<p>Oh. Gee. It appears that I may have misunderstood the process. As usual. I wasn't trying to use my Daughter's higher than average basketball prowess to get her into schools where her scores were lower than the average admitted student. I was trying to use her higher than average scores to get her into schools where her basketball prowess was lower than the average rim grabbing player. Although my D could easily grab hold of the rim, if she fell thru the ceiling directly above it. Sorry for the confusion. Carry on. ;) JK.</p>
<p>Wow, I've never heard of anyone doing it that way; academic recruiting to play a sport. Whatever works, I guess.</p>
<p>;););)Just having some fun. </p>
<pre><code> WARNING:REALLY BAD PUN ALERT
</code></pre>
<p>I apologize but that "One year....at band camp" thread got kinda testes over to the cafe. Had to escape. Sorry again.</p>
<p>There's a book about athletic recruiting in the Ivy League and NESCAC called "Playing the Game" by Chris Lincoln. I thought it gave an interesting look inside the process at the Ivies and academically competitive D3 schools. It looks at the recruiting process, EA/ED, likely letters, coach's lists, academic index, etc.</p>
<p>Thanks for the idea about googling players to get a idea of their playing level. It's usually easy to tell how good a D1 roster is because the player bios often give high school stats, info about club team and media accolades. But D3 rosters usually don't list player bios and it is difficult to tell if these are rec league players or phenoms who chose the D3 school for other reasons. And of course it varies with the D3 school--some are amazingly good, depending on the sport and on the school.</p>
<p>haven't read it myself, but here's some material/discussions/mentions on Lincoln's book:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.cornellsun.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/09/28/4158e3b86f3fb%5B/url%5D">http://www.cornellsun.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/09/28/4158e3b86f3fb</a>
<a href="http://board.uscho.com/archive/index.php/t-40517.html%5B/url%5D">http://board.uscho.com/archive/index.php/t-40517.html</a>
<a href="http://hsbaseballweb.com/eve/ubb.x/a/tpc/f/4686003481/m/162102738%5B/url%5D">http://hsbaseballweb.com/eve/ubb.x/a/tpc/f/4686003481/m/162102738</a>
<a href="http://forums.laxpower.com/read.php?f=3&i=32457&t=32267%5B/url%5D">http://forums.laxpower.com/read.php?f=3&i=32457&t=32267</a></p>
<p>British perspective:
<a href="http://www.squashtalk.com/html/news/aug04/globalgallery04_11.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.squashtalk.com/html/news/aug04/globalgallery04_11.htm</a></p>
<p>"Yeah I had a coach call me the other night from Harvey Mudd for track and he basically just was doing a follow u" </p>
<p>The CMS coaches for XC and track are known to be extremely intense and so dedicated that they flirt with borderline madness. The program is not for the faint of heart.</p>
<p>Well thats cool... Hopefully the guy was genuinely interested in me.</p>
<p>can recruitment help even if you are not applying early to a school?</p>
<p>yes, it can. Back in March, the coach of my D's future team made casual mention of pushing hard for a couple of more great players in RD. So I believe a coach would still support you in RD. </p>
<p>Of course, a coach will not stick his or her neck out but so far unless the student is committed to attend the school. Especially at the schools where a coach has a "wild card" auto admit slot, why would it be used on a person not committed to attend? That would be a dumb use of a valuable commodity.</p>
<p>Having gone through the process with my son last year, I can only tell you
that the summer of the junior year is invaluable for visiting those division
III schools personally and attempting to meet with the coach that your
interested in. Our goal was to target the best academic division III schools
in the location where our son wanted to go to school. In January of his junior
year, he wrote to the coach of each shcool he was interested in. At the end of his junior year, regardless of whether the first letter was acknowledged, he
sent another letter with a tape and his statistics from his junior year. In the summer, he sent emails to each of the coaches stating that he would be visiting the school and would like to possible meet with them. Regardless
of whether or not that was acknowledge, he met with the coaches who had
replied to his email and letters and "dropped in" on those coaches who had
not acknowledged his email (Many Division III coaches are two or three man
or women operations and sometimes do not have the time to acknowledge
emails or letters). By making a trip in the summer to meet with the coach
accomplishes two important goals: 1) It lets the coach put a face with your
son or daughter and 2) It shows the coach that your son or daughter is
interested in his school (this is especially important if the school is far away).
Division III sports are NOT division I. For the Tier I and Tier II schools, the
coaches are attempting to fill their roster with students that admission will
accept. Many times their first choices that apply ED I will not get in and
that is where visiting in the summer pays off. Your son or daughter may not
be the first choice of the coach but if the coach has a face to put with
the name, it helps your son or daughters chances. I will detail in the
next reply how son decided which school to pick, the mistake we first
made on ED 1 and how he finally chose a school</p>
<p>YAY, Marigotdog, anxiously awaiting details! D is a rising senior and we have followed your plan (although we are still working on the tape--got to finish that this summer.) D has met with both D1 and D3 coaches and I have to confess that the D3 world is still a mystery to me. The D1 coaches who agreed to meet with her were very clear about what they wanted to see and the outcomes are clear---if they are interested, they call, they eventually get the kid to sign a letter of intent and you know if you are on the team.</p>
<p>Some of the D3 coaches have been very clear about the process (i.e. send me a tape and I can give you a good idea if you would make the team and where you would fit in.) But others have been unresponsive or very laissez-faire so we don't know if they view daughter's stats (varsity, MVP, club team and Futures/ODP) as not good enough or if the coaches just don't have good recruiting skills. Or have D3 coaches been burned too frequently by spending time on recruiting kids only to see them go off to another program?</p>
<p>Any insights you have would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>D and I had a long talk this morning about D3 recruiting and have decided that we are going to let nature take its course. I think it is sort of a reaction to all she has on her plate, her surgery has relegated her to the stands all summer, and the fact that she's " going to apply to the same schools anyway". I think her thinking is that she'll use the coaches attitude, possibility of playing varsity ball, and the team chemistry as a tipping factor between two schools already on her list. She decided that if she doesnt fit in the basketball plans of the coach at a school she has number one, she'd go to her dream school anyway. But in deciding between her other schools basketballl would become a serious tipping factor.</p>
<p>So, we'll respond to e-mails from her nine coaches, try to set up meetings and visit the campuses, ask the coaches if they will be at any area showcases in the fall, and be prepared to walk-on to a team that has possibly expressed little or zero interest toward her. Hey. If the coach thinks she can play, she will play. If the coach thinks she can't,then she won't. Not being "recruited " is not going to change that a whit. As long as she is willing to accept the consequences of this far less involved strategy, it makes my life much easier.</p>
<p>I will be entering my junior year in the fall. I am interested in swimming for a Div. III school for college. I have checked the times of some of the schools and my times line up with what they list on their web sites. I understand that the coaches cannot contact me until the summer between my junior and senior year. But, from what Marigotdog said, it sounds as if I can contact them during my junior year. Is that correct?</p>
<p>rokko91, yes my understanding is that you can call (but they can't return phone calls) or email coaches prior to that July 1st date and you can even arrange to meet with them.</p>
<p>Curmudgeon, we are in the same boat as you and your D, although still hoping that the sport may give her an admissions boost to make up for her slightly disappointly critical reading score. There are a coupla schools that she might not get admitted to, based strictly on academics but maybe her commitment to her sport would help. Your daughter's approach seems much saner and will probably make for a more straightforward application/decision process. Let's hope!</p>
<p>Thanks for the vote of confidence dcmom3, and I'll pass it on to D. Dad's not so sure as I tend to want to be a bit more proactive about things like this. I think the thought of vetting 20 or 30 more schools to canvass for who'd give her the best shot of playing/best situation was just too daunting to her. She has eleven schools on her list but 2 are D1 and big-time D1 at that. We call it 9 bball schools and two that aren't.</p>
<p>Marigotdog, great post! I look forward to part 2. </p>
<p>dcmom, I believe they CAN reply, they just can't initiate contact.</p>
<p>rokko, do get in touch. If you visit the school, the coach can also be very helpful in setting up an overnight with a team member.</p>
<p>Here is why D3 is mysterious. Every school is different!</p>
<p>At top athletic schools (i.e. those with national rankings, the league champs, or those in very strong conferences) you will get more "D-1 style" coaches with more committment to recruiting and clearer, more explicit style.</p>
<p>Some D-3's are less serious about building winning teams and therefore scarcely recruit. Some coaches have auto-admits and some don't. Standards vary as well. </p>
<p>Once you have established some rapport with the coach (Marigot has good ideas there) if they seem to be enthusiastic about you, don't be shy-- ASK QUESTIONS!! Like:</p>
<ul>
<li>what is your school's cutoff for "recruitable" stats?</li>
<li>where do I rank on your list of potential recruits, academically,
athletically, and in combination?
-what has been the admission result for recruits who were like me in
past years, % wise?</li>
<li>do you have any auto-admits?</li>
<li>am I one of them?</li>
<li>can you get that in writing from admissions?</li>
</ul>
<p>Talk to others who were recruited in prior years to get an idea about the credibility of the coach. NEVER fail to keep your options open by applying to a bunch of other schools!! You can be the #1 recruit... till the coach's phone rings and it's someone better on the other end. Even the most credible, excellent, loyal coach can promise you an auto admit and get fired the next month.</p>
<p>The coach for whom D will play next year was very very clear in being 100% supportive, and D being the top priority-- but this coach did NOT say "guaranteed" and thus did advise D to submit her RD apps anyway. Furthermore the warnings I got on CC were such that we would not have tempted fate no matter what the coach said.</p>
<p>You can contact the DI coaches and they can respond. Many won't respond to phone calls just in case it might LOOK like they initiated the call (to a junior). S met with a DI coach in October of his junior year and several more in March. Starting in March they are allowed to call you once a month.<br>
Correct about a lot of differences in DIII schools. S is hearing from a top DIII coach every few days right now. Another one just sent a packet about the team, the stats etc. but didn't promise any help with admissions.<br>
SBMom's list of questions is key. S's college counselor pretty much gave him the same list. The counselor will also follow up with the schools once it gets close to ED time to see what the admissions chances look like.</p>
<p>Our recruiting odyssey began with a number of schools expressing
interest. We catagorized the schools by athletic (D1 or D3)
and, more importantly, academic (TIer 1-5-- using US News
and World report). Our goal was always Tier 1 D3, which
was a bit of a stretch. We kept track of all contacts and
made sure that any contact (email or call) was answered the
same day,-- We also told our Son that he could like many schools,
but love none,- since we didn't know, and no parent CAN know,
where their kid stands on a coach's recruiting chart. Your child
may be told that he is #1- but how many #1s does the coach
have??. You will never get a totally honest answer until rug
cutting time!!! It is, unfortunately, the name of the game to
keep all recruits on the hook until the coach checks his needs
and sees who he can get in. Understand, it is VERY rare that
a Division III coach gets fired because of his record. Most Division
III coaches goals are to put a competitive team within the
academic constraints put upon him by the college.
As for our son, by most of the tier I schools that were
interested in him, he was told that it was important for him to
ED in order for him to have a better chance in getting in. For
all parents whose children are reaching for schools above their
academic stats, I cannot stress how important it is to ED. The
key is to make sure to know what pull if any the specific coach
may have with admissions REGARDLESS OF WHAT HE OR SHE
MAY SAY THEY HAVE. Some general rules:
1. Coaches who have been at a school a long time as
head coach have more pull than coaches who have
been there a short time. Some coaches who have been
a short time have NO PULL regardless of what they may
say.
2. Some schools have protects which means that if you
meet a certain basic standard, that a coach can ALMOST
guarantee that your son or daughter will be accepted.
You should know if a coach has or does not have those
AND whether he or she is willing to use one of those protects
on your son or daughter before you commit to EDing a school.
This is especially true if you are "reaching" for a school.</p>
<pre><code> As for us, our son he did overnights at about 3 of the schools
</code></pre>
<p>that were recruiting him and was told by the school that he liked
the best that he was their number 1 recruit but their school did
not have protects but they were confident he would get in. He
did not nor did ANY of the first EDer/recruits for this sport at
this school get in. The coach had only been there 3 years and,
we later found out, had very little pull. Tough lesson for our
son- but a good learning experience for the next round. After
submitting the ED for the 1st school, son was contacted, out
of the blue, by 2 top tier 1 coachs whom he hadn't heard
from since interviewing in the summer. We're guessing that
those coach's top recruits didn't apply ED or they got rejected,
so he went to his next in line on the recruiting chart. During
this process he continuted to speak with other division III
coaches (tier 2 safety schools). FInally had to decide
between 2 (one who was above the rejecting schools
ranking but whose long time coach said they did not have
protects but he was very sure he could get him in and
one school that was a little below the rejecting school's
ranking but the long time coach's school had protects)
where to apply ED2. Once burned, my son met with the Coach
who had protects and was offered one. This was the first
time we felt we could really rely on a coach's representation.
Short version, son applied ED2 and was accepted.</p>
<p>Thanks, Margotdog. I sent you a PM.</p>