It might be useful if parents and players (both boys & girls) could share with all of us in this forum their personal experience with the college recruiting process (whether it was D1, D2, ..., etc). How was the overall experience? What were positive and negative aspects - experiences? What was the outcome? Any lessons learned? Thanks in advance!
Our daughter made a verbal commitment in January of this year. I'd be happy to share our experiences. Overall, it was a good process for us. It was definitely a long process. Sometimes frustrating (especially when we weren't sure what the coaches of her dream school were thinking). Sometimes exhilarating (when we saw signs of interest from various schools, especially her dream school). Lots and lots of work - sometimes it felt like a full-time job for me as I helped my daughter go through the process. Positive aspects - It was refreshing to see the attitudes of coaches who, although they wanted my daughter to come play for them, we're still interested in her success even when they realized their school was not her first choice. One coach even offered to speak to her dream school's recruiting coach (a friend of his) about my daughter if we thought it would help. Negative aspects - just the frustration noted above. Not knowing when the process was going to be finished. Not knowing what school would be her final destination (she had dreamed of playing at one school since she was 9 years old - that was the school to which she eventually made her final commitment). The outcome - as I said, she made a verbal commitment in January to play at her dream school beginning in the Fall of 2013. Lessons learned - Sometime during the process, I started writing down some notes about our experience - about our general approach to the process as well as about specific steps we took. I've shared those notes on some other forums, so rather than repeat them here, I figure it might be best to just link to another forum where I've shared those tips. We're definitely not the absolute authority on this topic, but I hope what I've shared here and in the tips on the other forum will prove helpful to some.
