Hi,
I’m frustrated. I’m curious to know if you’re a parent or child and what is your biggest challenge with the recruiting process? Mine is, I just don’t know enough about it and seems like a steep learning curve.
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Well, I think you’re in the right place to get up to speed quickly. Depending on the sport, there are parents on the forum with a lot of experience to share! Definitely use the search tool to see if there are existing threads for your kid’s sport (I’m assuming you are a parent).
I am a parent that went through recruiting 2 times with the same son and got the best advice and learned significantly from the members of this forum. I am done with recruiting now (one year of eligibility and school left and he is happy!), but I still engage with this community on occasion because of how much it helped me when I needed it.
The biggest challenge for us was trying to figure out the best fit of academics and athletics all while keeping things financially feasible. No one knows your child better than you and as a parent you don’t want them to navigate this alone. The learning curve is steep, but time spent learning is worth it, since there is a lot at stake. Throughout the recruiting process it always felt like we had partial info and timing was never in our favor. My son’s recruiting started late and went late, well into his senior year in hs, and then into the summer the year he transferred. He always felt like he was the backup choice and coaches were keeping him warm while other athletes decided what they were going to do. We never really knew where he stood with many of the coaches and communications seemed vague. By most accounts (solid performer in his event, state champ, high nat’l. ranking) he should have had a multitude of wonderful offers at all kinds of schools, but that was not our reality. The schools he liked didn’t want him or had full rosters already and the ones that offered any real money didn’t have a good coach or a program he wanted to be part of.
Outside of this forum, I felt like other parents exaggerated their experiences and what offers their kids received. We tried to learn what we could by reading this forum’s older posts and then posting our own questions. I think everyone here shares the truth (due to anonymity) and when I needed real help with info, I often got PMs with specific answers. After a little while it will become obvious which parents can help with a given sport and while no two athletes are in the exact same situation, chances are someone has been in a similar situation to yours before.
Looking back, my greatest frustration was the lack of understanding or appreciation by others about just how darn hard it was develop a strong list of academic and athletic matches, where both the school wanted the kid, and the kid wanted the school back, and the money worked.
My kid and I spent about 18 months working through the process and I wouldn’t have traded any of it (well, maybe a couple of coach meetings and unimpressive camp outings) because it was so much fun to see my kid grow up as he worked through the process. He is now happily competing, studying, making mistakes and learning from them, at a school which is just right for him. His team is his family, and I look at the guys from his recruiting class and realize they will be his life long friends. I had no way of knowing that when we started the process, but with the help of CC, and some level headed folks in real life, that’s where it ended up.
One of the biggest challenges was riding the ups and downs of the process (which for us, started middle of sophomore year…she’s now a senior who recently signed an NLI). Because a coach who seemed very interested at one point can ghost you. Also challenging (at least for me) was balancing optimism with a healthy dose of realism…knowing which programs were reaches and which ones were better fits for my kid. And finally, learning to be patient — kids outside of the top tier (which is most of them!), sometimes need to wait for dominos to fall into place before coaches get around to considering them.
It is a confusing process. If money is not an issue, that will open up a lot of options. Unfortunately, money was front and center of all decisions at our house. At one point my daughter just looked at me and said “Will you handle the money?” She was 16, she was worried about the academics, she was worried about the athletics, she just couldn’t handle the money piece too. We did have to decide D1/D2 with merit and athletic money or go to D3 and get merit (which in itself limited the D3’s because not all give merit) and need based. My daughter didn’t really like most of the D3 schools she looked at for the academics, and many had teams that were, to put it kindly, not good so many were out before they were ever really in.
I think another hard part was realizing THE school was THE school, that it had the right academic, athletic, and financial pieces, and we could stop looking. D knew before I did, but I was still worrying about the finances right up to the last minute I also had to come to the realization that although I wouldn’t have picked that school for me, it really was perfect for my daughter.
My daughter was taking a chance because it was a new team. The coach was not really impressed with her playing ability because there weren’t a lot of awards or national teams on D’s resume, and her high school team was just okay and her club was fairly new, but the coach needed warm bodies and D had the stats to get in academically. Coach has been quite surprised at D’s skills but mostly with D’s work ethic.
Things we didn’t consider at all and I wish we had (but they have worked out):
- Amount of travel the team does. Look at the conference and how much travel there is. It can be brutal. The first year they took a lot of long bus trips and even the coach figured out it was too many trips.
- The history of the tuition increases at the school. D's tuition has gone up $2k per year and is now almost $10k more than it was when were looking at the school (it went up $2k from when we looked till when she started)
- Will any of the aid increase each year?
- Can your parents watch you play if you pick school A over school B? My D plays a spring sport so never gets a spring break, but I've been able to travel to see her play.
Been through recruiting several times in different sports at the D3 level. The biggest challenge was never knowing. Was the kid good enough, would the colleges have a need, were the grades and board scores good enough, would the kid get admitted, what did the coach really mean by this or that comment, and the list went on. The worst was questioning whether all of the effort would end well, and if it didn’t, how that would affect the kid.
The learning curve is not as steep as you may think. Make a list of colleges, and start emailing coaches. Use any excuse to continue communications. Understand that at the D3 level at least, coaches rely on athletes approaching coaches with their talent. There is no doubt that recruiting comes from camps and tournaments, but remember that any given coach is competing with other coaches at the camps or tournaments for the best players. When a player communicates directly with a coach, the coach knows that the athlete already has a true interest in that college. Set up appointments with some local college coaches, even if you have no interest in that college. Ask questions.
Listen to what the coaches have to say. At a certain point, you will “get it.”
You don’t control the process, so don’t try. You can guide the process based on your family’s values and priorities, but ultimately I could never have predicted at the beginning each time where mine actually ended up. Each time, the process was sprinkled with serendipity. I am glad that I went through it.
You can always run any questions through this site, although you may get differing opinions on some points.
The postings from CC have been a tremendous resource in our recruitment process. So many experienced parents giving great advice helped to clear up what was a very mysterious and confusing process. Our child always wanted to be at a Div 1 academically elite school, since many of his friends are current athletes in those schools. Therefore since 10th grade he set his goal both academically and athletically to be good enough to be recruited by those schools. Our frustration was not know how realistic we had to be of his chances. He literally put in 200% percent dedication, which I am both extremely proud and quite amazed that he was able to do that, to eventually become good enough to be recruited by all the school he wanted to attend and received his LL from his first choice. However, during the past two years, despite his “200%” dedication, there were many times he was in a slump both from academic and athletics, and we all wondered if we needed to switch his path to other non athletic endeavors. We had several “serious” discussions of possibly switching from recruitment to other more academic concentration and/or music. But fortunately he was able to bounce back very quickly and continued on the upward trend.
Another frustration was that despite having a mutual commitment by the coach and son in the spring of his junior year, the official pre-read was done later in the summer, so despite his grades and scores being very good but not perfect, we just didn’t know if we were going to lose other opportunities by relying on just one school and not know how the pre-read would turn out.
There is a lot of good advice about finding target schools, etc above, but let me take a slightly different take then most. The biggest challenge in recruiting from the parent/athlete side is maintaining perspective. There are two parts to this, a “10,000 foot view” and a “nuts and bolts” part.
The big picture part was about trying and keep my kid grounded, to help him avoid the normal highs and lows of the process. I wanted him to remember that he didn’t start playing his sport on the off chance that it would get him to college one day, and that he should take whatever recruiting interest he received as a boon rather than a right. I also wanted to help him realize that he very likely was not going to play his sport past college, so that he should choose his college based on factors beyond the athletic ones. When it came time to build his target list, I think my kid did a pretty good job of focusing on schools he would have liked attending even without the athletic part. From there, it really came down to trying to find the right athletic match. But the academic part always predominated, and in many ways that made his process more manageable.
On the detail front, the objective stuff comes first. Learn your sport’s recruiting calendar. Here is the NCAA calendar for the next cycle http://www.ncaa.org/student-athletes/resources/recruiting-calendars/2017-18-division-i-and-ii-recruiting-calendars. While many here will tell you that certain sports do not operate in accordance with these rules, I would suggest that you start here and use the actual rules as your default understanding until you are sure you are operating on a different time table. A great resource if you have access to it is other parents who have recently gone through the recruiting process at your kid’s school/club. I personally got a ton of insight from a couple dads in particular whose son’s had been recruited in the cycle before my sons. As always, you have to separate the wheat from the chaff, but parents in the same sport with recent experience can be a great help. In addition, and based on the sport, there are always some articles written about recruiting in the general sports publications. Read widely, not necessarily for the specifics of any individual circumstance, but to get a general sense of how the process works in your sport.
From here, if your child is interested in high academic conferences like the Ivy/NESCAC, look for whatever you can about the conference’s specific rules. Here is a summary of the Ivy rules that I believe is still relatively accurate. http://ivyserver.princeton.edu/ivy/downloads/rulesummary/ivysummary.pdf. The Bowdoin Orient published a series of articles on the NESCAC band system a few years ago, but a quick google search didn’t lead me to the articles. Some time here or with google should get you there though. Another truly excellent resource for high academic recruiting is http://www.tier1athletics.org/. Once you know the rules under which you are operating, it becomes easier to get a sense of the general timeline.
Once you feel comfortable knowing the general “lay of the land” I found it helpful to look at historical rosters of several schools my son had targeted. This will give you a sense of how many kids a particular program “carries” at your kid’s position, and also a sense of how many that school may be looking for in your particular cycle. This was invaluable to me, and I think it is an underappreciated piece of information. Simply put, if a program tends to roster 5-6 middle distance runners (as an example, I have no idea about track at all) over the last several years and they are only returning 2, then that school may be a good target. On the other hand, if 4-5 are coming back, that school is probably a tougher ticket.
On to the real nitty gritty, once your kid gets to the point of communicating with coaches either electronically or in person, always keep top of mind that no matter how nice a coach seems, he is only talking to your kid because that coach thinks your kid can help him win and therefore keep his job or move on to a school higher up the ladder. If the coach finds someone else who he thinks will help him more, or if he is not convinced your kid is going to help him, he will move on. For this reason, it is very important to help your kid to listen very carefully to everything a coach says. Generally speaking, coaches are pros at recruiting, and they are going to use specific language for specific purposes. Help your kid ask direct questions and look for clear answers. Most importantly, help your kid remember that until a committable offer is clearly and unequivocally extended, absolutely nothing is for sure.
Best of luck, and keep reaching out as you have more questions. There is a pretty wide experience pool here.
So much great advice from Ohiodad51 above. Especially this: “I wanted him to remember that he didn’t start playing his sport on the off chance that it would get him to college one day, and that he should take whatever recruiting interest he received as a boon rather than a right.”
So many great answers on here! I wear a dual hat: both HS coach and parent, this is my first time from the parent
side, and it’s been great to be able to watch my son grow through the process.
I agree: academics and athletics need to marry and in my opinion, in that order. I always like to keep in mind that the athletics could end tomorrow. Our biggest thing was finding the school with the major, seeing if it was an academic fit and then an athletic fit. Key was having HIM make the connections - sending the emails, making the calls. After the first couple of times with some guidance, he got to be pretty good at it. Now he doesn’t even blink with a coach on the phone or in person.
I think another important thing to remember is that you steer the ship - you may not control the destination like @gointhruaphase said, but you do have the power to guide it . But, you need to “dance” carefully…We had an incident this summer at a big event where the asst. coach reached out after the first day to my son and wanted to talk to him after the event the next day once he competed. He’d already passed the initial pre-read, already in contact/calls w/ head coach. They set up a time and place at the event and he completely blew my kid off - no phone call, nothing…just didn’t show. In fact, we watched him leave early before he even got a chance to see my kid compete. I get it - interest sways quickly, but be a professional - these are kids. Suffice to say, based upon those actions alone, I wouldn’t want my kid in that program anyway, and he got to see the not so nice side of recruiting. Dance carefully…
Like @Ohiodad51, we looked at the rosters over the years as well to see how many juniors/seniors there were, where the need would be, etc. I also wanted my son to see retention, who stayed, who left…that can tell a part of the story.
Fate is an amazing thing. Our son’s top choice wasn’t even on the radar at first. Sometimes things happen for a reason (see above story!). He sent info. on a whim to the coach, and we went to visit with the intent that it would not even be a blip on his screen, and it ends up being his way up #1. Huh. If you asked me a year ago, this never would’ve been the way I’d have predicted this story would go. Be flexible and open, look at things through their lenses. Sometimes the diamond in the ruff is waiting to be found.
One big thing I would take away from our current experience is if the school is close enough, don’t just meet with a coach once if the school really grabs your kid’s attention - one meeting doesn’t necessarily give you the full picture. The OV will shine a bigger light for the student/athlete, but I like to see things in real time - no smoke and mirrors and wanted to expose my son to that. We were always sold on our son’s top choice from the academic side. We’ve really done a lot of research - taken in games, watched how the coach acts with the kids on the team, and have seen the coach in action, etc…If it pans out for our son, it will be a win, win. We’ll find out soon enough 
You can learn an awful lot by watching and listening…and do your due diligence. All in all, it’s been a fantastic experience, and we’ve learned an awful lot about our son! 
Biggest Challenge for my D3 D? Cost. Cost to play AAU/club and travel to the tournaments. My D was looking at D3 LAC’s. We spent a lot of money and time visiting colleges prior to letting the coaches know she had interest to see if they were an academic fit. Then taveling to the elite/ID camps the schools put on. Last, traveling to OV. We started the college search looking at academic fit, then looked at acedemic fit. Definitely look at academic fit first, imo.
@mamom, agree about academic fit being 1st as they call them student-athletes not athlete-students…I would put social fit 2nd as this is a pivotal point in their lives, understanding that their team will play a big part of their social life.
Meant to say look at academic fit then athletic fit.
OV visits were key for D. She knows her teammates will be her BFF’s at college. Not necessarily her only friends, but people she will be spending a lot of time with. She ruled out a couple of schools because of the OV.
One thing we found odd was how differently it works from sport to sport. How you get seen, who will even get a glance, how much money is available, if rosters support walk-ons, etc is completely different for each team. I found a great website for my DD’s sport that made a huge difference, but make sure you find advice particular to your child’s sport. If you read up on softball (recruiting in 8th grade) vs track (waiting until 11th grade) or headcount sports (finite number of larger scholarships) vs equivalency (many tiny shards of scholarships) or any number of other topics you’ll find quite a variety of answers you the same questions. This board has threads on rowing and fencing and running and swimming and soccer and quiddich and god knows what else, but if you need to know more about hoops or hockey or something just ask and someone will know those specifics.
Another thing we found to be a dirty little secret was how many athletic scholarship kids were transferring after a year, and how many were dropping down a level. Among DD’s friends there were issues with homesickness, playing time and just plain losing. One D2 school my DD was considering would have had her competing for time with a fresh transfer from Iowa State. These kids mostly ended up doing really well down at D2 or D3, so that’s terrific, but there may have been a few cases of being too flattered by an offer to take a realistic look at how things were going to actually play out. Being at the top of your club in a high level of your sport is not the same when you’re suddenly competing against a four year age group instead of just your birth year, and these athletes are the ones that have made the jump from HS and Club so the indifferent ones are gone. So I guess be realistic about your child and the level of play and commitment at each school you’re considering.
College academics can be really hard, and top level sports are really hard, and moving away from home can be hard, and all of this is quite expensive, so to me it’s almost more surprising how many kids handle it all well than how many transfer.
It’s not really a secret how many kids transfer. If you look on the roster for any college team, it lists the last school the athlete played at. If it lists a high school, probably not a transfer. If it lists another college, you can tell if the athlete switched from D1 to D2;I don’t consider this dropping down a level as the D2 team might be more competitive.
Playing time is huge. I agree that all the kids want to play all the time. My daughter was a starter as a freshman, and spent every second from the first game of freshman year to the first game of sophomore year wondering if she’d start. She spent the next year worrying if she’d start in her position or be moved to defense. She worried if a recruit she knew would take her place. She was a captain and still worrying. Now she’s a senior and no longer worrying.
Her class started with 9 freshmen. Two left after the first year (both staying at the school just quitting the sport) but the other 7 are still there. Every year there seems to be one or two freshmen who don’t return to the team. Last year they lost a soph-to-junior because of concussions (pre-existing). We’ve gotten one or two transfers
Do check the rosters from year to year to see how many return. Some good information there.
So I’ve been thru this twice with my kids-all NESCAC/Ivy/High Academic. One point is that it’s SO much easier to be recruited for an individual sport-you send your time, and you are done! Team sports are SO tough, and SO stressful, and SO expensive, because the coach has to see you play! And your child is constantly being evaluated and scrutinized, and maybe it isn’;t their best day, or no ball gets hit to them, or the pitcher they get the one time they are at bat is throwing smoke-It’s really stressful for you, and the child.
My son was a diver-sent his scores and his list of dives and everybody wanted him! My DD plays softball, and it took 4 showcase tournaments, and 10 “camps” at individual schools over 2 years, under the microscope every time to reach her goal of playing at a NESCAC! You need nerves of steel and a very strong belief in yourself!
On the plus side, it has made her a much stronger person-
Who does he want and who wants him? S has vague long term plans, which doesn’t really help on our end. He isn’t sure what he wants to do or where he wants to live. So that makes it tougher to eliminate schools.
Also, he is borderline acceptable academically for most of the schools he wants to attend. So I am freaking out (mostly to myself but sometimes it spills out) about every grade, which adds some stress at home. Plus if he could get 1-2 more ACT points this spring he will be on much more solid ground.
If he was on slightly more solid academic ground, I would be more comfortable weeding out a few schools. But since I don’t really know who (if anyone) is willing to take him as their recruit that brings down the academic index, it is pretty hard to eliminate anyone yet. If he doesn’t get that extra 1-2 points, he is going to have to be pretty close to #1 on a coaches board to get the nod.
He has other options at a couple D1’s that are athletically great fits, but I’m still hoping we can get the academic part too.
Plus pretty much every other answer above.
:-*
@dadof4kids I personally would not recommend playing a big commitment sport at an academic reach school. It is hard enough to balace without being over your head academically. IMO