Hi, my best friend’s son was told by the Colby soccer coach that he wanted him to play on the men’s soccer team, and was told to apply early decision. He would not have gone to Colby without the anticipation of being on the team. His grades and activities made him eligible for most excellent colleges and universities, and Colby would not have been his first choice otherwise. When he arrived for pre-season practice, so did 40ish other “recruits” who were then told that they had a significant chance of being cut from the team as there were too many of them. I feel terrible for these young men, and wonder how unusual this practice of over-recruitment/cutting is, as it seems unfair and deceptive to allow these players to arrive believing that they are on the team when it is anything but secure. In addition, in at least this young man’s case, forgoing other excellent college options willingly-- in order to be part of the team. What can you tell me about this situation? Is this something unusual or not in college soccer recruitment? Thanks in advance for your thoughts.
40ish seems like a heck of a lot. Do you think there is some exaggeration in what was reported to you? 10-20 would be well within the range of normal.
I always advise young people to choose the school they would be happiest at in terms of fit and academics rather than making a decision based on playing a sport, especially at the D3 level where you are not receiving athletic scholarships. No guarantees with sports and even if he made the team, an injury could sideline him at any time.
Lilysm,
Colby is a terrific school. At a 22.5% admit rate, no one is a shoo-in to get into Colby, so congratulations to best friend’s son for getting in.
Being a NESCAC school, there are limits on how many tips and slots are available the the coach of any team. For a team like soccer, I would “guess” in the range of two slots and five tips. Thus, I surmise that most of those so-called recruits were not recruits at all, but rather were told “you have talent. We would love to have you on the team if you get into the school.” My guess is that your best friend’s son is probably a true recruit since he was told to and did apply early decision. But, many of the other 40 or so may not have been.
Whenever a D3 prospie talks to a coach, there are certain questions that should be asked: 1) can you give me a pre-read (if no pre-read is given, that is a clue that a student is not a true recruit); 2) where am I on your list of recruits (this tells you a lot in terms of projecting out the likelihood of playing time and admission); and 3) do you have “cuts” on your team (if the coach likes the kid, he or she will say "I do have cuts, but I don’t see you getting cut).
The other piece of this is that a number of NESCAC schools have “B” soccer teams (Williams, Wesleyan, Conn College come to mind). This is roughly equivalent to a junior varsity team, but it does truly allow the kids to mature soccer wise, and there is definite mobility from the B team to varsity. Perhaps Colby has a B team.
I think best friend’s son should ride it out. If he gets cut, he should meet with the coach and tell him that the only reason he applied to Colby was because of the promise of being on the team. Not sure that it will make a difference, but it might.
Thank you for your wise thoughts. 40ish is not an exaggeration, unfortunately, so there will be a number of disappointed players.
I appreciate the advice and appreciate your taking the time to write!
My frame of reference in NESCAC is baseball, and–yes–I have seen and heard about over-recruiting.
The way it works most of the time in NESCAC baseball is that the coach can “tip” or “highlight” a certain number of applications for the consideration of the Admissions Office. This is not a guarantee of admission, it is just a possible tipping factor in the applicant’s favor.
In these cases the coach has some skin in the game. Why? If someone the coach has tipped gets admitted and doesn’t even make the roster, the Admissions Office can be expected to lose some confidence in the coach’s ability to evaluate talent when applicants are highlighted in subsequent years–and the coach risks getting his/her quota cut or losing some prized recruits down the road.
We do not know the conversations your friend’s son had with the coach. Along with things mentioned by other posters above, the youngster should have asked straight up if he would be receiving the coach’s support in the admissions process. If he didn’t ask this, and the coach saw that the kid could probably get in on his own–coach got a free player. Anyway, the kid should just go out and make the team.
Forty recruits (meaning about 40 unofficial visits) seems like a pretty high number to me too, even acknowledging that some over-recruiting goes on. That coach must be one heck of a recruiter. (Imagine all the thank you notes!)
I can understand forty kids total. I can understand forty freshmen, some of whom were recruited and some who are trying to walk on. But forty freshmen recruits? Not buying it.
There are schools where athletic programs are used to boost applications/enrollment from students who otherwise wouldn’t have considered the school, especially in D3 where no one is getting athletic money and full pay athletic recruits can be pretty desirable.
I wouldn’t think Colby is in that group though as it’s a well known LAC and the fact that it’s accepting ~25% of its applicants would seem to say the school has plenty of interested students. Certainly the particular coach could have encouraged a large group of students to apply. There are also certainly some recruits who hear what they want to hear.
Anyway I hope things work out well for the young man.
Looking at the website, it looks like the head coach is fairly new is this position. Perhaps he is still trying to figure out this whole recruiting game and was a little too gung ho. This is his second season coaching, so depending on when he was appointed as head coach, he may or may not have had much hand in the previous year’s recruits and this might have been his first year in command of that part of the job.
Thanks! I will check on the 40 number. My friend may have confused the meaning of what her son told her about the total number of freshman recruits vs walk ons etc. I do think the coach is new and not sure what he intended with the excessive numbers.
Unfortunately, I know someone who went through a similar situation at an LAC in baseball. He was a great player, and the whole team was behind him. He was cut due to some strange politics and a new coach.The tryout period was long and drawn out and unpredictable, which was really inconsiderate to the players, especially stressful to the freshman. The team ended up being short on his position, and one could guess that would happen. He lived on a baseball floor, which made not making the team particularly difficult. It was a very sad situation.
Of course, it’s always best to choose a school you would be happy at without the sport. But, when the sport is very important to the student, it can be hard to separate the two.
I have seen something like this happen, but where those players are not recruits but only hopeful walk-ons. We know of schools where potential players have approached a coach about playing with the team and are told that if they end up attending that school, the coach will let them try-out with the team. In those cases, there are no promises made and it is clear to those players that they very well may not make the roster. It seems unusual for 40 such players to show up for a try-out as most coaches we have seen weed out players prior to the try-out so that they only end up with a few that are very talented but maybe have not been actively recruited for whatever reason. That being said, if the player in question was asked to apply ED and was told he would play with the team, I would hope that he asked enough questions as others here have noted so that he is sure he is on the roster already. Since D3 does not offer athletic scholarships, the recruiting process is a bit different and it is so important to ask questions and be clear on what your role will be with a team. I would never recommend choosing a school based on the sport rather than on the academics and other fit, as injuries or other circumstances can change participation in sports very quickly. An ideal number of players for a men’s soccer team seems to be around 25-30 with 25-27 being very typical. Some of the D3 teams carry more- sometimes closer to 40. It is not an ideal situation as many of the players will never see time on the field and many times leave the team as a result. There are always a few players that are very aware they will never play, but are willing to sit on the bench just to be part of the team. As long as they are clear on their role up-front, then that is OK, but I’m not sure all coaches are as open with their players as they should be.
Very helpful comments, thank you all!
So, being the nosy person I am, I just looked at the roster that was posted today. Roster size is 32 (5 more than last year’s 27). 19 of those are freshman. It looks like about 7 players from last year’s roster either chose not to return or were cut. Talk about a young team.
@lilysmom1 - Did the boy you know make the team?
Yes, thanks for asking but not playing tonight… hopefully he will soon, but don’t know!
I would like to say something.
The title of this thread is:
over-recruitment in men’s soccer (Colby College 2019)
It is already on Google search. OK, as of this writing there are only 391 views of this thread, and there are probably many repeats. On the other hand, don’t know how many have seen just the title.
Based on the facts presented, there was no over-recruitment. The things the Colby soccer coach told the son of the friend of the poster turned out to be 100% honest and correct. For all we know, any freshmen who showed up for tryouts in addition to the 19 who were rostered were walk-ons, who were also honestly and correctly advised by the Colby soccer coach.
Good job, Colby soccer coach, to recruit 19 team members in a single class!
I hope anyone who comes across this thread reads it all the way through.
I don’t know about over-recruitment, per se, but I know a kid who went there to play soccer – very good player with lots of offers who can most definitely play in this league – but who got in on his own and then didn’t make the squad. I know of identical circumstances at Middlebury with lacrosse. So if you’re choosing the NESCAC school in part because of athletics and you’re smart enough to not need one of the valued tips or slots, I guess you need to be pretty aware that making the team isn’t a done deal, even if the coach is asking you to come and to apply early and so on. It’s really just common sense and caveat emptor and all that, but I think plenty of kids make these decisions based in part on coach’s encouragement. If the coach doesn’t have any skin in the game, beware. The flip side of the coin is equally true: there are plenty of kids going to non scholarship schools who parlay a formal recruitment, tip or slot into admission to a school they’d never get into otherwise and then promptly change their minds about their passion for the sport. The coach is left holding the bag.
I get what @fenwaypark is saying, and I can appreciate how tough it is to be an athletic coach at a D3 school. I suspect (and would hope) that there was more to the discussions between the student and the Colby coach than original poster related. If indeed the coach told the applicant “he wanted him to play on the men’s soccer team,” that sounds very far from any sort of guarantee to me.
When we visited schools with D last year, we met with the coaches in her sport whenever possible. We asked all the tough questions–how many slots do you have open this year, how many applicants have expressed interest so far, how many students get turned away each year?, etc. We felt like we had a good understanding of the process at each school. Several schools requested that D consider applying ED. She ignored those requests because she wanted to keep her options open. She ended up enrolling at the school with the best combination of academics, “fit,” her sport, location, and size, for her. She tried out for the team last week and, thankfully, made the roster. But the most important thing was that she knew going into it what the process was, and that there were no guarantees.
Son rejected for soccer at Colby after being recruited and given a pre-read and asked to apply ED1. Nothing academically changed from the preread. Was told son had nothing to worry about. Not the end of the world, but he could have used the ED1 at other NESCACS that wanted him, but now that is not a possibility The process is screwed up and the conferences and D3 think they are protecting their academic environment but they are actually just screwing over kids. They are not giving money so what is the big deal if they just have a more transparent process?
Well, it doesn’t sound like he was rejected from soccer but that he was not admitted academically ED.
I know you are disappointed, but don’t give up on the other schools he was interested in. If he is accepted academically, he can try to walk on for soccer.
Twoanddone,
I am convinced that it would be worthwhile to spend the next fifteen days on the phone with other colleges to see if there is interest elsewhere for ED2. I know of folks that have had this same experience – some on this board. Swivel is not the first to have a child rejected or deferred after being a recruit. If he is a good player, other schools will be interested on the rebound. I do believe that some D3 schools pick up recruits that for one reason or the other were rejected or deferred ED1.
Two schools worthy of pursuit are Wheaton MA and Conn College. Wheaton has a great mens soccer program. Conn is totally solid, with some terrific players.
I agree with fenwaypark that, based on the facts presented, the title of the thread seems misleading. The facts appear to be that the Colby coach encouraged a prospective D3 “walk on” to apply telling him that “he wanted him to play on the men’s soccer team.” The (academically qualified) walk-on later tried out and made the team, thus, affirming the accuracy of the coach’s statement. The fact that others tried and failed to make the team is irrelevant, since there is no indication that the coach misled them in any way.
Other posters have correctly placed the blame where it belongs upon the inexperienced applicant, who failed properly to comprehend what the coach was telling him. A NESCAC applicant needs to find out whether the coach is/is not offering a slot , a tip, or zero admission support. If the walk-on is being offered zero support, then he needs to find out whether he is being guaranteed a spot on the team, if admitted through normal channels.