The 2016 NCAA Division I men's soccer tournament (also known as the 2016 College Cup) was the 58th annual single-elimination tournament to determine the national champion of NCAADivision I men's collegiate soccer. The first, second, third, and quarterfinal rounds were held at college campus sites across the United States during November and December 2016, with host sites determined by seeding and record. The four-team College Cup finals was played at BBVA Compass Stadium in Houston, Texas on December 9 and 11, 2016.[1]
The Stanford Cardinal successfully defended their 2015 title. Stanford played the North Carolina Tar Heels to a scoreless draw in the semifinals before winning a penalty shootout, 10–9, to advance to the Championship game.[2] The Cardinal then also tied the Wake Forest Demon Deacons, 0–0, in the final before claiming the back-to-back title with another penalty shootout victory, 5–4.[3]
Stanford tied the NCAA record for the Lowest Goals-Against Average in the Tournament (Minimum 3 Games) of 0.00 by becoming the fourth team to not allow their opponents to score a goal in the tournament. The other three co-record-holders are the 1976 San Francisco Dons, the 1995 Wisconsin Badgers, and the 2009 Akron Zips.[4]
All Division I men's soccer programs except for Grand Canyon, Incarnate Word, and UMass Lowell will be eligible to qualify for the tournament. Those three programs are ineligible because they are in transition from Division II to Division I. The tournament field remains fixed at 48 teams.
Of the 24 schools that had previously won the championship, 13 qualified for this year's tournament.
Format
As in previous editions of the NCAA Division I Tournament, the tournament features 48 participants out of a possible field of 203 teams. Of the 48 berths, 24 are allocated to the 21 conference tournament champions and to the regular season winners of the Ivy League, Pac-12 Conference, and West Coast Conference, which do not have tournaments. The remaining 24 berths are supposed to be determined through an at-large process based upon the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) of teams that did not automatically qualify.
The NCAA Selection Committee also names the top sixteen seeds for the tournament, with those teams receiving an automatic bye into the second round of the tournament. The remaining 32 teams play in a single-elimination match in the first round of the tournament for the right to play a seeded team in the second round.
^Syracuse played their home match at David W. Murphy Field, on the campus Onondaga Community College, instead of their regular stadium SU Soccer Stadium, due to field conditions from snowy conditions.[7]
