Twoinanddone, you’re probably right that there have been changes, given the commotion in recent years (particularly the Northwestern University football players’ attempt at unionization). However, I do recall that the Southeastern Conference, the 1st or 2nd most profitable college league in America, opposed providing guaranteed 4-year scholarships and supplemental financial assistance to athletes. Is that still the case?
Brian, you sound like a heady and great parent. Please have faith that there are several U.S. colleges where your son would fit-in quite well, academically and athletically. Don’t take the first offer in haste and do not settle for some obscure school that has little interest in your son other than for his basketball skills. Make sure to inquire about student life and whether or not the athletes are truly integrated into the overall student experience at a particular school. Find a place where he can grow and prosper as an individual, where he will appreciate that athletics can be a means to an end, but not the be all and end all. Best wishes.
One thing about D1 athletics is the full-time tutors available. Schools spend a lot of time making sure athletes are making academic progress.
Shameless plug for our in-state school, Washington State University. They are generally mid to bottom of the PAC-12, but he would consistently be playing against some of the best in the world. Kids tend to love it there and support the athletes. His academics would fit. Coach Ernie Kent is one of the all-time great guys.
There are direct flights to Seattle, but then it’s a 4 1/2 hour drive (or bus) over the mountains.
Seattle U is another option but within about 15 minutes of the airport.
I don’t know if the SEC or ACC have started giving the 4 year scholarships, but they definitely give the stipend. In fact there was a lot of bitching and moaning about the fact that the stipends for southern schools weren’t as high as other schools (Penn State’s is something like $6000) and there have been a lot of adjustments. Most now have an instate COA and an OOS one to account for travel. However, I don’t think a student from England would get more than an OOS student from Wisconsin or even Hawaii. It’s just an average for the travel used to establish COA. I think the NCAA did the right things and said “We’re not going to get involved in making this equal. The schools set the COA using federal guidelines.”
Sounds like the OP’s son is D1 material although probably not Kentucky or Duke level (because I really think he’d know that after 3 summers of camps and clinics). All he really needs to know is that the scholarship will cover tuition, room and board, books, fees, and there will probably be a stipend (some of the smaller conference might not offer these, but many do). Original question was what would the family expect to pay, and it really is just the incidentals and travel. Find the best basketball and academic fit and the rest will be fine (and the coaches can feed them now, which was a really big deal last year). I’m thinking this student will be looking at the schools that usually have a good basketball program, sometimes make a run at March Madness, but usually are just conference favorites- Butler, Marquette, Wichita State, Minnesota, Colorado State. There are 351 teams in D1, I’m sure one or two will be just perfect for OP’s son.
If they start looking at D2, there might not be as much BB money but then there can be merit money. A little more complicated but can work out well, especially for a superstar for that conference.
^Depending on the family’s financial need, they might be okay with full tuition - many parents expect to pay for “accomodations” (ie., Room&board) anyway, as well as books.
The question was what they can expect to pay. In D1, it’s ‘all or nothing’ so the if the students gets the D1 scholarship, the family would not cover tuition or r&b, just personal travel and incidentals. Even if the parents are prepared to pay, splitting of scholarships is not allowed in D1 men’s BB.
Answer to #1: travel, personal incidentals and clothing (although a lot is supplied by the team), maybe a laptop
Answer to #4: that a D2 scholarship may not be (probably won’t be) a full ride although merit comes into play; that the scholarship may not be for 4 years (depends on the conference); that there are tons of schools out there that the agent may not have connections with and you need to find on your own even after paying the agent; that there might be a better opportunity by waiting a year as many of the scholarships for 2016 have already been awarded.
@twoinanddone Thank you for those details. Sounds like common sense has finally prevailed at least in some aspects of big-time college sports.
@Magnetron Yes, Wazzu deserves more love. People forget that for most of the last 30 years WSU had the best basketball program in the state; bit of course Mark Few at Gonzaga and Lorenzo Romar at U of Washington changed all that. All of the outstanding coaches at WSU tend to eventually get better offers and then lead their new teams to glory; George Raveling, Kelvin Sampson (whom actually wasn’t the most ethical guy in the room), and Tony Bennett. On the surface, it seems to me that the OP’s son is the type of player that WSU looks for, in the mold of Derek Low, the guard from Hawaii whom led WSU to the national tournament. What a team that was!!!
Thanks all for thoughts and advice. It’s getting a bit more interesting now. My Son has had initial interest from some D2 schools and 3 D1 schools. Miami OH, IPFW and Cleveland St. 5 D2 schools ( one looks particularly strong) Augustana. Any insights?
Miami Ohio is by far the better school of the few you cited. Beautiful campus, not too large, excellent attention to teaching quality.
What are the other 5 universities?
Elon is very beautiful, but he’d be in basketball country, not playing for the best program in town. He might like that or hate that, but UNC and Duke are going to get all the press. Elon is D1.
Spring Hill is tiny, and plays in NAIA which is a different set of rules than NCAA as far as money goes.
Yes, now you’re in the tornado, seeing just how many choices there are!
Yes, I would agree that of the three D1 basketball colleges Miami University is the strongest academically overall; but I would investigate STEM at CSU if I were an aspiring engineering major. Also, you will have more cultural assets in the City of Cleveland than you will find in the small town of Oxford, Ohio, although the City of Dayton is not far from Oxford. By the way, several years ago the Cleveland State University basketball team made an astounding run into the late rounds of the NCAA championship tournament, defeating at least one really elite team. Miami U (not the U of Miami in Florida) has also made a splash in the NCAA tournament from time to time. A former colleague is a MU alumnus.
Elon University is attracting attention and increasing numbers of applications from smart kids. Nice campus just outside of Greensboro, North Carolina. You probably know that NC is a basketball paradise. U of North Carolina and Duke U are not far from Elon. Duke is on Elon’s schedule this season.
Meant to add that your son would likely enjoy Elon or Miami much, much more than Union College because D2 Union College is in a dreary region of upstate New York. Union is a fine college but parts of upstate New York have been relatively depressed for years. I attended a football game at Union recently and I was not impressed by the look of the place.
Elon is Division I, I think. It’s in the Colonial Athletic Association, which is definitely a D-I league, although not necessarily stocked with national powerhouses. An interesting collection of East Coast teams including Northeastern, Hofstra, Drexel, Towson State, James Madison, William & Mary, College of Charleston. They also played Michigan, Syracuse, Duke, and UNC-Greensboro this year.
What an interesting, random collection of colleges! They are very, very, very, very different, one from another. Very small to pretty big; private, public, Catholic (of different varieties), Protestant (loosely); Mobile, Alabama to Schenectady, New York, and southwestern oil-well Oklahoma to eastern South Dakota to Research Triangle to urban hood; ag school to preppie liberal arts college. Basketball makes awfully strange bedfellows.
Apart from the basketball, there are really big differences there. Twenty-year-olds are very adaptable, and can probably do well in all sorts of different environments, but there’s no way anyone could be indifferent (from a non-basketball standpoint) among all those choices.
I made that mistake about Union College, too. There are at least three of them: one in the Hudson Valley, upstate New York, one in Kentucky, and one in Nebraska. The one it probably isn’t is the only one I had ever heard of before this, the one in New York.
As much as I like the area Case Western is in and thus think Cleveland has come a LONG way, Central isn’t University Circle. All in all, for an international student who may not be used to American urban areas, CSU - while safe on campus - is not one I’d recommend. Too commuter, too “American inner city” vs. “walkable urban area”.
Elon is another great choice.
Which Maryville? Which Union? (I believe that there are 3 of each in the US )
What academic areas would your son be interested in?
Thank you once again folks. We really appreciate the guidance…feeling a bit less blind now. At the moment our young person is very attracted to playing Basketball and not so much thinking about Academics. His SAT Is this Saturday so that may make him think a bit more about that… I think ( like many other parents) it’s about the right mix of academic and athletic focus. One of the attractions for our son is the fact that you don’t have to major until later on in US universities.in the UK you have to choose at beginning. Environment certainly looks more engaging for a small town lad from the UK at Miami and Elon. Let’s find out where the Union and Msryville are. It’s just day 3 on the journey so early days indeed.
I am pretty sure that the D-II Union is a tiny Seventh Day Adventist college in Lincoln, Nebraska (the state capital, and also the site of the humongous University of Nebraska), and the D-II Maryville is a small Catholic university in St. Louis, Missouri.
There’s no question that, among the colleges you have named, Miami (OH) and Elon probably lead the pack in terms of academic quality, aesthetics, decent location (as long as you aren’t desperate to be in a big city), and a size conducive to having a variety of options for studies and friends, and having people to watch you play. The basketball quality could be better at Cleveland State or Augustana – I don’t really know – but I would be surprised if it were better at Indiana Purdue Fort Wayne (a college with overwhelmingly local appeal that would likely be no higher than the sixth or seventh choice for local ballers).
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