Get Ahead of The Recruiting Grind
November 18th, 2008 - byAthletic recruiting has come a light year in the last 25 years. Most fans of college sports focus on the changes in men’s college football and basketball, but women’s sports have come just as far. Becky Martin was initially hired 27 years ago by McDaniel College as a teacher, assistant volleyball coach and as the head basketball coach, For many years she successfully juggled jobs, but that all changed when recruiting became a priority. The Carroll County Times discussed the grind that Coach Martin goes through to land top recruits.
The grind
Half of a basketball coach’s job today is developing players and the other half is finding new ones.
The latter is far more grueling and turns coaches into salespeople.
doesn’t involve being on the court in practice or gameplanning or roaming the sidelines. It’s all about convincing a high schooler that your program is the right one to join.
And there’s a ton that goes into making that hap-pen.
First, coaches must identify the players they want, so they travel all over the country, and sometimes abroad, to attend prep games, AAU tournaments, recruiting camps and showcases.
Next is expressing interest in the player mailing information about the school and beginning the courting process.
Then it’s maintaining contact if the player reciprocates interest. That involves e-mail, phone calls, text messages and attending games all of which is regulated by the NCAA.
After that, it’s continuing to show interest while waiting for a decision.
Division I coaches can take verbal commitments from players at any time. That commitment doesn’t become official, however, until a signed letter of intent is received during one of two signing periods. This year, the early period is Nov. 12-19.
The process is similar for Division III coaches, but there is no letter of intent. The player can verbally commit, but it’s not official until a non-binding tuition deposit is made and the kid shows up to school.
Now imagine going through that grind on a shoe-string budget. For these reasons coaches turn to NCSA to help identify talent all across the country. Our Recruit-Match database allows coaches to streamline a large part of their early evaluation process.
The other take away from looking at the breakdown of the process is to understand how hard college coaches work to build relationships. Recruits can take control of their own scholarship search by being equally aggressive in contacting college coaches. The recruiting game changes every day, but in the end its all about finding the right fit.
