3 Steps To Help You Get Recruited During COVID-19
The Spring evaluation period has already been cancelled due to Covid-19 and it’s unclear how this pandemic will affect the rest of the summer.As the July recruiting period hangs in the balance, there are many athletes unhappy with their current offers.
Here are 3 steps that you can take to be proactive during this time:
The Spring evaluation period has already been cancelled due to Covid-19 and it’s unclear how this pandemic will affect the rest of the summer.
As the July recruiting period hangs in the balance, there are many athletes unhappy with their current offers.
Here are 3 steps that you can take to be proactive during this time:
1. Research/Know your fit and make a list
When looking at schools that you want to attend, create a list of things that you want out of your college experience. Do your homework and make sure that the academics and athletic program aligns with your wants.
There likely won’t be a perfect match but if you come up with your non-negotiables (ex: Engineering program, uptempo playing style, within 5 hours from home) you will be able to come up with 8-10 schools that you could envision yourself playing for, maybe more.
Once you’ve made this list, organize the schools starting with your top choices.
Quick tip: Make sure your list is realistic. If you are being recruited mostly at the D2 level, then creating a list full of D1 programs isn’t the best way to spend your time.
Unless you’re planning on going pro, don’t get too hung up on level. Go where you’re wanted, where you can have an impact and great experience on the court, campus and classroom.
2. Gather and Send
Now that you have your list, you need to get all of the contact information of the coaching staff, you can usually find all of this on the athletics website. It’s best to send your email to all staff, giving it a higher chance to be opened.
You will also want to gather recent full game film, a highlight video if you have one, your stats, any awards you received and your GPA. Once you have all of these, it’s time to draft your email.
Keeping the email to 5 to 6 sentences is ideal. Do your best to leave out your life story (save that for the recruiting calls). You want to make the email easy to read and to the point. Throw in a quick compliment of the program, why you’re interested and let them know you’re excited to speak with them.
Quick tip: If you’re being recruited by anyone that they compete with, let them know. It helps to quickly give coaches perspective on what level you are and may intrigue them more.
Once you’ve drafted your email, make sure to include the game film(s), your contact information (include social media ex. Twitter handle), your coach’s contact information and links to any articles that feature you.
Try to personalize these emails as much as possible. Triple check to make sure that when you’ve created your template, you’re not putting in the wrong school name or coach’s name in the message :)
Finally, the subject line. This is very important. It will be the first thing they see so make sure to include your full name, year and position.
3. Don’t be shy - Follow up!
You want to stand out from the competition? Get on the phone. We all know how many kids are awkward and don’t enjoy being on the phone but one way to separate yourself is to actually reach out to the coach and introduce yourself.
Nervous? Here’s a little script to give you some guidance:
Hey Coach ______, this is Mya Hooper. I’m a 2021 and I’m very interested in your program. I sent you and the coaching staff an email last week with some game film that I would love to get your feedback on.
Here are some potential scenarios:
They haven’t watched: Let them know you’ll send another email with it attached when you get off the phone.
They watched and are interested: See if it’s possible to set up a virtual tour with your family. FaceTime is your best friend during these unique times!
They watched and it’s not a good fit: Cool, use it as an opportunity to get some free advice to get better!
They don’t answer: Leave a voicemail or shoot them a quick text once you’re off the phone.
Your goal with this phone call is to see if they are recruiting your position in your class. Some schools would be a great fit but they just don’t have a need for your position.
If that’s the case, great, move on, there’s plenty more out there. It’s better to find that out now so that you can put more time into pursuing other opportunities.
No response to your email and no phone number to call?
No problem, keep emailing! You have to understand that coaches are receiving close to one hundred emails a week from athletes interested in their program so it’s likely they just missed yours.
Give it a few days to a week between and keep reaching out until you get a response. Persistence is key!
--- Happy recruiting!
3 Ways To Help Your Players Get Recruited
Whether you are a high school or AAU coach, your role in recruiting is very important. With social media and all of the recruiting platforms, it’s important to remember that nothing can replace your first hand experience with the players that coaches are recruiting.
Whether you are a high school or AAU coach, your role in recruiting is crucial. With social media and all of the recruiting platforms, it’s important to remember that nothing can replace your first hand experience with the players that coaches are recruiting.
Here are a few ways to make sure that you are prepared to help your players reach that next level.
This may seem obvious but.. Pick up your phone! The number of coaches that would be slow to respond or not return phone calls was surprising.
Whether it’s a DI coach or NAIA, understand that keeping communication lines open could majorly impact your players future.
College coaches understand that you have busy lives but if you don’t have the time, assign calls to an assistant that you trust to make sure that your player is not missing out on any opportunities.
Have accurate stats on your players. As a college coach, there were many times where I had to scramble to get accurate information on the kids we were recruiting.
Some states don’t have the convenient stat sites that keep these up to date so having correct information on your individual players performance can be very helpful in a coach’s evaluation.
Film, film, film!
Technology has made it much easier for college coaches to discover kids around the world. It is impossible to expect college coaches, especially during season to make it out to as many games as they would like.
One way to help encourage them to make a trip is to have film so that they have more confidence in the caliber of player they are going to come and watch.
If you don’t have enough staff, ask a parent or student you trust.
College coaches know that you want the best for your players and sometimes that can get in the way of reality.
If your player is a DIII/NAIA player but you like the sound of DI or DII more, that is doing nothing but harm for your player.
Not only that, it can impact your reputation as a coach, especially when it comes to evaluations.
If you are struggling to figure out the appropriate level that your player is at, it’s okay to ask local college coaches for their honest feedback.
When stating your player’s height, be honest.. When speaking on your player’s coachability, be honest..
When asked about your player’s parents, be honest...It will only build rapport.
When coaches can trust you, it will go a long way when you have players down the road that are an appropriate fit for their programs.
“Not only that, it can impact your reputation as a coach.”
Once you have all the appropriate information and have a decent feel for the level of your player, help them get opportunities in front of coaches.
During the high school season, reach out to college coaches with statistics, accomplishments and/or any other applicable information to help get your players name out.
Sending your team’s schedule along with that email is another way to make recruiting your player easier and if you want to take it a step further circle what you think will be the most competitive games - the better the game, the better the evaluation!
Players can take this step too but receiving these types of emails from high school coaches legitimizes the information and has a higher chance of getting a response.
For AAU coaches, this is a little bit of an easier process due to July being a live recruiting period but to reference a point I made earlier about making evaluations more clear, as much as you can, play the appropriate level of competition.
College coaches know that you have a lot of pressure to win games with the current makeup of AAU but understand it doesn’t help your players when we watch them play in blowouts.
Not only that but vs players that don’t at least half resemble the athletes they will be up against at the next level.
So as much as you can, research your tournaments and bracket levels to make sure you are playing quality competitive opponents as frequently as possible.
And finally, for players that choose not to participate at the AAU level, more power to them. There are plenty of opportunities outside of July.
High school team camps and elite camps that are hosted on university campuses are just a couple of ways to get your players seen during the summer season.
There are so many other ways to impact your players recruitment in a positive way, these are just a few to get you going in the right direction. Thanks for reading!