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The following article is sponsored by National Scouting Report. Visit NSR’s web site at http://www.nsr-inc.com/
DON’T WAIT TO START THE COLLEGE RECRUITING PROCESS
A cardinal sin made by parents of high school athletes hoping to play at the college level is presuming there is no harm in waiting to be recruited.
There is glaring evidence of this each day with announcements across the country of freshman and sophomore athletes committing to colleges or coaches making scholarship offers to athletes in eighth, ninth or 10th grade.
Within recent months:
A 14-year-old baseball pitcher from Huntington Beach, Calif., made a verbal commitment to UCLA.
A 13-year-old softball pitcher from Filmore, Calif., committed to the University of Arizona.
An eighth-grade quarterback from New Canaan, Conn., received a verbal offer from Florida State University.
An eighth-grade boys’ lacrosse player from Long Island, N.Y., committed to Penn State University.
Those offers were not imaginary. They are real indications to parents about the state of college recruiting today.
Sure, those young athletes have exceptional talent. But they also were prospects known by college coaches at a young age. Athletes do not become college prospects until they are actually in the recruiting process.
So, how early should your child start the recruiting process? It is not too early for athletes to begin the process if scholarships already are being offered to other athletes in their sport and class.
Here are four key reasons parents should not wait to start their young athletes in the recruiting process:
More white boards:Every day you wait, another athlete in your child’s class will be jump ahead in the recruiting process. The sad thing is: Many times athletes who go on white boards first are not as talented as your athlete. The difference? Those other families did not wait to start the recruiting process early.
More evaluations: The longer your athlete is in the process, the better the chances are that he or she will be noticed and evaluated. Obviously, the more schools that evaluate your athlete, the better his/her chances are to be formally recruited.
More relationships: Recruiting is all about relationships. The more time your child has to build trusting relationships with college coaches, the more offers he or she is likely going to receive. That gives your athlete leverage with coaches and creates demand for his or her athletic talents. So, it make sense that the longer families wait, the fewer opportunities their athletes will have to build solid relationships with coaches.
More options: When families wait to start the recruiting process, the fewer options they are likely to have as signing periods approach. Other prospects who started the process early will have filled the roster spots which for which your athlete may have been considered.
National Scouting Report, the world’s oldest and largest college recruiting organization, has received hundreds of requests from college coaches seeking qualified prospects (2017-20) in all sports. More than 95 percent of NSR’s prospects receive scholarship offers. For a FREE athletic evaluation, contact NSR Area Director Gary Silvers, former Executive Sports Editor of the Bucks County Courier Times, at (215) 480-8764 or gsilvers@nsr-inc.com.