I want to get a feel for your opinions about the trend of early commitments we are seeing these days. The past few years we have seen seniors commit the summer before their senior year, now we are seeing girls commit in fall of their junior year or spring of their junior year....what are your thoughts? I think there are a select few who know their college choice and have no issues with that early of a decision. My hesitancy lies in the fact that schools can now pressure kids into making that decision (USC loves to offer juniors in the fall and say, "you have a week to decide.") The NCAA has set up the 5 official visit system to give our kids a chance to go on campus, meet coaches, players and see schools first-hand, but these visits happen in the senior year...so these early commitments are before many players have investigated all their options. Now, I realize that many players take unofficial visits and travel extensively with their parents and club teams, my question asks if you think this is the right way this should go. I know what is happening currently, I am wondering what you all think about this... The NCAA is investigating this whole deal, and discussing how to limit these early commitments...the arguement being that kids aren't making the best educated decisions... Lastly, this process forces coaches to make up their minds on players the summer before their junior year...that puts a lot of pressure on coaches for talent evaluation, and allows many late blooming kids to slip thru the cracks...Again, what do you think? Is this trend of earlier and earlier commitments a good or bad thing?
I think it's ridiculous that they are VERBALLY committing to schools their junior year. It's a catch 22 situation, though. The coaches are trying to get these kids committed but in reality they can't SIGN until their senior year, I believe. I don't think there are any penalties via the NCAA for changing a VERBAL. Once you sign on the dotted line, though, it's another story. I have friends who coach in the college ranks and I know it's frustrating for them, as they deal with younger and younger kids who are being pulled and wooed in all different directions. We're hearing the line..."I just want to get it over with and not have to worry about what school to go to. I just want to enjoy my senior year." So then does the trend continue and we start seeing verbals sophmore year? And what happens if a junior who has committed verbally blows out her knee before she has actually signed? Does she still get the scholarship?
My daughter had been sent her tickets, hotel reservations and itinerary to make one of her officals during the 3rd week of Sept. Her Sr. year started the first week of Sept.and the dates picked to visit would allow her to see two games. (16 days into her Sr. Year) She recieved an email (EMAIL..Spineless coach) 12 days before the visit..simply stating .. gave all my scholarship money away this weekend.. sorry.. Unfortuately you learn how the game is played a little late..but I guess who would want to play for a coach who treated you this way...
I was wondering if other people were noticing the same trend. I was at a 7v7 tournament about 3weeks ago and in speaking with parents from one of the U-17 teams, almost half had already committed!! Granted this is a very talented team but this was February! This year I read in letters where recruiters could make 1 phone call in March to Juniors. Is this a new rule? It appears only to be a "players market" to select programs and schools, only if you are a truly exceptional talented player. That is, a top regional or national caliber player. Those type of players can wait it out a little longer to explore their options. Unfortunately there are only 12 scholarships to fully funded programs. The average team has at least 24 players on their roster. Everyone is aware of the skyrocketing cost of college tuition. Those players and parents that have the foresight, talent, and money to explore their options earliest in the junior year have the best opportunity to make a objective decision. Unfortunately, for the player who may be late in development and receiving scholarship offers, or the family that doesn't have the time and money to make a series of unofficial visits to capitalize on an early offer are at a disadvantage if they are considering a highly selective school/program. I don't know what could be done to minimize that disadvantage. Just as in putting in for early decision and early action in college admissions, there are pros and cons to an early verbal: 1. It does relieve the pressure of a drawn out recruiting process. 2. More than likely a school will honor their commitment to that student athlete should that athlete become injured before the national letter of intent signing day. (A biggie in my book) 3.The more likelihood of a significant percentage of athletic scholarship money. By the time official visits roll around the "new player funds" could be quite diminished. 4.Once a commitment is made, that player can focus more time on developing a comraderie with her potential teamates, coaches and school sooner, making the transition smoother. On the con side: 1.Early verbals aren't binding so although it is unlikely, you could get bumped from your scholarhip offer with little or no recourse on your part. 2.Many schools stop recruiting a player once the word is out that they have committed. Could come back on you if there is a change of heart on the players or schools part. 3.Coaches change often. That same coach that recruited you could be gone by the time you hit the campus or soon thereafter. 4.Some schools are reluctant to offer official visits if you are committed, thereby limiting opportunities to see what other programs have to offer when they are putting their "best face forward". Overall, as there has become such interest and participaton in women's soccer, the talent has become much broader and deeper. Add to that the influx of foreign players and the competition becomes that much fierce. Yeah, there are over 300 D-1 programs and hudreds more D2 and D3 programs. That's a good thing. But there are over 450,000 high school age girls playing soccer. My two cents, the early birds catches the fattest worms. Do your soccer homework and with some hard work and good fortune, a good opportunity will be there for most who aspire to play on the collegiate level.
Today is so different than in the eighties when there weren't as many schools or shcolarships available. If you wanted to play outside of your ODP region, you had to either be at the rgional/national team level and be "seen" by those coaches or put together a tape and send it off. Video cameras were a bit primative then, too. I think my mom actually rented one and lugged it around to my indoor games that were played at an old tennis facility (no turf) with walls. Only a few schools had the max # of scholarships available, so many out of state players got partials. In-state players had the advantage of tuition being lower, so full rides were easier to achieve, which I assume still holds true. I would imagine that there is an elite group of players (read national pool at the U-16 level) that are able to use an early verbal commitment to their advantage but it really is a two-way street. You've got coaches pressuring these kids into making decisions earlier and earlier when they haven't even had a chance to see what the best fit might really be. I just don't think it's fair to place that kind of pressure on a junior in high school. Don't know how to change it but hope if my daughter eventually takes this route, there is an easier path. That's a long ways off, though.
As a someone who is in the business, I can tell you all that we, as coaches, hate the early recruiting process. However, if we don't start recruiting the juniors at this point, the process has passed us by and we are looking at the less talented players. There are several coaches out there who really want a recruiting calendar, and that would help a great deal, however, the majority of college coaches seem to want to keep the system as is. My advice to players and parents is to still look at all of your options. The idea that scholarship money is gone by March is absurd, much less April or May. What is much more realistic is June or July. If your daughter finds a school that she really wants to go to, then make the decision, otherwise, look at other schools. Most coaches are bluffing when they say their money won't last until the summer. I know of at least five top 25 Division I programs that still have scholarship money available for 2005. The other option that most people fail to realize is that the best option isn't always the first or biggest school to recruit a player. There are several smaller DI schools, DII, DIII and NAIA schools that play a very high level of soccer and offer great academics. Don't get caught up in a name, choose the school that is the right fit and take the time to make the right decision.
Borisman, I know that a significant number of schools may have scholarship money leading into the official visit period, but how can an athete or parent know when that money is going to be gone? It 's a crapshot at best. Especially if a coach is saying so? We all know that some coaches may be less ethical than others, but as a parent, I think that we would give most coaches the benefit of the doubt. For the kid that is in the situation that financial aid among other things is going to be a major factor, it's hard to call that coach's bluff. At about this time last year, a prestigious midwest school was recruiting my daughter, who was a regional caliber player, but only as a "preferred walk on". The reason we were told was that there was no more money. Although it is an outstanding institution, we had about 35,000 reasons to examine other options. In other athletes situations, I have observed that there was money available later in the recruiting process, but not the kind of money that was on par of a regional caliber player. This varies from school to school I know. This can be especially true if another kid had committed that was in the next group of desired kids and maybe playing the same position, and verballed. God forbid that a kid has a significant injury before verballing. Their options become much smaller. I know of a top ten program now that reportedly has filled it's recruiting class. You should know better than I, that these situations may be the exception more than the rule. Just the same, just like kids are making early action and early decisions on the academic side of college admissions because of increased competition for the most desired schools, I think the same type of competition on the athletic side is making early verbals more prominent now.
It can really become a catch 22 and the early verbals can also hurt a school. This year we have seen a couple of verbally committed players going back on their verbal commitment. I know of one school that had to turn away some recruits because they had committed all their scholorships to recruits that had verbally committed to them. Then at signing time, actually the day after, one of their verbals changes her mind. How fair is that to the next girl on the list that had to be turned down by that school? Not sure if there is any answer to early verbals....
Borisman, even in that scenario it would still be an early commitment, and most of the money could be gone before official visits begin. Official visits don't begin until late August of the senior year. During the spring most weekends are filled with league games, tournaments, ODP, State Cup and such. The spring doesn't lend itself much time for unoffical visits. To visit in late spring is nice but then you run into the problem of visiting schools during exam schedules, and the possibility of visiting a school when most students may be gone. It's also tough to catch a coach on a lot of spring weekends because they're visiting tournaments too. Getting kids to visit some schools during "junior days", is a great vehicle to show a potential recruit the program and campus before the soccer season kicks into high gear.
Everyone has made some very good points, and I think we all see the positives and negatives of these early commitments. Do you think it wise for the NCAA to step in? My biggest issue is twofold: one that kids are being "forced" into quicker and uneductated decisions and two that coaches' evaluations will not be as good because they are making offers based on girls in their sophomore years, or just after and there is a lot of development yet to be had. Either way, our margin for error in college soccer will go up. I know of coaches who, like you Borisman, don't agree with the system, but have to keep up so are offering juniors. But you are correct in that many coaches (and good programs) have money left well into the summer and fall of the kids' senior year. And there are many other great options, as far as level is concerned. I don't know what the NCAA could do, maybe institue a money rule, where you cannot talk about a financial offer until July 1 of the kids' senior year?
How would the ncaa enforce the "no money until July 1 rule" ? As it is the reason these are all verbal commitments is that nothng is binding until the signing date.Verbals are a way to get around that siging date. With the new 1 call in March of the JR year and 1 on campus visit in April, The NCAA is actually moving (whether deliberately or not) in the other direction. I think one thing for parents to think about is how important is the money really. Now I know we all want to get the least expensive, best education we can. I also know that for some people the money is truly a make or break situation. Based on the demographics of young female soccer players in the US, however, for many (most?) young women that is not the case. If your daughter said "Dad/Mom, I dont want to play soccer any more but I still want to go to XXX School" Many parents who are VERY concerned about this process would still be able to make this happen. Since money is virtually the only carrot the coach can offer at this point (If they like you enough to offer money early, they are certainly not going to say you can't be on the team if you come back to them later willing to play as freshman on no money) So in many cases, the worst case scenario of staying out of the early pressure until you are ready to decide is the possibility of going to one of these schools without a scholarship as a freshman. The balance to that is the school you choose would be one that you are sure (or at least as sure as a 17 year old can be) you want to attend. I know there are some other issues (competeing with the player they recruited in your positon, etc) ...
I agree with EJDad and Borisman. It's much more important in our case to find the right academic and athletic match for our D than it is to win a scholarship as a frosh. Even though private universities are getting ridiculously expensive, we could pay (I'd could re-enter the workforce for instance). Really, we are hoping for the intangible - a less random admissions process at a highly selective school.
What I mean by the "no money rule til July 1" would be that coaches cannot talk specifics about their financial offer until that date. Currently, coaches can offer money to juniors even tho all they get is only a verbal commitment. So if that rule was instated, coaches could say to a player, we like you, we want you, we will offer you July 1..thus "limiting" the amount of verbals until kids hear their financial package. I don't know, just thinking aloud here, and yes, I agree with the junior year rules (ph call/visit) the Ncaa is moving the other way. I completely agree that the ideology of college selection should be one where a family finds the best fit for their daughter, but this thread is directed at the current process. I think we all agree at how the process SHOULD look, but sadly, it seems to be going the other way... Lastly, as soccer gets bigger and bigger, the white upper-middle class make-up of the sport is changing, so scholys are a necessity for a lot of kids. I know on the teams I know personally, the girls with money could not be at the school they are at without the soccer money.
I still think a "no money rule" is unenforceable. What if a coach says "I'll give you our best package" or "As much as I have ever given anyone" or some such non-numeric comment. Is that in violation? We are moving in the early direction and are fortunate that it has taken this long.(Volleyball is already there) It is experience, power and control (coaches) vs inexperience and fear (players and parents) complicated by many MANY people on both sides of the equation who easily lose track of their values
One of the best ways to solve the whole problem is for the NCAA to establish a recruiting calendar, much along the lines of what football and basketball have. If the opportunites to evaluate players were diminished, then the opportunity to have players commit early would also be diminished. I would also suggest that an early signing date would help with some of the questionable practices that a select few coaches use to coerce kids to commit before the player is ready. However, I do want to point out that it is somewhat amazing that in soccer the majority of coaches honor verbal commitments and do not recruit players that have verbaled to other schools. That is the one area where we still set ourselves apart from other sports.
I do not see how a recruiting calendar would help. The top players are easily identified early (They stand out, they play up an age group, they play in odp events etc) There is nothing in the calendar that prevents a verbal offer. It would also make the rich richer. A recruiting calendar sets dates when you can and can't recruit.This means a program that can get a lot of coaches (NCAA has limits on the # of campus at a time) to a lot of places quickly has the advantage. Many programs do not have a fully funded staff (part time second assistant) nor a great recruiting budget. The top programs generally do. This means they can better identify top players earlier in the process, make offers and the trickle down process begins!
Actually, you can only have two coaches on the road recruiting at a time and therefore even those programs that only have a limited amount of assistance can compete with the top programs. Additionally, under the current setup a coach can be on the road recruiting every weekend of the year if he/she desires. The smaller programs, budget-wise, can't afford to be at every event. A recruiting calendar would cut back on the amount of times coaches have the opportunity to make an evaluation, therefore, coaches would be less inclined to make early offers to players they have not had as much time to observe.
Not sure if this point has been brought up--but I had an interesting conversation with an assistant from a top 15 D1 school about this very issue of early committments and its disadvantages. He said that a big risk schools are taking when giving early verbal scholarships to kids their junior year is that if a coach is counting on this scholarships being one of the 12 scholarships becoming freed by a player entering her senior year (thus graduated when the HS player reaches college), and that player blows a knee and needs to take a med redshirt, then a coach is in a real dilemma if all his scholarships are already being used. Either the coach has to tell that player that blew her knee and already given him 3 years that she can't be financially covered her 5th year, or he has to renege (sp?) the scholarship to the player coming in. That or keep a scholarship free to cover situations like this, which many schools do not. So not only is this trend of early committments an arguable detriment to the girls in HS, but there is the possibility that it will negatively affect the girls already on the college teams. This assistant felt that sooner or later schools are going to be negatively affected by going after kids so early. Not only for the previously mentioned possible problems, but also because there is still so much room for development and growth after a player's junior year (not to mention the fact that many of the "big namers" fizzle once other "lesser" players catch up in that year and a half before the college season starts.)
Great point. I know that recruiting sophomores is a riskly proposition, and how many times have we seen THE BEST high school players become average college players. A recruiting calendar would level things a bit, I wonder if we are far away from that. One clause in that would be to not allow college coaches to coach club teams. I already think that is a mistake, but a recruiting calendar would eliminate that possibility. I can't believe soccer allows that, but oh well. Can you imagine if m bball allowed college coaches to run club teams? Each school would have a designated assistant just to run a club team to funnel the kids in. Sorry, tangent there. Here's a question...what is the earliest you have heard a school offer a player...not a player commit, but a school offer a girl a scholy?(Legal or not) The earliest I heard was beginning of junior year. Anything earlier? Can it even be any earlier?
My understanding from an 06 that has already verbally committed to a top 5 program is that they had an 07 verbally commit this past fall (04). The trend for early commits is disconcerting and is not limited to national pool players. Though the overall earliest I have heard is from men's bball where a kid just prior to his freshman year in HS verbally committed to UCLA.
That is true in theory but it doesn't usually work that way for these reasons: It is people + $$ that make for effective recruiting. Bigger budget means more flights and covering more space in a smaller time frame Not all DI programs have a full time assistant. The calendar applies to every area of recruiting- the local HS or indoor game as well as the big tournament. As it is now, a hard working coach at a less funded school can use budget/ time to find the local "diamond in the rough" With a calander this "advantage" to the less funded/lower tier school is lost A calendar would still allow the top schools to make early offers to the top kids (doesn't take a lot of time to tell that O'Reilly, Wambach, Tarpley etc can play) but would make it more difficult for an offer to be made to someone that one of the middle/lower school teams might offer to. If the top schools can still make early offers the trickle down process would start, we would still have people making offers but they would be doing it with less info, and it would lead to more rethinking and deal breaking- worse for everyone! A recruiting calendar helps the rich hold on to what they have and makes it tougher for everyone else to catch up FYI-Women's softball fought like crazy to get one put in a few years ago and now are trying to get rid of it!
Story on Meagan Holmes breaking her oral commitment to Santa Clara to sign with USC: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/feature?id=329755&cc=5901
A little off subject but what about making soccer scholarships all or nothing? Meaning... like it is in basketball or football. you either get a full scholarship or you get no scholarship. This would help to even the playing field for smaller schools. No?
That is a great idea to give Full or nothing that way it comes down to the type of education you offer and the chances of playing right away. The only problem is that then you would have to increase the amount of scholarships given to Women's Soccer. 12 would not be enough you would need at least 15/16 per school.