Early Div I commitment

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Re: Early Div I signing

Coaches are allowed to speak to student athletes on the coaches home campus. ?You as a parent or dd/athlete may call the coach, the coach can not call you. (timing is important) ?Obviously, these named student athletes had done their homework early so they were prepared to make a commitment early. ? I have stated before, parents/student athletes need to begin visiting campuses & making relationships with coaches by the athletes freshman year. ?Coaches will have an opportunity to see the athlete mature and grow for the next couple of years. ?Coaches also know approximately how much money they have to work with each year and can extend offers to student athletes at any age. ?If the offer is from an instituition that your daughter will achieve her academic goals and the financial package is one that will meet her needs, then a match has been made. ?

Coaches advantage
As a college coach, if they can get A recruits to commit early, this allows them to focus on the the next years athletes. ?Do the math...........that means they are looking at freshman & sophmores. ?

Student Athletes advantage
The pressure is off!!! ?Not only for the athlete, but also for the parents. ?The parents will know the exact financial obligation (if any) for their dd. ?

I know in my daughters situation the conversation went as follows:
Mom says, "Our word is our word" ?and coach stated, "My offer as well. ?Once she verbals, I will send a letter stating our agreed intent." ? That was one of the most important letter she had recieved until she recieved the actual NLI. ?

Congrats to all the young athletes.............because of your hard work, you continue to put Ohio on the radar!!

 

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Re: Early Div I signing

I still don't get it. If there can't be contact how can the coach "Offer" a spot for the junior to early comitt too?

I realize athlete can go and visit them on their own terms and talk to them. Is it ok for the athlete to ask, How much will you give me? do you want me? Can I play for you?

 

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Re: Early Div I signing

Coaches can officially make contact to juniors via email. If a player or parent calls the coach, and leaves a message, the coach is not allowed to call back. Your daughter will know whether or not a coach is interested in her by going to camps and sending schedules, etc. If the coach takes an extra interest in her (coming to watch her play in games, personally taking time to talk to her or work with her at camps, etc., then your daughter will probably hear from the coach after September 1 of her junior year. If the coach feels that your daughter is the #1 recruit, and she wants her on campus, she'll send her camp information, contact her summer coach, or somehow get her to campus for an extended visit (all day, spend the night, etc.) At that time, your daughter will be given a campus tour, have an appointment with someone in the area in which she wants to study, etc. The coach is not allowed to invite the girl per se, nor is the coach allowed to pay for anything (meals, lodging, etc.). Once the recruit is on campus, the coach is then allowed to initiate talk about athletic scholarships and can make an offer at this time. For a parent to flat out ask "Are you going to make an offer? or How much will you give us?" is stretching etiquette (imho).

 

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Re: Early Div I signing

I still don't get it. ?If there can't be contact how can the coach "Offer" a spot for the junior to early comitt too?

I realize athlete can go and visit them on their own terms and talk to them. ?Is it ok for the athlete to ask, ?How much will you give me? ?do you want me? ?Can I play for you? ?

My daughter just signed her NLI for a D1 school in November so I can tell you how it worked for her....she started getting emails and snail mail (just about every day) September 1st of her junior year. ?This was because she'd been playing competive travel ball since age 11, and by the time she was in high school she was playing in Colorado (Fireworks tournament, tons of coaches), South Carolina, ASA Nationals, etc...and attending the NFCA recruiting camps whenever possible. ?When she started her junior year, she already had quite a few schools who'd had her on their radar and were paying attention. ?She was responsive and quick to send back player profile sheets, let them know her spring/summer plans and developed quite an "online relationship" with some of them. ? They are allowed to send mail, email and even text message...they just cannot call (although she could call them and all of them were adament they wanted her to call them ANYTIME). ?Those that were close enough for our family to easily drive to (1-6 hours away) we made UNofficial visits to that year. ?This meant we drove her there, we paid for our own food, etc...but other than that, once she was on their campus they were able to talk to her just as if she were a senior. ?She spent the night in the dorms with the current team and in most cases attended an athletic event (girls BB game, boys BB game, etc.) while visiting. ?Some of the coaches did talk about verbal commitments during the unoffical visits (my daughter did not want to make an early commitment...but then she's not a pitcher and it seems that is much more common for pitchers and catchers) and some mentioned specific offers (good ones). ?If a player is very sure of where they want to go, it's not hard to understand them making the verbal commit at that time. ?There are risks however, I know one of the coaches that asked my daughter if she'd be willing to make a verbal commitment while she was there on an unofficial visit as a junior, ended up leaving that program and moving to another university the next year....so her verbal commitment wouldn't have held up AND she would have missed her chance to continue being recruited by other schools (so I'm glad she said she wasn't ready to verbal at that time). ?

What my daughter did do was keep up the communication with them in the spring and made sure they had her summer schedule. ?On July 1st they can telephone and even though she was in Colorado at the time, our phone at home was ringing (one who called said he knew she was in CO because he was there watching her play...but he wanted to call her house just to make sure she knew he did on July 1st). ?Following ASA Nationals, 3 of the coaches most interested in her asked her to come for official visits. ?The official visits didn't differ all that much from the unofficial ones, except this time they paid for everything except the parent travel cost. ?She decided to accept the offer (it was excellent) the 1st school made after visiting the 2nd school the next week (she already had her airline ticket so she followed through on that visit), but she cancelled the visit to the 3rd school. ?I'd guess about 4 additional coaches have called since she's signed to ask if she had signed yet...so if she hadn't, she'd still have had some other D1 offers.

Cathi Aradi's book really was a gold mine of information. ?That, and some extremely savvy travel ball coaches, were all we had for advisors and it worked out great for my daughter. ? The most important part of the entire recruiting process was communicating EARLY with the colleges that interested the player. ?My daughter attending all events possible where college coaches were watching (the NFCA camps, the winter event at Kent State...sorry the new name escapes me right now, the travel ball recruiting tournaments, ASA Nationals, etc..). ?She emailed her schedule and letters of interest to these coaches starting in her sophomore year, so when September 1st of her junior year hit, they mailed her back. ?Because they had her schedule, they looked for her at those events and she got her chance to catch their attention. ? I really think 90% of the effort involved falls on the shoulders of the player and parents...it would very unusual for a player to not work hard to get themselves seen and still end up with a great athletic scholarship. ?

 

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Re: Early Div I signing

Softballmum, your experience is very similar to ours from November a year ago. DD had narrowed down her choice to one DI school - fairly close the the early NLI signing period. There were two coaches in particular that were calling her on a regular basis. After an official visit to what she thought was her favorite, another DI coach started calling and emailing frequently. She decided to go ahead and do an official visit to this last school before she made up her mind.

As it turned out, the last school visited was a perfect fit for her - she loved the school, the coaches, and the school had her major. She made the right choice - the coach at what she THOUGHT was her favorite school moved on shortly thereafter.

In DD's case, a verbal commitment would have been a disaster. Although it's not a binding contract, you still esentially remove yourself from other coaches lists. Unless you are ABSOLUTELY SURE of your choice (and some are by the 7th grade!), don't let your favorite be known. It depends on your situation.

She quite possibly wouldn't have been on ANY of these coaches radar screens had she not busted her tail making the contacts she did. There was no room for an ego trip at our house. She knew what she wanted, and in the process, we got an education ourselves finding out how to go about getting it. Every prospective recruit should assume that NO college coaches know who they are. They'll miss far fewer opportunities at being recruited if they do.

Very true that 90% (or more) of the effort falls on DD and family's shoulders to initiate the whole recruiting process. Every step in the Aradi book is important. ...Great stuff softballmum.

 

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Ohio is shining and softball is great!!!

 

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Nice job Jessica, you will benefit for all your hard work.

 

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Jessica Richards ;D -
Congratulations on signing with Eastern Mich. ?Good Luck this year at Jackson and with GS.

Congrats,
Jamie Wolff

 

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We only got to see Jessica on two different occasions, once last fall and once just a couple weeks ago...what a great pitcher!

Our congratulations - you deserve it!