NCSA College Athletic Scholarships Blog

 September a new month…a new season. September started off with our first Junior Varsity game against the Loyalsock Lancers. I was starting at Linebacker, we ran a 5-2 and on offense I started at Guard but I eventually switched to Center halfway through the game. Our team wasn’t prepared for a game; what I mean we never actually practiced as a team. It was more important to get the Varsity team ready for Fridays. So we lost 44-6. I recorded 8 total tackles, 4 solos and 4 assists. So the next day it was back to practices 3:00 pm - 5:30 pm Tuesday through Thursday. But, I was still lifting and running after practices.

Thursday was pre game like every week. Pre game was full pads put light hitting and we had a spaghetti dinner afterwords. This pre game was special though because we were preparing for an important game against the Danville Ironmen. Danville was a team that could make it to playoffs and they have so much talent. Plus this was time for the Central Columbia Blue Jays to redeem themselves from 3 years of losing seasons. We did just that we showed up on Friday played football and won against a great team with a great D-I prospect quarterback, 48-35. I did not play this game but I was still on the sidelines cheering the team on, congratulating players, and calling pass or run. After a great win we had practice Saturday, we watched film and lifted a little afterwards. Next Monday we had a JV game against Danville, it was a tough game but in the end Danville’s special teams led them to a 26-6 win. We lost our second game. I finished this game with 7 total tackles; 1 assist and 6 solos. Now it was back to practices, lifting and running after.

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Congratulations Women’s Golf Recruit Chelsea Michalek signing with Lehigh!  Good Luck!

The eyes and ears of the majority of the college football world were focused on Norman, Oklahoma for the big showdown between Texas Tech and Oklahoma to see who gains the inside track at playing for the National Championship.  My eyes were focused on the less compelling race for the ACC title between Florida State And Maryland.  However, it wasn’t the football game that had my interest, it was the compelling story of FSU corner-back Myron Rolle.

On Saturday Myron became the most well-known student athlete since Bill Bradley to win the Rhodes Scholarship.  Rolle has made a name for himself the past 3 years at Florida State by starring on the football team while taking an enormous load in the classroom and the Tallahassee community.  He graduated pre-med in two and a half years with 3.75 average, was awarded a $4,000 grant to conduct stem cell research and set up a program to educate Seminole Indian children about fitness, obesity, and the importance of fitness.  He was so involved in the classroom that he was actually criticized by coaches for spending time studying abroad instead of working out with his teammates.

On Saturday Myron made decision to interview for the Rhodes scholarship and risk missing part or all of his team’s pivotal match up.  It turned out he was able to interview in Birmingham, board a jet, fly to Maryland, receive a police escort to the game and join his ectstatic teammates late in second quarter of a huge 37-3 victory.  He now faces the agonizing decision of pursuing a NFL career or taking a year off to study at Oxford to study a one year’s master degree in medical anthropology.

The decision will no doubt be difficult, but Rolle went through a similarly difficult decision during the recruiting process.  He has known all along that he plans to open a medical clinic in the Bahamas following his playing career, and he placed that goal in mind during recruiting.  He chose Florida State in part due to his official visit where he spent the entire first day dedicated entirely to academic activities.  The school layed out a plan where he could graduate in three years to enter the NFL draft and then ultimately attend med-school.

Rolle’s amazing accomplishments are a tribute to true student athletes across the country.  Here is to hoping he continues to put academics first. I’ll also support this idea floating across the blog-o-sphere (Shanoff); Perhaps the award for the most outstanding player in college football, the Heisman Trophy, should be awarded to the most outstanding student athlete in college football.

Last week we discussed the first step that every student athlete must take:  Receiving an objective evaluation.  Once you have taken that step and you have developed realistic expectations, it is time to convey your academic and athletic abilities to the college coaches through the second step:  Building an Athletic Resume Website

Years ago, families would send hundreds of paper resumes to college coaches through traditional mail distribution channels, thankfully those times are behind us.  With the improvements in technology, information is easily updated and sent through the internet which has changed the way college coaches recruit.  In today’s recruiting world, student athletes need to have some sort of athletic online resume.

Why an online resume?

Let’s start with the obvious.  Every student athlete needs an athletic and academic resume.  This will allow college coaches to examine all the important measurable information they need to make decisions.  With that in mind, families can either create a physical paper resume or build an online resume.  Let’s look at the advantages of having that information online compared to paper:

• Customization: As student athletes progress through the recruiting process, the majority of their athletic and academic information will change. In some cases this information will change frequently. The idea of updating a paper resume and printing out a new copy for every change seems rigid and difficult. However, most websites and online resumes can be changed within seconds making them much more logical to use for this type of resume. Advantage: Online Resume

•  Distribution:Let’s assume that a student athlete is qualified for 200 college programs. Each one of those programs has multiple coaches on the staff and each one should receive the information to ensure it will be reviewed. If each program has 4 coaches, that information now needs to be sent to 800 individuals. The thought of sending a paper resume through the mail to 800 people should make most families shudder. The evolution of the internet and email has now made traditional mail channels almost obsolete. Emailing the information to 800 coaches does not seem nearly as time consuming or expensive. Advantage: Online Resume

• Trackability: Once the information has been sent off to college coaches, the knowledge of whether or not it has been looked at will be critical in determining the next steps. When sending a paper resume through the mail, the only way a student athlete will be able to know that a college coach has seen their information will be waiting on a response or return letter which might never happen. Advances in technology provide student athletes the unique opportunity to place tracking capabilities in their online resumes. This means that if they email the college coach, they will know whether or not the college coach opened the information and provide them the understanding of how to follow up. Advantage: Online Resume

What should the resume contain?

To put it simply, the online resume should contain all the athletic and academic information a college coach might be interested in.  The information needed by the college coach will vary depending on the sport.  Every student athlete will not have all the information immediately.  It will be a process of gathering all the data needed throughout the recruiting experience.  However here is a list of some basic aspects that each resume should contain:

• Personal Info
• Statistical Info
• Scholastic Info 
• Athletic History
• References

Remember, the purpose of this online resume is to spark the interest of the college coach and convince them to allocate their time and money towards recruiting that student athlete.  Of course the quality of the athletic and academic information being evaluated will be the single most important determining factor.  However, the coach might only look at the information for a few seconds, so the more professional in appearance and the easier to navigate, the better the odds are that they will take the time to evaluate the entire resume.   

For an example of NCSA’s athletic resume website that we create for our student athletes, click here.

Next week I will discuss the third step in the process:  Highlight / Skills Video

NCSA caught up with rising volleyball star Alex Martin to talk about her high school and club seasons, and the opportunity to compete at the next level. 

NCSA: How did your high school team do this year?

Martin: This year was a pretty good year. We stood our ground with teams that should have beaten us and we beat teams that we out-hustled. Although this year was a rebuilding year I would say that we played pretty good. We learned a lot about ourselves and hopefully all the good energy will transfer over to next year.

NCSA: Were you recognized by your team or anyone else for your performance this year?

Martin: Surprisingly, yes.  I was in the paper every game I played. Which really was shocking because I only got to play 3 matches due to TSSAA rules (I switched High Schools). It felt great knowing that I was chosen out of all these talented girls I played with and against.

NCSA: How do you handle club tryouts? Are you nervous? If so, how do you get over your nerves?

Martin: Club tryouts for me are so fun! I have always felt pretty confident, because I know that if I get out there and leave110% on the floor and out hustle everyone and just play the game I know how to play that I will be fine. But I mean everyone has the jitters the first few drills and I just remember something my coach for club used to always tell us, “Heart is the difference between believing and achieving.” Then I just take a deep breathe, remember my fundamentals, and leave everything out on the court.

NCSA: What are you looking forward to most during this club season?

Martin: Where to start… This year is a very different year for me because I’m playing up an age group with Choo Choo 17-1’s.  I love a challenge and having to push myself to the limit, simply because I want to improve. It’s going to definitely be a challenge this year, but it’s a challenge I’m ready to overcome.

NCSA: What type of recruiting contacts do you have so far?

Martin:  Several contacts from SEC schools and also SoCon. I have reached out to many more schools and received questionnaires back from maybe half of them.

NCSA: What are your recruiting plans over the next 6 months?

Martin: I plan to continue contacting the schools I would like to attend, and continue to update my scouting report with stats, grades, strength and performance training achievements, all that.

NCSA: What is best advice you have heard about recruiting so far?

Martin:  Start early and stay organized. Stay on top of the things that colleges send you and keep sending them things to make you stand out to them, so that when they can contact you they will have knowledge about your prior achievements.

Carl Joseph was once dubbed “The Most Amazing Athlete I’ve Ever Seen!” by Dan Dierdorf.  After watching the below video I think you will agree with him.

At NCSA we work to help athletes like Carl achieve their dreams and attend college.  By refusing to accept what he couldn’t do, Carl made the supposedly impossible happen.

Necessary Roughness starring Scott Bacula is one of my favorite sports movies of all time.  In the film a group of walk-on students take the place of the previous year’s team that has been expelled for various NCAA violations.  However, the new “real student” team falls quickly in line by all signing up for Journalism 101 aka Snooze the Newz. 

Large groups of athletes “clustering” in a few majors and classes.  It only happens in the movies right?  The cover of yesterday’s USA Today would have you believe otherwise.

 B. David Ridpath has a confession to make. As the athletics department’s compliance director and liaison to academic services for athletes at Marshall from 1997 to 2001, he often told athletes to avoid tough majors if they wanted to play their sports.

A USA TODAY study of the majors of juniors and seniors in football, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, baseball and softball at 142 of the NCAA’s top-level schools shows athletes at many institutions clustering in certain majors, in some cases at rates highly disproportionate to those of all students.

Academic advisers for athletes face complex, pressure-filled jobs that have become more so in recent years as the NCAA eased rules on freshman eligibility while ratcheting up requirements for minimum progress toward a degree.

The USA today article paints a very grim picture of conflicted advisors, but the NCAA Double-A-Zone points out an important viewpoint:

Some athletes, like former Kansas State football student-athlete, Steven Cline, opt to switch majors rather than placing their eligibility at risk in a more demanding field of study.

Cline went to Kansas State with the intention of becoming a veterinarian, but after performing poorly in freshman biology, he said he discussed his situation with his athletics academic advisor who told him social science would be “an easier path.” Cline then made the decision to forget his dream in favor of, “not-so-demanding courses that helped him have success in the classroom and on the field.”

It’s a decision Cline regrets. “It was a stupid effort on my part,” he told USA Today. “I wouldn’t advise any other athlete to do that. I’d tell them to choose a career–a real career for their life after football and work toward it.”

Here’s the thing that USA Today doesn’t make clear, Cline had a choice. No one made him select social science. If he thought it would be too difficult to major in pre-veterinary curriculum, he could have made several decisions, including dropping out of football altogether.

At NCSA we stress to student athletes that the decisions they make will impact their next 40 years.  When looking at prospective schools it is extremely important for recruits to ask both athletic and academic questions.  In the end they will have to live with the decision.  That is why it is more important than ever to get started the right way!

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Many student athletes and families face a difficult choice during the college recruitment process of when, if ever, to specialize in a single sport.  The days of Bo Jackson tearing up both the diamond and gridiron appear over.  The thinking goes if an athlete could spend all of his or her time focused on improvement in a single sport, thus improving the athletes chances of attaining an athletic scholarship.

Naturally there is a wide range of disagreement.  One extreme advocates that each sport compliments the athlete overall.  Former Bronco QB Jake Plummer is in this camp, crediting his development to multiple sports.

“I guarantee it helped my career by rounding out my ability: hand-eye coordination, endurance and mental toughness,” Jake says.  “My ultimate goal is to get coaches to stop specializing their athletes, telling them they can’t play other sports because it’ll hurt their football. I played all three sports and handball whenever I could. That’s why I made it in the NFL - that rounded me out as an athlete.”

The nations number one defensive tackle prospect Jacobbi McDaniel was once a top baseball prospect, but gave up the sport after last spring to focus solely on football.  Still, scouts marvel at his quick hips, and one wonders if baseball helped develop that quickness.

At the extreme far end of the spectrum are athletes like the Martin brothers Zachary and Josh.  Their parents decided to have them drop all sports and focus on golf.  They were 6 and 8.  Today, they are two of the best young golfers in the country.

Their father justifies the decision with a simple, “I just wanted them to be great at something.”

Should athletes specialize in one sport, and if so what is the proper age?  What do you think?

NCSA is proud to present our recruiting gurus, Coach Bob Chmiel and Coach Randy Taylor, breaking down the top football recruits in America for Takkle Primetime.  In our inaugural webcast we break down Russell Shepard, Matt Barkley and the rest of the best quarterbacks in America.

Check out rest of  Episode 1of Takkle Primetime and the rest of Top 200.

If you would like to talk to a scout to learn how NCSA can unlock your recruiting potential click here!

NCSA Board Member and friend Kevin Carroll, a.k.a The Katalyst, stopped by NCSA headquarters last week to share his D.R.E.A.M. message with our team.  I urge everyone who watches this to use his message to find your red rubber ball.