That’s a pretty good list Zenator. Assuming a guy who is not already on the radar (mainly high 3 to 5 star guys) mine would be a little different:
Now - Put together a quality, short, highlight clip. Pick plays showing your skill at various things against quality competition. Quality over quantity. 15-20 plays and 3-4 minutes is plenty at this stage. Leave enough time at the beginning of each clip to allow a coach to recognize the offensive and defensive set, and highlight yourself before the action commences. Consider paying the nominal fee to join a recruiting aggregator. All the Ivys will want you to join GoBigRecruiting.com
Feb to May - Attend the nearest SPARQ or Rivals combine to get verified measurables. Update your Hudl and gobig account.
Continuous - Pick up heavy things and put them down. A lot.
Continuous - Work your form, and drill against the best competition you can find.
Now - Work with your HS coach to identify programs in your athletic range. Depending on your HS program, many colleges will visit your school in the spring to meet with your coach to start identifying targets. These visits started already, so the clock is ticking. If the schools which interest you are not expected to visit your HS, identify your area recruiting coach from the team website, fill out the questionnaire and send a brief e mail to the recruiting coach including the questionnaire, a link to your highlight clip, your actual measurables (Ht, Wt, 40, shuttle and calculated max bench/squat/clean).
Spring Break - Hit some junior days of schools where there is mutual interest if possible. Some schools don’t have formal junior days. For those, set up unofficial visits if you can. Follow up by sending an email to the position or recruiting coach, thanking him for his time and telling him what you liked about the visit and how you feel you can fit in the program.
April to May - Plot your camps. If your HS program does not see a lot of visits from coaches, or you are not getting a lot of responses to your contact e mails, consider a big prospect camp. NE Elite, Northwestern, Baylor are all supposed to attract a lot of high academic coaches. I assume places like Stanford, Vandy and Duke do as well. If your HS pulls a lot of coaches, or you are receiving good responses to your contact e mails, put your resources to individual camps. These should be at schools where you are seeing some real interest; a visit with the coach at your HS in late spring, a couple personal e mails, a phone call in the May to early June window when they can call you once, that kind of thing. If you choose wisely, 3-5 school camps are enough. Leave at least one day between camps.
April to June - Take the ACT and/or the SAT to get a baseline. Update your Hudl and gobig account.
Pre Camp - Collect your junior transcript, ACT/SAT scores and senior schedule to provide to coaches who are interested. Work starts in the 40, agility circuits and max reps on the bench at 185/225. Work your form. A lot.
Camps - Compete. Be serious, pay attention and show you are coach able. Enjoy the opportunity, and let the coaches see you love the game. Talk frankly and clearly with each coach who shows an interest. Follow up with e mails to each coach where there is mutual interest.
Thanks Ohiodad for the vastly improved list. As always, you are spot on.
Do have a comment as to (4). Do not know from personal experience, but I have been advised by a college football insider that combine numbers are widely circulated and poor numbers may cause a player to be forever taken off a college’s board with the result that no further attention will be paid to him. Thus, combine numbers may be a mixed blessing depending on result.
As to (5), I can confirm that HS visits mostly by D1 coaches are already underway. Have been told that D3’s are still focused on recruiting seniors. For those of us in states where spring football is permitted, I have been told that recruiters pay close attention to performance in practice as a measure of progress for suspects that they have been following. Apparently, taller kids take longer to develop so recruiters want to get a handle on their development curve.
I do not know whether my family’s experience is a normal one. But, after football season ended, HS Head Coach set up a meeting with our family, where he explained the recruiting process, provided a candid evaluation of son’s talent level, gave us grade and SAT ranges of football players recently admitted to a number of identified schools and even provided a listing of colleges where he had strong relationships, including several backups that he identified as close to sure things unless son got injured or got poor grades. We found this process invaluable, if a little overwhelming.
Three things that we learned at the meeting that surprised us. First, good football players can get into top academic schools outside of HYP with surprisingly low academics. Second, one important key is to get on a college’s board and stay there as long as possible because a kid with a low ranking can move rapidly up the board if higher ranked prospects commit elsewhere. Third, being perceived as athletic and able to project to a variety of different offensive and defensive positions is a big plus.
In closing, this is my first time through the college recruiting process for football. However, I am fortunate to know a number of players and coaches so I have gotten good intel. That stated, the insight of Varska, Ohiodad etc. has proven to be invaluable.
First if you are fortunate enough to attend a high school with a sophisticated approach to recruiting you need to take advantage of it. In my son’s school there is a dedicated recruiting coach. In Zenator’s example his son’s high school coach apparently handles those duties himself. Like it or not, the high school program is the gateway. As Zenator says, these guys have multi year relationships with college programs where the HS coach knows what the college is looking for and the college coach knows what kind of players are produced at that high school. I have watched parents and kids who did not agree with the recruiting coach’s assessment of their realistic athletic fit ignore interest from schools the coach thinks are a good fit to chase Ohio State, Alabama, etc. It doesn’t end well. I personally know two kids who turned down low end D1 offers because they thought they were headed to a power program. One kid ended up walking on at Oklahoma, the other is in D2. I know several parents who eschewed the coach’s advice that their son was a D2 or D3 level player and spent way too much money doing the Rival or Under Armour circuit, or hitting Big Ten level camps.
Second, there are no secrets on the beach. I have heard the don’t attend combines because your measurables may not meet a certain school’s minimum standards for a position before. My opinion is it is better to find that out in February than in August, after spending a grand running around to camps where you are not an athletic fit. The fact is that coaches know what they are seeing on tape, and if your speed/height/raw athleticism is borderline to low they will see it. That is why the schools push their camps so hard. They want to confirm the impression they have from the tape. Sure, some guys jump off of tape. But most of those type of players are hitting the Under Armour or Rivals Challenge circuit, and getting 4 or 5 star ratings from ESPN, 247, etc. The simple fact is if your measurables are not in range for what the school wants then you are not going to that school whether you attend SPARQ in February or a Big Ten stringer watches you during summer scrimmages.
Agree that there are no secrets on beach. My comment here is just parroting what we were told so take it for what it is worth. We were told that big, athletic kids, who are still growing, should avoid early combine testing because likely to do much better in the summer camps following extensive speed training and related weight training throughout winter and spring. We were also told that, due to longer development curve for big kids, knowledgeable recruiters want spring game film so they can compare to earlier fall film. We were also told, as you suggest, that recruiters can get a very good read on measureables from game film anyway.
Any high school coach can request the invitation to a combine.
Combine tests provide places to show competitive skills. Many unknowns earn their scholly/are found in these events. Athletes can practice the drills so recruit is ready. Hire a track/strength coach to learn how to show your explosion off line in any drill.