A&M in their last match, a sting that surely has lasted for quite a long time. (And that rival might not even select A&M back as their fiercest rival overall!) The USA has a fierce rival, as well, but unlike A&M, Mexico would absolutely unquestionably choose us back as its biggest rival. In another difference, after being behind for decades, we’ve actually eclipsed Mexico in terms of overall success (including a very fun win in the knockout stages of the World Cup), leaving them to languish in confusion and pain. It’s not a perfect comparison to UCF, because at least Mexico has won a fair amount of conference championships and an Olympic Gold, but UCF is definitely a better USA comparison than A&M in this regard. When thinking of a country in A&M’s shoes, I might think of England, whose fierce rival across the channel has completely eclipsed them overall, with far more recent success apart from the head-to-head matchup (and, of course, very memorably coming out on top in the highly important most recent matchup between the two).
  7. When thinking of fans who would gather together to burn things before a big game, which fan bases would you think of? A&M? Check. UCF? Lol no. USA? Lol no. Some European squad like, idk, England? Wouldn’t put it past them.
  8. Finally, the big one: national championships. A&M is not a “never-won”. Was it way, way, way, way, way long ago? Yes, of course, but those kids played extremely hard and extremely well, and <small>(coughtwo ofcough)</small>their championships remain valid even though the players are pretty much all dead and buried. Yet the paradox continues–these prior championships are a core part of the lore of the program, and yet they are obsessed by the desire to bring the championship back “home”, unsatisfied with simple past successes. The closest possible comparison in the soccer world is certainly Uruguay England, who won 64 years ago and has yet to reclaim it since. The United States has, according to some, never won one of those fancy World Cup championships, even though we definitely have. Tell me what’s more UCF than that.

To summarize, while there might exist a more American program than UCF, I can’t think of one. Meanwhile, I’m not sure what soccer nation you’d compare A&M to, but whatever one you pick, I’m sure it wouldn’t be mutually embarrassing.