VALDOSTA — Valdosta State University announced the addition of women’s soccer to the Blazers’ athletic family on Wednesday afternoon.

The announcement was made by VSU president Dr. Patrick Schloss and VSU athletic director Herb Reinhard at a press conference. They both cited the growing popularity of soccer and the need for additional women’s sports at VSU as reasons for the addition of women’s soccer.

“The addition of the women’s soccer team will extend our commitment to provide athletic opportunities to our students, and particularly, it’ll demonstrate our support for gender equity in women’s athletic competition,” Schloss said. “Soccer is a sport that captures the imagination in the state of Georgia and the region.”

The women’s soccer team will be the 12th intercollegiate athletic team at VSU, and will start competing in the fall semester of 2011. Reinhard said the university plans on starting a nationwide search for a coach within the next month, and he hopes to hire a coach by late winter or early spring 2010. Once hired, the coach will spend the next year recruiting, raising money, scheduling, buying equipment and doing the things necessary to get a program off the ground.

“Because of our geographic location, the wonderful things we have at this university, the quality of coaches we have, the quality of our athletic staff and just this community in general, I think we are well-positioned for women’s soccer to join the ranks of the rest of the athletic program, as far as being competitive on a national level,” Reinhard said. “Maybe not the first year, but certainly in a short period of time. That will be our goal. We will expect our women’s soccer team to compete at the same level nationally that we strive to do in all of our sports.”

Reinhard said VSU is finalizing plans that will allow the team to play on a field behind the new athletic fieldhouse. Except for the playing field, the infrastructure for women’s soccer is already in place. The fieldhouse has two locker rooms for women’s soccer, a coach’s office for women’s soccer and a locker room for officials.

“What really, I think, propelled us forward very, very quickly was the fact that we had already put in the infrastructure for bringing a program aboard, as far as where will they be housed,” Reinhard said.

Reinhard said the key hurdle in starting the new sport was funding. The state of Georgia does not fund intercollegiate athletics, so all the funding comes from student fees and community support. Reinhard and Schloss thanked the VSU students, Student Government Association and the community for supporting the addition of women’s soccer.

Both Reinhard and Schloss hope the addition of women’s soccer can be financially beneficial to VSU. Schloss said, in his experience, when an athlete chooses a school, that person brings an average of two students along.

“Soccer can be a valuable commodity for this university, not only for what we can do from an athletic point of view, but also from an enrollment point of view. We have the opportunity, with this soccer program, to bring 20-25 new students to this campus. In today’s economy and in higher education today, if you can bring new students to the campus for a program, and there’s other valid reasons why that program can be successful on this campus, that’s something you need to take a look at.”

The team will compete in the Gulf South Conference with the rest of VSU’s teams. There are currently eight schools in the GSC that have women’s soccer.

Reinhard said the GSC has been very competitive in women’s soccer over the years. Christian Brothers won the national championship in 2002, and West Florida played in the national championship game in 2008.

In attendance at the press conference were Bill Kent and Lee Blenman. Kent is the executive vice president of South Georgia United, a local soccer club. Blenman is the director of coaching for South Georgia United.

“We’re extremely excited to see it happen,” Kent said. “The growth and interest in soccer in South Georgia, really in the last few years, has exploded. The young people are really excited about soccer as an alternative to other athletics. Soccer is now the most participated in sport for youths in the United States.”

Blenman said that he and Kent knew about the addition of a women’s soccer team at VSU for a few days, but they were sworn to secrecy, and didn’t spill the news to local players.

“Now that the cat’s out of the bag, I can tell you a lot of our players will be very, very excited,” Blenman said. “We have a lot of excellent girls around the ages of 15, 16 and 17 right now that would love to come play at Valdosta State.”