Elmer Bolowich’s North Carolina Tar Heels have been near the top of the men’s college soccer scene for the past few years. UNC lost on penalties to Akron in last season’s College Cup semifinal, but we’re giving them the slightest of edges over Caleb Porter’s Zips in our preseason men’s ranking.

The ranking is our unique effort to track the 48 NCAA Tournament qualifiers through the season. Thus the overall profile of the list reflects all conferences receiving automatic tournament bids, plus the at-large selections from larger conferences. The ACC for instance has 7 teams in the preseason ranking, and the Big 10 has 6. The rankings are of course updated every Monday during the season.

Bolowich’s Tar Heels are quite simply loaded for bear. Standouts from last year’s squad include, Cameron Brown, Alex Dixon, Kirk Urso, Michael Farfan, Billy Schuler, Dustin McCarty and Brett King. Scott Goodwin will have the spotlight on in goal as he replaces the graduated Brooks Haggerty.

An Akron-North Carolina rematch late this season would be a soccer fan’s treat, but the teams also square off in the season opener Sept. 3 at Chapel Hill. Caleb Porter’s squad boasts a quartet of Youth National Team defenders including Kofi Sarkodie, Chad Barson, Zarek Valentin and newcomer Petty Kitchen, goalkeeper David Meves and attacking players like Michael Nanchoff, Anthony Ampaipitakwong and Darlington Nagbe.
 
Other perennial contenders high in the preseason ranking include Maryland, UC Santa Barbara, Wake Forest, defending national champion Virginia and UCLA.

One thing about this ranking is that with the weekly fluctuation of results in men’s college soccer, it’s always dynamic. We’ll be updating the rankings every Monday on TopDrawerSoccer.com Click here for the opening offering of the ranking.