Thread hijack - Buyer Beware- "College Showcase" tournaments advertisements

[flarays]

I am not sure what the situation is in Ohio or the surrounding states, but in the SE there are so many so called showcases that it makes it very easy for teams to tout themselves as showcase teams. But most of these showcases simply do not deliver what was promised. Most down here MIGHT get 5 coaches to come - 4 JC's and 1 D2. The tournament fees are inflated but the families simply don't know the difference. We all believe that there is a place for every player that wants to play - in travel and in college - and that is true. But sometimes the journey gets clouded by these tourneys (and teams) that simply don't live up to the hype. And yet teams (families) continue to go back. Is it an ego thing where coaches, parents and players have to say they play in these events to keep up with the Jones?

As coaches we all should be hyper critical of events that don't deliver what they say they will. Remember its the families money we are spending on these events. But all too often we keep quiet so we don't make too many enemies.

.........exiting soapbox........now back to your original thread............Buyer Beware- "College Showcase" Teams Advertisements

 

[JoeA1010]

Sometimes tournaments will list colleges on their site. There are two kinds of lists. One is a list of schools that have registered and will attend; another is a list of schools that are expected to attend because they have attended at some point in the past. Look at this closely. Most tournaments do not lie, but if families do not look closely, they think that schools are signed up to attend a tournament when the list actually said a school has attended a tournament in the past.

The best showcases have a link on their site that allows college coaches to register and only lists those colleges who do register in a given year.

 

[JoeA1010]

The other thing that I'm noticing is that the top teams in the Midwest are traveling more and more as many of them are joining the group of teams that hit top showcases nearly every week in this half of the country. This is causing situations where a college coach has to decide where to go between several tournaments that have all been solid showcases for years. The best example for us this summer was the weekend where you had Atlanta Legacy, Sparks in the Chicago area, the PGF showcase in Owensboro, Ky, GAPSS and Loudonville 18-U. Even Toledo had a tournament that weekend that is billed as a showcase and there was a tournament in Michigan that draws a lot of coaches in that state.

More than ever, travel teams need to know the needs of their players and make tournament decisions accordingly.

 

[brownsfan]

The other thing that I'm noticing is that the top teams in the Midwest are traveling more and more as many of them are joining the group of teams that hit top showcases nearly every week in this half of the country. This is causing situations where a college coach has to decide where to go between several tournaments that have all been solid showcases for years. The best example for us this summer was the weekend where you had Atlanta Legacy, Sparks in the Chicago area, the PGF showcase in Owensboro, Ky, GAPSS and Loudonville 18-U. Even Toledo had a tournament that weekend that is billed as a showcase and there was a tournament in Michigan that draws a lot of coaches in that state.

More than ever, travel teams need to know the needs of their players and make tournament decisions accordingly.

To further that, only 50 days off campus to recruit players. The example you gave is a perfect example of different showcases are going on at the same time. Not only do you know the needs of players, it's more important to know what colleges are going to what showcases. That's going to make a travel coach or whoever is doing the recruiting on said team a nightmare. Girls can be emailing all they want, but college coaches can't reply until junior/senior year. So unless the travel coach or recruiting coordinator isn't communicating, it doesn't do much good to attend.

 

[flarays]

Sometimes tournaments will list colleges on their site. There are two kinds of lists. One is a list of schools that have registered and will attend; another is a list of schools that are expected to attend because they have attended at some point in the past. Look at this closely. Most tournaments do not lie, but if families do not look closely, they think that schools are signed up to attend a tournament when the list actually said a school has attended a tournament in the past.

The best showcases have a link on their site that allows college coaches to register and only lists those colleges who do register in a given year.

Down here we have folks that post - college coaches invited - !! Teams go and get pissed when no coaches are there......

 

[CARDS]

It been three years since I had teams doing college showcases but, one thing I did that helped me and our players was to make sure they CCd me on their college coach contacts/emails.
Back then I had a pretty good network on be recruited / coachbook and had a lot of college coaches follow up through that site with me on players and the events we were playing in. Not sure why but unfortuantly; the be recruited site does not seem to be as user freindly as it was in 2009/2010.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

College coaches come to see players, so a lot of the responsibility is with the teams and players to draw coaches. Besides emailing game schedules before each event, they need to include which events they will be attending in the future so coaches can plan ahead - especially when they're deciding which events to attend.