Breaking into soccer’s professional ranks never seemed like a sure thing for Nate Dossantos while growing up. Long before he became one of the most dependable defenders in the USL Championship, Dossantos was a young player in Canada trying to find the best pathway to becoming a professional player in a country without a clear blueprint for doing just that.
Canada’s professional soccer scene has expanded significantly in recent years with the introduction of the Canadian Premier League. However, when Dossantos was a youngster dreaming of playing professionally, the most direct path toward achieving a professional soccer career through the academy of one of Major League Soccer’s few Canadian teams.
Dossantos spent time with Toronto FC’s academy during his youth career, but when that opportunity came to an end, he was suddenly left searching for another route to keep his dream alive.
“It’s tough in Canada,” Dossantos said on a recent episode of the Rowdies Podcast. “Up until the CPL came around a few years ago, if you were outside of those three MLS academies, it’s like where do I go from here?”
Playing college soccer across the border suddenly looked like the best option for Dossantos. Following his exit from Toronto FC’s academy, he started playing for Sigma FC, one of Canada’s top development academies outside of the MLS system. Sigma had a proven track record of developing players who were able to earn opportunities in college soccer.
Getting a college or university to take notice of you isn’t as easy as it sounds, though. Dossantos took it upon himself to reach out to prospective schools.
“I was that kid emailing all these schools saying this is my info, this is my highlight tape, let me know what you think,” he recalled. “I’m just straight up going through school directories, looking for emails and sending them out.”
The college offers were slow to roll in. In fact, Dossantos didn’t receive any offers. He spent the first semester back at home, working and training to stay in shape in case an offer came his way.
“For young players, I would say that your path is your path,” he said. “Really embrace that. It doesn’t do you any good to kind of compare yourself to others. I saw that from when I was in that position where I didn’t have any offers, so I stayed back. I was working and training at the same time while all my friends went to college and I was just trying to keep it alive and make it happen… It’s really a journey and everybody’s story is different.”
Eventually, one email from a college showed up in Dossantos’ inbox. Josh Faga, an assistant at Duquesne University, was interested in bringing Dossantos down from Toronto to play for the school. That one reply changed the trajectory of Dossantos’ life.
“I ended up down there at Duquesne because of (Josh),” he said. “He was really the one that vouched for me and said I should be brought in… He was a huge influence on me. When I was a freshman, he sent me to Seattle to play in USL League Two. He said I should go play there and basically got me on a plane to go there. That summer was huge for my development.”
Dossantos spent two seasons with the Duquesne Dukes men’s soccer team before transferring to Marshall University, where he helped the school win their first national title alongside current Rowdies teammates Pedro Dolabella and Max Schneider.
The college pathway ended up paving the way for Dossantos to sign his first professional contract with Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC in 2022. Five seasons later, Dossantos has more than shown his value in the USL Championship as a key contributor in Pittsburgh’s Players’ Shield winning season in 2023 and the Charleston Battery’s Eastern Conference title the following year.
This year, Dossantos has missed only one minute of action for the Rowdies, who currently lead the league with 13 clean sheets and have posted a total of 17 shutouts in all competitions in 2026. So far, Dossantos has gotten exactly what he was hoping for when he made the move to Tampa Bay. After seeing his playing time diminish toward the end of last season in Charleston, Dossantos arrived in Tampa Bay eager to establish himself as a consistent presence at center back.
“Every player wants to play,” he said. “That’s the mentality every player has. I was obviously super excited coming here this year knowing that I had the opportunity to play center back. That’s a position that requires a certain kind of consistency. So, I want to be on the field for every minute. I want to play every game, and it doesn’t matter to me if it’s the first round of the Open Cup game against a semi-professional side, or if it’s the regular season, or the playoffs. I just want to be out there. I want to contribute. That’s just kind of my mentality and why I really push myself to always be available and help the team.”
That personal drive for consistency has helped reach a personal milestone five seasons into his USL Championship career. In his last outing for the Rowdies this past Saturday, the veteran defender surpassed 10,000 regular-season minutes played in the league.
“Achieving that kind of thing just makes me grateful,” he said on the milestone. “I’m grateful to have played that many games and to get that many minutes in the league across three really good clubs and some really special places. It gives me a real sense of pride too, because I pride myself on being healthy and available for the team.”
