Problem Statement: Collegiate football serves as a cornerstone of the university sports movement, fostering both physical fitness and mental fortitude. However, these teams frequently encounter a multi-layered "barrier system", including: scheduling conflicts between academics and athletics, funding shortages, psychological pressure from expectations, and infrastructure limitations. Without a systematic intervention, these hurdles will lead to a decline in both athlete recruitment and retention, ultimately undermining the core educational values of university sports.

Approach: The study employs a mixed-methods design integrating the Delphi technique for expert consultation and a pre-test/post-test experimental design on a sample of 120 students (100 males, 20 females) from football teams across four universities. The core intervention is the Dual-Path Management (DPM) Model, focusing on four solution clusters: (1) Personalized digital scheduling; (2) Socialized support network engagement; (3) Stress-resistance psychological training; and (4) Academic flexibility mechanisms.

Purpose: To identify key barriers and evaluate the effectiveness of the DPM model in mitigating their impact, thereby improving retention rates and competitive performance of collegiate football teams.

Results: Following 24 weeks of implementation, the overall barrier perception index decreased from 4.12 ± 0.45 to 2.38 ± 0.52 (on a 5-point scale, p < 0.001). Notably, the "Academic-Athletic Conflict" barrier saw the most significant reduction (54.2%). The student attrition intent (intention to quit) dropped from 32.5% to 8.3%. In terms of performance, the experimental groups recorded an 18.5% improvement in ball control and team coordination metrics through video-based data analysis.