<p>I live in Maryland which is like lacrosse central so it's pretty difficult to get recruited here. But once you leave Maryland is it difficult to get recruited for lacrosse?</p>
<p>Talking about women's lacrosse btw.</p>
<p>Are you interested in D1 or D3?</p>
<p>more D3, not good enough for D1 I don’t think</p>
<p>Do you play on a club team and attend summer tournaments? That is one way to get noticed. If not, try some camps/clinics where coaches from schools you are interested in will be in attendance. There are many in the summer, but also some throughout the school year. Go to the websites of teams that interest you and look for them. Another option is to make a video of your play and send it to coaches. I think it would be easier in MD because of all the attention paid to teams by coaches looking for recruits than it is in my area, but girls I know who play lacrosse and have successfully been recruited have had to aggressively pursue it through these 3 methods. Good luck!</p>
<p>Lacrosse, like the other non-revenue sports probably has a strong club system where most of the major school/coaches are tied into…in turn the strong worthwhile players have already been identified and followed from an early age.</p>
<p>So, if you are a marginal player or just participating for a hook than you are probably hanging on to the dream. I’m vaguely familiar with both soccer and lacrosse, but outside of the number of people who play—it’s process is similar to fencing which has a smaller domestic pool of talent, school choices, athletic funding but more international recruits. However, most sports that recruit(basketball) look at the club system/AAU etc…and identify talent–that is driver.</p>
<p>My D is currently a first-year on a DIII lax team. We are from a non-traditional part of the country so it took a bit more for her to get on the radar. She did travel with club teams during the summer to national tournaments and that is mostly where she got “noticed”. Talk to you coach about these tourneys - many should be local to you since you live in the area and you might be able to solo join a team for one tourney or something.</p>
<p>If you don’t play on a team in those national tourneys (Rivalry, President’s Cup, All-Star, Nationals, etc) you can go to any school’s lacrosse website and fill out their recruiting questionnaire - make sure you have a video of highlights to send them or link them to an uploaded video on YouTube or something.</p>
<p>It is a lot of hard work but can be done without spending huge bucks (esp. since you won’t get $$$ for sport at DIII).</p>
<p>What schools are you looking at?</p>
<p>As a parent, I went through this process with my S (at NESCAC colleges for a helmet sport) last summer. I would HIGHLY emphasize on having a broader reach/approach with all your NESCAC/IVY college coaches and recommend that you methodically go through this long process. Please dont confuse NESCAC/IVY leagues with other finer schools that are equally and maybe even better academically. I am just using the NESCAC/IVY in this context as an example of two groups of great schools, and as all the readers know, there are many fine schools that play in other divisions. That said you need to cast a wide net and heavily market yourself, get to know the head coaches, assistant coaches, and most importantly the recruiting coaches responsible for your geography. As others pointed out, you need to stay focused on your academics and make sure that your ACT is north of 30-31 (although some LECs super score the ACT). You need mostly As in AP courses and should take at least 3 APs in your senior year (the general rule of thumb is to take as many AP courses that you can score A in them). You also need to take your ACT (or SAT) test in early spring of your senior year, in time to have the score ready for upcoming summer camps (see below).
You need to make highlight films of your junior and senior years (take a look at [Easy</a>, affordable, powerful coaching software - Hudl](<a href=“http://www.hudl.com%5DEasy”>http://www.hudl.com) site if your school coach has already signed up, it is the easiest and most cost effective way to produce your highlights). You should also fill out the athletic recruit form on every NESCAC/IVY college web site before you sign up for their on-day summer camp. This is one way for the NESCAC college coaching staff to build their recruit data base (they have access to other data bases as well). Once you send your information to the colleges, you will receive form responses and often get updates from the coaches. A typical NESCAC helmet sport recruit data base has as many as 1,500 names to start with, and they end up actively focusing on selected 60+ per helmet sport. They go from 60 to even a lesser number of spots, supports, and LL (in case of IVY only). It is a grueling and long process but you just need to stick with it if you are utterly determined to use LAX as your hook. At the end of the day the NESCAC/IVY coaches are looking for highly motivated and great students that can equally play well on the field! It is not the other way around for these very selective colleges.
Sign up for the NE, Harvard and individual LEC/IVY one-day sessions (as many as you can afford). This is your marketing opportunity but you need to be physically, skill wise, academically, and mentally ready for these camps. It takes a lot of effort and coordination to hit these summer camps. As luck would have it, lots of enthused parents and student-athletes leverage the summer before senior year as an opportunity to visit colleges and these sports camps. These camps are sometimes oversubscribed but this is how you get noticed by the coaches. You need to prepare your profile (consists of resume with your picture on it, transcript with list of courses you will be taking in your senior year, ACT/SAT test score, and AP test scores if available). Once on a college campus, make sure you introduce yourself to the coaching staff, have a 15-20 seconds introductory speech ready, hand out your profile and show energy, enthusiasm, and as much team work as you can during your short visit. Your parents also need to get to know these coaches and start a dialogue. As they say, it takes a village! Once the camp is over, send a thank you note to the coaching staff and identify with them how much you learned, and how you feel about their program. Now you are ready to send periodic updates in response to the emails that you will receive from college coaches (see above paragraph). Make sure you have your thumb nail photo as part of your signature block. All these coaches are overwhelmed with emails and voice mails. A photo will jug their memory about who you are (every little thing counts).
You can also be invited for a recruit day before and/or after your one-day camps. Some colleges (like Middlebury) will go to different camps but they dont have a camp of their own. Instead, they invite some student-athletes to attend their recruit day and this is when they put out a very nice dog and pony show to further their recruiting process. If they are interested in you, they may ask for your commitment and encourage you to apply ED. (Please read the next paragraph for details about how to qualify their interests).
Now the waiting game starts around late August (for football and Spring of Junior year for LAX). Coaching staff will start to contact student-athletes that fit their needs. Of course, by now you should have a good feel about the level of interest that you received during one-day camps, recruit days, or simply your visits. Be aware that if they are really interested they ask for your stats (GPA, ACT, SAT, AP scores, number of AP courses, and transcripts) for a pre-read at the Admissions office. Also be aware, that most good coaches keep their cards close to their vest and dont volunteer too much information about where you stand on their priority list, unless you are on top of it. That said, you need to understand when and under what circumstances they will send your academic information to the Admissions office for a pre-read. Again, most of the coached dont commit to you unless they get thumbs up from the admissions. They equally encourage you to do ED I because they have the most pull. However, you need to ask probing questions about the coaches track record and their past performance with the admission office before you commit to any ED. As you may have read on CC, there are a number of cases where a student-athlete thought s/he is in but the opposite happened. To hedge your bets, dont burn bridges with other schools that have an interest in you but be honest with them because honesty will go a long way in this process. Dont forget to do a quality essay! Some student-athletes think that because there is a favorable pre-read and the coach really wants her/him that means that they are in. Well, the ultimate decision will be made by the Admissions office and the committee that reads your application materials. Remember that these are very selective colleges and there is no shortage of great and qualified applicants waiting at their door steps. Do yourself a favor and work on your essays as if you dont have any athletic hook.<br>
If you decide to do an ED with school of your choice, and there is one (or more) school that is trying to recruit you (and they also did a favorable pre-read), let their coaches know. That does not mean that they will keep a slot open for you indefinitely but the coaches are in the same position as you, and they are trying to get commitment from student-athletes at the same time. College coaches also lose good student-athletes to competing colleges, so in a way it is like a game of musical chair! At the end, you need to have a fall back plan and have your application ready in a stand-by mode for other colleges in case your ED does not pan out. As I mentioned above, get in touch with other coaches that may have an interest in you. There may be an opportunity to do EDII, or RD with other coaches. There are only two weeks between 12/15 (when ED acceptance/rejections/deferred) news comes out and when most RD, or EDII applications are due on 1/1. You are in charge of your destiny and cant afford to miss the opportunity for RD. Good luck.</p>