<p>So please don't shoot me if this has been posted about before. (In fact, I'm fairly sure it has but maybe I searched the wrong keywords).</p>
<p>One of my cousins is trying to play volleyball in college. She has pretty bad grades (not even on honor roll, so she has a B- average or below) a couple extra curriculars, but nothing stellar. I think she's pretty good, but not good enough to go to a DI school (at this point, she's using volleyball to try and get into a better school than she could get into otherwise). </p>
<p>SO my question is this: with less than stellar grades (albiet at a VERY challenging high school with a fairly good reputation among LACs) and okay extracurriculars, how far can volleyball take her?</p>
<p>(For example, if she were on one of the top teams nationwide, would this be enough to get her into an ivy league school or a top 10 LAC?)</p>
<p>You say she’s not good enough to get into a D1 Vball program. Then the Ivies nor others you listed won’t give a spot to a marginal academician for her either. Frankly, even if she were one of the top VBall recruits, those kind of grades would not get her past most, if not all, of the types of schools you said.</p>
<p>Anecdotal here: Neighbor’s son was an athletic recruit at Middlebury for a Div III team. They were very clear during try-outs: You had to have a 3.5 gpa overall to even be considered. So at least at one top 10 LAC, the standards are high for athletes. I suspect the same is true at other top LACs.</p>
<p>I agree. I know a kid who was #1 in the world in his (preppy) sport. He had about a 3.5 in high school and decent stats. He did NOT get into any of the ivies. He did get into a well regarded LAC known for that particular sport. In contrast his sister was a very highly ranked athlete in same sport but nowhere near #1. However, she did have a near 4.0 GPA and good scores. She got into several ivies and chose Princeton. </p>
<p>So for the ivies - stats matter TREMENDOUSLY.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone! I guess, having known some seemingly unintelligent athletes, I’ve always assumed that they didn’t do as well in high school, but I guess that probably isn’t the case, given what everyone is saying.</p>
<p>What I meant about her not being good enough for DI was in regards to the big state schools with great volleyball teams. As far as I’ve heard, the Ivies have good sports teams but nowhere near the level of the big name DI schools!</p>
<p>So, does the difficulty of the high school not make any difference? (I think she could have a 3.7 or so at most of the public high schools in the area, which are much easier…)</p>
<p>It depends on the Ivy and the sport. For example, Princeton was twelfth in D1 for cross country last year. They recruit All-Americans with 3.8’s and a hard course load. Same goes for Stanford, which is harder to get into than several Ivies. Their Heisman trophy candidate a few years ago was valedictorian of his high school class.</p>
<p>A B- average or below is below a 3.0. No top 10 school will touch that GPA. (Stanford’s freshman class has 1% of its students with a GPA between 3.0 and 3.499 and none below that, for example).</p>