Hello,
Has anyone used a recruiting service like NCSA? We are thinking about using one but they got mixed reviews. It seems like some people really liked them and other thought it was a scam. Thoughts? Would we be better off learning on our own? Thanks.
Don’t think its needed, maybe use their free component to get your name out there - find the schools that would be a academic and athletic fit, fill out the recruiting questionnaires, email the coaches, and you’ll find out whose interested.
I almost went for them, but a lot of what they do can be done on your own. Getting your name out there can be done simply by emailing or calling coaches. For me, their best asset is realistically evaluating where you stand for colleges and they layout an organized plan. But, like I said, you can do that on your own. NCSA does cost quite a bit, so I would suggest you try it your own way. Good Luck!
I don’t have first hand experience with any of the recruiting services (I talked to them but didn’t use them). It seems to me like it depends on how wide a net you want to cast. S realized there were less than 20 schools that were realistic choices that he was interested in. That’s a pretty manageable number. If you have no idea where you fit in or where you want to go, then they could be helpful. I think you might get exposed to more schools. But if you know that you only want to go to D2 schools within 300 miles of where you live now (or whatever your criteria is), then you don’t really need them. You can contact those coaches on your own. If you want to hear from schools that you haven’t heard of or that would be off of your radar, then I think they could be helpful. For some people that’s a negative, for others a positive.
The coaches at the schools my DD was interested in told us point-blank that they hated recruiting services, and didn’t use them. They delete the emails unread.
Fill out the recruiting forms yourself and start e-mailing the coaches at your target schools. You can even send short videos or post something on You-Tube with links. My DD got where she neede with that.
When my daughter was looking to run in college, she created a presence on NCSA. She was interested in going to school in the southeast, and used College Board to find some schools that would fit her desire , location, sizewise and academically. She then went to those schools websites to see if she could fit in athletically with the teams. She then reached out to the coaches directly, and rather than having to give them all her scholastic and athletic info, she directed them to her profile on NCSA. She was viewed by many coaches, not only the dozen or so that she reached out to. It was free, and when they wanted to “interview” and propose the recruiting package, we simply passed on it. Not a necessary tool, I suppose, but it worked very well for her. She is now a sophomore at a small LA school in Tennessee, loving it, and number 5 on their XC team.
I could be wrong, but I think that it depends on the type of school whether they use them. The top end of D1 I would think doesn’t. They don’t need to, they have other resources and plenty of talent to pick from. Plus if you don’t have a national reputation they probably aren’t going to look at you anyway. Likewise with the Ivy, NESCAC and similar schools, which is probably who @OldbatesieDoc was talking to. They are looking for a specific type of student, and by and large that type of student will either contact them or be found in a more targeted search.
I would guess they get used a lot more by the lower D1’s, and D2 and D3’s who aren’t necessarily at the Ivy/NESCAC academic level. They would love to pick up a talented but overlooked kid from 1,000 miles away who is more interested in playing their sport than necessarily where they go to school. They don’t have to be nearly as selective as Ivy/NESCAC types, and they don’t have the recruiting budget of the big boys.
My DS used NCSA. We didn’t sign up for the top level, I think we ended up paying $800ish when he was a Freshman and it was well worth every penny. Context: My son is a good T&F athlete who is an awesome student. Some stats: 1510 SAT (770 M: 740 V) and 34 ACT (36 E and CR, 32 M): 4.0 Unweighted GPA 4:39 Weighted. Max AP test scores (5) in 6 AP subjects Jr. year. 6 more AP subjects SR. year. Class Rank top 5 out of 506. 12 time letter winner in XC, WT&F, ST&F. 4 time team captain. 2 time state medalist on relays. Qualified for state indoor 800 individual, but ran relay his Junior year. His PR on 800 is around 1:57 indoor his junior year and was hurt outdoor, but projects at a 1:55 outdoor PR.
His track times are good for DIII or low DI, but not a scholarship to any of the top tier academic schools. He knew he’d never run in the Olympics or NCAA DI championships. He is a one event mid distance guy and he knows that. He wanted to use his Track time and his academic performance to get him into a top DIII school and he felt that his Varsity potential would help him there.
The services web presence are ok, we get contacted daily from programs that he has no interest in and he did use it to make first contact with some of his targeted schools. At the end of the day, he made contact with Johns Hopkins, UChicago, Williams, Bowdoin, and Washington and Lee through the service. The real benefit was the one-on-one coaching he received from former NCAA DI and DIII athletes/coaches that NCSA uses. They helped him focus his search, how to correctly contact coaches, how to spend the off season. NCSA and DS set a goal and a plan from day one.
The end of the story is that 3 weeks ago, he received a Likely Letter from UChicago to run XC and T&F. He is stoked and while using the service may not have been necessary, it made the process much easier. Especially since he is the first person in our extended family to go through the whole college athlete process.
Hope this helps.
My daughter did well with it – they helped her target her efforts to athletic match schools and also helped her and I to research financial information to make sure she targeted coaches where we could afford to send her. We also didn’t do the top level but we did love the informatin we got at our fingertips from the service. We could see who looked at her profile, who opened her emails and we could guage who was really interested. I agree with @BrianBoiler that is was very useful. I never would have thought to reach out to the specific coaches we did – I thought it was totally worth it. It wasn’t really that costly IMO for the database of information and the realistic evaluation of where she would fit as a player. She plays LAX now at a pretty highly ranked D2 school.