NCSA Blog

                                                                                                                                                                                          The landscape of college recruiting has changed in recent years. There is no denying this fact. Most parents and former players remember a time when the senior year would determine the opportunities they had at the collegiate level after the fall seasons were complete. As seniors all over the country are finding out, scholarship offers have been made, some rosters are full and in many cases, doors have been closed. This can be a devastating realization for families that have not realized just how much the recruiting process has evolved over the years and thus accelerating its timeline. In most cases parents are left wondering, “Have we started to late?”I’m here to tell you there is still time. In the famous words of Douglas Adams, “Don’t Panic!” If you have a sincere desire to find a home to continue your athletic and academic career, there is a place for you to play. But I am going to be honest with you; the recruiting process is a game, plain and simple, and you have to know how to play it.

The first thing you have to realize the game has already started and you have to make up ground. Second, if you don’t know the rules of the game, or how it works, you can guess that you aren’t going to have much success in attempting to win the game. Now apply that analogy to the recruiting process and you can easily guess that your first step should be to get educated on exactly how the recruiting process works. Don’t go into this process blind, get educated and start making up ground.

First, you should read the NCAA Guide for the College Bound Student-Athlete. This will give you a ton of great info concerning the rules and regulations surrounding the recruiting process. You should use the information in this booklet to guide you on what sort of events should be happening to you throughout the year. You should quickly notice that there is a calendar of events or time periods that allow coaches to contact recruits through letters, calls and in person visits. This should allow you to construct a rough timeline for the recruiting process. Understanding this timeline is a great first step to becoming educated on how the process works and should really allow you to get off on the right foot with playing the game.

Now that you’re ready to play the game I want to pass along some very helpful advice on how you can make up ground. Recruiting is about relationship building. If you think of it in those terms it is easy to guess your next step. Whenever attempting to start any sort of relationship with someone, the first thing you would want to do is introduce yourself. Send out video, make phone calls, send emails, and get proactive! The more personal touches you can have with a coach and his staff, the more likely it will be that they will become comfortable enough with you as a player and a person to extend an offer. Use any means available to you to get in front of the coaching staffs that you want a chance to play for.

Be persistent and don’t take and don’t be afraid to hear the word no. Odds are there are going to be more schools that aren’t interested in having you play for you then there will be schools that are interested in playing for you. This is simply a numbers game. It’s ok to hear “no”, and “I’m not interested in players at your position,” you can hear one thousand “no’s,” but you only have to hear one “yes.” Odds are in your favor.

Again, keep in mind that you want to build a relationship with these coaches, so after you’re introduced don’t stop there, make sure to ask them questions, make visits and get to know the coaches that you want a chance to play for. A great way to build upon your relationship is to set up an unofficial visit to a local school. This way you can have an opportunity to ask questions about recruiting needs and opportunities at the various schools surrounding your home. Once you start to get introduced to these programs you should really start to see some momentum build for yourself, and hopefully those local contacts will turn into national contacts.

Building a strong relationship with each and every coaching staff that you are working with will ease some of the pressure of the recruiting process. It will make it easier to truly find out where you stand with them, and whether or not they plan to offer you a roster spot. If you’ve built a strong relationship, whatever the outcome concerning a scholarship, that coach will be an advocate for you in the future.

Remember there is still time left if you want to get involved with college athletics, but you have to start making up ground.  If you feel like you need assistance there are avenues you can explore to become more educated on how this process works. You only get one shot at the recruiting process, do not leave any stone unturned, and make sure to put in as much effort as possible and you will find success.

Typically the trend in lacrosse is that the goalie position is wrapped up and filled as early as possible. Some might say it is due to the growing nature of the sport, as others have expressed that there are just less spots on every team. Either way, athletes are giving their verbal commitments in recruiting earlier and earlier each year–no matter what their position. If you plan on playing at the next level you need to get seen by the college coaches at the big camps and tournaments the summer before your junior year, as well as, the summer months before your senior year.

Among the many reasons to enter the college sports recruiting process earning an athletic scholarship to pay for college is always at the top of the list. Playing in college offsets the burden of paying for college. After all, who wants to be paying for college 10 years after they graduate because of student loans? In May 2007, testimony before US congress revealed that a quarter of all students graduate with too much debt to pay back on a starting teachers salary. That is way too high.

If that’s the case, shouldn’t you be knowledgeable in the ways of Financial Aid?

I earned my MBA from one of the top business schools in the country and traded sophisticated financial instruments for over 20 years. I thought I could figure this financial aid thing out. I couldn’t. I needed help. I’m very glad I invested in professional advice that helped maximize the grants and scholarships my daughter received. One of the great things about NCSA is that their advice on how to maximize scholarship dollars actually works. And it continues to work. Except for the less than 1% of college athletes who have “full rides” (tuition, books, room & board, fees, transportation), most families must negotiate their financial aid package on an annual basis. Paying for that expert advice helped - a lot! As she enters her junior year, my daughter has received over $135,000 in financial aid. Not one penny of that is a student loan. It’s all grants that don’t have to be paid back. Do you think I’m happy with the professional advice I received? My return on that investment was over 6700.00 per cent!

When I talk to families and tell them that the freshman year of high school is the optimal period to begin recruiting, most parents and students will be in shock.

Now usually, I attribute that state to parents thinking that recruiting doesn’t begin until junior year. But maybe some parents thought freshman year was too late.

Why do I say this? Because incoming freshman hockey player Jordan Schmaltz already has verbally committed to the University of Wisconsin on a full athletic scholarship.

Talk about getting a jump on the game! From the article:

“It was a hard decision,” Schmaltz said Tuesday, “but I think Wisconsin is the place for me.”

What does Schmaltz’s father have to say about his son’s über-early commitment?

Mike Schmaltz said Jordan, who turns 15 in October, has seen a variety of hockey atmospheres in the U.S. and Canada and felt comfortable making a decision this early in his development.

“He’s got a pretty good idea of what he wants,” Mike Schmaltz said of his son.

Here’s the thing: I’m seeing a lot of so-called “weak” words from Jordan and Mike that don’t exactly emphasize the word “commitment” — namely ”think” and “pretty good.”  

The reason I tell everyone to get started on the recruiting process earlier than later is so you have optimal time to learn about as many schools as possible, get to know more about academics, athletics and college life at the vast majority of those schools and eventually make the best possible decision.

Now is this to say that if you get started your freshman year and commit by the time you’re a senior, you’re going to be attending the perfect school for you? Not always. But taking the time to examine every little thing about a school and a program greatly improves the odds.

And who knows? Maybe Wisconsin is the perfect school for him right now. But what about in four years, when Jordan grows from a young teenager to a young man? From experience, my ideals, priorities and maturity level significantly had changed from my first year of high school to my last, and I’m sure many of you out there would agree that the same happened to you.

Don’t think you’re going to the place for you. Get started early, take your time and know you’re going to the right place.

Do you think the college athletic recruiting process should provide you with the highest number of opportunities? Do you think understanding college athletics recruiting can reveal the perfect college fit for you? How do you go about increasing your opportunities? What system should you employ to make sure you are selecting the right opportunity for you?

College coaches begin by initially contacting 1,000 or 2,000 or even 10,000 (depending on the sport) student athletes by sending them camp brochures, emails, questionnaires, etc. Those same college coaches are clearly not recruiting all of those student-athletes. Why do they start with such a large pool? They are following the advice of Marketing 101: the more kids who they find out about, the better chance they’ll find the really quality student-athlete who will help their program. If that’s a good strategy for college coaches, shouldn’t a student-athlete use the same strategy? Doing so will increase your number of opportunities.

A savvy student-athlete will learn as early as freshman year that they need to develop trust-based relationships with college coaches. This can only happen through communication. Since the NCAA restricts the amount and timing of contacts initiated by college coaches, the student-athlete must be proactive. Unfortunately, the 14 or 15 year old student-athlete doesn’t have the life experiences or the maturity to begin building relationships with adults. The good news is they can be trained in that skill set. It’s like interviewing for a job. 

College recruiting boils down to trust-based relationships between college coaches and student-athletes. What college coach is going to make a significant investment in a student-athlete unless they know a lot more about that student-athlete than her/his performance on the playing field?

If you agree with playing the numbers game and building trust-based relationships with college coaches, have you thought about how you would do that? If you’re a student-athlete reading this, do you think your parents can do this for you? If so, you better forget about playing sports in college. Do you think your coach can do this for you? Again, if so, you better forget about finding the perfect college fit for you. You are the one that needs to take charge. You can only do that if you develop the skill set to do so. Who will teach you that?

Finally, if you do all of the above correctly, how do you determine the right fit? There are many different factors including: academic quality of the school, size of school, location of school, financial aid package, level of competition, opportunity to play early, getting along with the coaching staff and players, receiving tutoring help (if necessary), etc. There is a way to logically sort out all of those factors. If you need help, go here.

As the recruiting class of 2009 gets ready to begin their senior season I’m starting to get the question of “When should I commit?” more and more often. Most recruits will enter into a period of confusion as to when they should decide between their present options and commit, or to continue to try and find a school that will be a better fit for them in the long run.

The recruiting process is tricky; most families don’t have a strong grasp as to what the timeline is truly like for recruits. The first thing you must understand is that each division operates off a slightly different timeline. It’s important that you find out what division level you are capable of playing at first and foremost. Once you have determined what division levels you should be targeting it’s time to find out more about when most recruits at that particular level decide to commit.

An easy guide to knowing when each division level looks to gain verbal commitments from their recruits is posted below.

D1

Most division 1-A schools begin to offer players at some point in their junior year, with the early offers beginning at the start of their junior year in September and the bulk of offers coming during the spring and summer. If you currently have interest from division schools, it’s important you ask direct questions about how many other recruits they have offered at your position and when they plan on making a decision on you. Typically if you don’t gain an offer by the end of September during your senior season, it’s not likely one will be coming. Schools at this level love to get decisions from their players as early as possible. Unless you’re one of the top recruits in the country at your position, I would recommend coming to a decision either before your senior year starts or shortly there after.

D1-AA

Division 1-AA schools have an accelerated timeline as well. They typically start offering players a little bit later than 1-A schools, most of their early offers will come during the spring of a players junior year, with the bulk coming during the summer and early fall. Most schools at this level hope to finish out their class or be close to it by the close of the senior season.

D2/NAIA

D2 and NAIA programs offer players a little bit of breathing room in terms of making a decision. Most schools will not extend official offers until after a player’s senior season, although expressed interest in offering is typically made early on in the senior year. Most players will have plenty of time to make winter visits before coming to a decision on where to play.

D3

When deciding to commit to a D3 school I recommend you take your time. With no athletic scholarship money available at this level, recruits will need to wait on finical aid packages are set in order to see what the cost of attendance will be. Most aid packages will not be given out until after the first of the year during a player senior season. This obviously gives players plenty of time to figure out which option is the best fit for them.

I would love to get some feedback from all the recruits out there on how close they are to making a decision and if they have any helpful advice for other recruits, if so please comment below.

Are you a student-athlete who is on a mission to play college sports? Are you a student-athlete who has played your sport for years? Imagine your first sport season after high school and you’re not playing. What would that feel like?

Most student athletes and their families are unaware of how early college recruiting begins. Or the reasons it begins so early. The problem is that 93% of high school students who go on to college are applying through the academic door. They begin researching colleges late in their junior year or early in their senior year. They listen to the high school guidance counselor who advises them to apply to several schools. They place these schools into 3 categories: 1) Reach schools (if I’m lucky, I’ll get in.) 2) Stretch schools (I’m pretty sure I’d get accepted to half of these I apply to.) and 3) safe schools (I’ll get in no matter what.) Make sure you have all of your applications in before Christmas break.

Unfortunately, student-athletes and their families think that college athletic recruiting operates along the same time-line. It doesn’t!  If you wish to apply through the athletic door, you need to understand the different calendars and timelines.

Different sports have different recruiting calendars and time-lines. However, all sports have the following in common:

1. College coaches would love to find out about you early. In some sports that’s as early as 7^th and 8^th grade, other sports it’s by 10^th grade. Waiting until the beginning of junior year begins to reduce your opportunities.
2. A college student athlete has a certain athletic profile. For example, in baseball, a student athlete needs to have a certain 60-yard dash time, a certain overhand throwing velocity, a certain bat-speed, etc. For very competitive schools, those metrics need to be achieved by the end of junior year. If not, many college coaches will refuse to evaluate a student-athlete. It takes time to develop physically and student-athletes need to train to that level early to ensure they reach that level on time.
3. College coaches only give scholarship money to student-athletes they know, like, and trust. Those trust-based relationships take time to build. Because of the recruiting restrictions placed on college coaches, it’s important that a student-athlete begin to build those relationships as a freshman. Most don’t know how to go about that.

If you’re serious about being a college student-athlete, you need to implement that game plan that will get you there. Knowing what to do is as important as doing it. If you don’t know what to do, you should contact an expert for an evaluation. You can do that at NCSA.

 Relationship Building and Recruiting are two skills that go hand in hand in college athletics.  Coaches are always striving to build their recruiting networks and develop solid contacts at high schools, camps and most importantly with student athletes.  The time tables involved in that cycle have been getting earlier and earlier in recent years.  InsideCarolina.com sat down with second year Coach Butch Davis to discuss the challenges he is facing while rebuilding the University of North Carolina Program.

You mentioned on Signing Day that you still felt like you were a little bit behind in terms of building relationships…

“I didn’t realize how badly — we were probably two years behind the day I took the job compared to everybody else in the country. Recruiting has changed so much and it’s changed even more just in the last year. With kids pushing to try and get commitments from 2010 kids, we hadn’t even gotten the ‘08 kids into school yet, and we’re already half-through the ‘09 class and already talking to 2010 kids.

“When I took the job so many kids - you pick up the phone and call the high school coach and you’d like for the kid to visit - and he goes ‘well, coach, Carolina’s ok, but I’ve gone to Phil Fulmer’s camp the last three years’ or ‘I’ve gone to a camp since I was in the ninth grade.’ So, we were trying to recruit kids and it’s like trying to talk to somebody that’s engaged and going to get married next month, to somehow break up and that doesn’t happen very often, you know?

“But, the longer we’ve been here now we’re getting 500-600 kids every summer into camp. We’re starting to build relationships and now we’re starting on an even playing field with a lot of the coaching staffs, for the kids in the ninth and 10th and 11th grade. Now, they don’t have those committed loyalties because of where they’ve been going.  Now, hopefully recruiting starts to swing a little bit.

Coach Davis explained exactly why it so important for recruits to start developing relationships early. Since slots are being snatched up by athletes earlier than ever before its up to recruits to jumpstart the process and start contacting coaches pro-actively.

 Why do high school student athletes want to play collegiate athletics?  I speak with so many student athletes who express that commitment on a daily basis and often times I wonder if they truly realize the advantages of being a collegiate athlete. Outside of love for their sport which is the best reason to want to continue to play at the next level, I believe that if student athletes realized the ancillary benefits of partaking in collegiate athletics, their desire to maximize the recruiting process would increase significantly. 

I have often contemplated writing a list of all the rewards that accompany playing collegiate athletics to pass along to prospective student athletes, but quickly realized that it might take hours if not days.  Secondary advantages such as an immediate community of possible friends on a new college campus all the way to an instant alumni network for career opportunities after college fall into this extensive list that student athletes should think about.  I believe it will inherently create more value on the goal at hand and thus a greater attention to the steps required to achieve that goal.   

Student athletes should realize that a love for their sport should serve as their main motivation for working hard in the classroom, on the field, and throughout the recruiting process.  However, they should also understand the ramifications of taking part in collegiate athletics and how that might change their entire life.  Knowing what’s at stake, every student athletes should make sure to maximize this process.  What are some other advantages that college athletes receive?  I think that is a topic well worth a discussion…

Anyone serious about college athletics knows the term “redshirt“. For those who aren’t familiar with the term, this is when a program allows you to enroll in the University and practice with the team, but sit out from actual competition for the academic year without losing a year of eligibility.

A less familiar term to many, both general sports fans and athletes going through the recruiting process, is “grayshirt“. What happens in this scenario is when an athlete delays enrollment into the university without losing a year of eligibility. In this case, the athlete isn’t allowed to practice or can’t receive their scholarship and is often put into effect when a coach has too many scholarship athletes.

Case in point, Tyler Bass. The University of Maryland, which had given Bass a scholarship, offered him the opportunity to grayshirt because they had more than the allotted 85 scholarships for Div. I-A football.

Unfortunately for both parties, Bass wanted to enroll in the fall, and Maryland released him from his scholarship.

Thus demonstrates the importance of asking questions when you talk to college coaches before signing a NLI! Find out if you’ll have to redshirt or grayshirt.

Or even if there is a possibility of greenshirting — enrolling in what would normally be your senior spring semester in high school to practice with the team. Obviously, you and your parents need to plan ahead for this situation to work, and this option usually is reserved for those student-athletes who are expected to play their freshman year.  

There are a lot of shirts out there. Make sure you’re wearing the color and style — if any – that looks best on you.