NCSA College Athletic Scholarships Blog

Last week I wondered if a lawsuit against EA Sports and the NCAA by former Arizona State and Nebraska QB Sam Keller. The lawsuit alleges that EA owes players royalties for using their likeness.  I wondered if the case could lead to athletes being compensated.  Deadspin contributor Dashiell Bennett has a different take on the issue.

Also, the game makes it extremely easy for users to upload actual names or create their own virtual players that mirror real-life people. A group of retired NFL players won a similar lawsuit on this issue last year. Every one will know that’s Colt McCoy leading your Fake Texas Longhorns vs. Fake Sam Bradford and the Fake Oklahoma Sooners, even if the names aren’t on the back of the jersey. Maybe the real Colt and Sam get some kind of compensation for that.

On the other hand … the game is so damn fun. If college players had to be compensated for their exact height and weight, EA would simply stop making “authentic” rosters and that makes the game a lot more boring. And doesn’t the money that the NCAA makes off the deal go back to the schools, which goes to scholarships? Is that fact that you can play a video game as yourself reward enough?

Just how shady this practice is probably depends on which side of the “college athletes should be paid” argument you fall on. And how quickly you can replace Sam Keller when playing Dynasty Mode with Nebraska.

No matter what side of the divide you fall on, its clear this issue has the potential to change the way collegiate “amateur” athletes are viewed.

Blair came on the program already with a D1 pedigree. His father had played D1 ball at Kansas. However, his dad knew that the recruiting process had changed since he had gone through it. They knew they needed some help navigating this recruiting course. In that respect, both Blair and his entire family have taken advantage of every NCSA resource.

Blair Tushaus

They have been matched with coaches 6 times (including schools he has been offered by), had 3 coaching sessions, and have consistent correspondence with their recruiting coach. They have parlayed that guidance/exposure into 3 D1 offers right now (San Diego State, Air Force, New Mexico State).

On the field Blair is as solid a Center you will come across. One of the best athletes we have on the program. At 6’2″ 270 he still has a vertical of 32 inches recorded at an Under Armour Combine! He also a 5 flat forty at the same combine, while putting up 315 lbs. 3 times on the bench.

This is not where it stops for Blair. With a 3.73 GPA at Notre Dame Prep in Arizona, he brings the same work ethic to the classroom. This GPA includes 3 honors classes including Math, History, and Spanish.

Blair has come a long way on our program, and we look forward to more offers coming in as the months pass.

The day when the NCAA’s definition of amateurism is officially demolished is around the corner if you spend any time listening to sneaker marketing wiz extraordinaire, Sonny Vaccaro.  Vaccaro helped create the current amateur basketball culture while working for all three sneaker giants; Nike, Adidas, and Reebok. He was a trusted adviser to many NBA players including LeBron James, Tracy McGrady and Kobe Bryant.  He was the first to sign college coaches to exclusive apparel deals.  He held the first national high school all star game and it kept it running for 43 years.

But now instead of wooing top prep players to AAU teams with sneaker sponsorship, he is brokering deals for prep players  to skip college in favor of short stints playing professionally in Europe to train for the NBA.   All of his endeavors have led to his impassioned lobbying against the NCAA.  USA Today profiled his campaign to educate college students on Vaccaro’s arguments against the NCAA.

Whether he is on the lecture circuit speaking to business and law students about perceived injustices of the NCAA and its amateur rules or advising high school players as they ponder professional careers in Europe, this man with distinct droopy eyes continues to captivate audiences.

“There should be a radical change in amateur athletics in America, because it’s a farce,” he says. “Amateurism lost its virginity a long time ago.”

Such statements make NCAA administrators cringe.

“He helped create an environment in which the value of high school and college education has been diminished in the minds of many young basketball players,” Wally Renfro, an NCAA vice president and senior adviser to NCAA President Myles Brand, says of Vaccaro.

Vaccaro has a new audience, college students, whom he urges to buck the establishment if they believe in a cause. His beefs with the NCAA and the NBA are his rallying cries.

“He’s my hero,” says Indiana University sports marketing and management major Jared Casden, who invited Vaccaro to speak to the Hoosier Sports Business Organization. “His visit was definitely the highlight of my college experience.”

Vaccaro says he doesn’t charge a speaking fee. He is driven “because the message is right.”

“I am grass roots,” he says. “The only way you change anything in America is by the youth. Kids are everything.”

Vaccaro also wants to be heard by Congress and has met with congressional staffers to challenge the merits of the NCAA’s often-questioned tax-exempt status and whether amateurism rules strip the athletes of rightful earning power as television and marketing revenue stream in for schools and the NCAA.

But some of Vaccaro’s critics think the sweeping commercialization of college sports was in part driven by Vaccaro.

“Sonny was one of the actors who helped create negative things in sports in the 1980s and 1990s,” says Richard Lapchick, chairman of the DeVos Sport Business Management Program at Central Florida and director of the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport.

Even Lapchick concedes, however, that Vaccaro effectively gets his message out. “He’s looked at differently now,” Lapchick says.

Vaccaro’s impact has been so powerful that HBO has a movie in development about the ABCD camp he used to run, with actor James Gandolfini in line to portray Vaccaro, who grew up in blue-collar Trafford, Pa., the son of Italian immigrants. Vaccaro recalls Gandolfini telling him he wanted a character with conflict. “I said, ‘I’ve been conflicted all my life,’ ” Vaccaro says.

Yet his struggles usually have pitted him against others, not filled him with self-doubt.

“When I was employed to do this for the companies I worked for, I had a job,” he says. “I gave the kids a platform. I treated them honestly and fairly. We never took a dime from any of the kids. We were paid because they marketed our product.”

This of course raises questions about the thousands of other student-athletes that won’t be playing professional sports.  Do they deserve a stipend?  Do they deserve to be paid?  Whatever the outcome we haven’t heard the last of Sonny Vaccaro.

Matthew Busch, Baseball, Bucknell University
Benjamin Huffman, Baseball, Chesapeake College
Ted Bickert, Baseball, New Jersey Institute of Technology
Jonathan Sebring, Baseball, Ottawa University
Brandon Olewine, Baseball, Delaware Valley College
Joshua Rodgers, Baseball, Bethany (WV) College
Craig Provow, Baseball, Colorado Christian University
Cameron DeLasantos, Baseball, Willamette University
Zachary Taylor, Baseball, Sacred Heart University
Jordan Brunelle, Baseball, Blue Ridge Community College
Zachary Tomlinson, Baseball, College of Idaho
Casey Gray, Baseball, Berry College
Robert Wodarczyk, Baseball, Emory University
Joseph Fiorino, Baseball, William Paterson University of New Jersey
Parker Johnson, Baseball, Willamette University
Stephanie Pezzello, Field Hockey, Moravian College
Derrick Morgan, Football, Cabrillo College
Bryan Sonneveldt, Football, Orange Coast College
Brad Beard, Football, University of Puget Sound
Michael Moreno, Football, Whittier College
Jonathan Nelson, Football, University of St. Thomas
Matthew McDonagh, Football, Catholic University of America
Jared Gobert, Football, Willamette University
Mathew Cahoon, Football, University of Montana — Western
Ryan Macken, Football, Washburn University
Chris Graves, Football, Shenandoah University
Michael Ivory, Football, Adrian College
David Goltz, Football, Elon University
John Atkinson, Football, Ohio Northern University
David McKinnie Jr., Football, University of New Haven
Miguel Marshall, Football, Virginia Military Institute
Kenny Kill, Football, Trine University
Chris Ettson, Football, Coastal Carolina University
Tyler (T.J.) Perry, Football, Stonehill College
Tyler Bammert, Football, Drake University
David Kulp, Football, Humboldt State University
Bobby Coburn, Football, University of Redlands
Kurt Monix, Football, Manchester College
Jon Di Vita, Football, Fairleigh Dickinson University — Florham
Leighton Cunningham, Football, Coffeyville Community College
Jake Minster, Football, College of the Canyons
Colin Destache, Football, University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point
Johnny Mobley, Football, Jamestown College
Garrett McGiffert, Football, Furman University
Bobby Martin, Football, Ithaca College
Sal Salvato, Football, Butler University
Alex Turbow, Football, University of Colorado — Boulder
Curtis David Cox, Football, Hiram College
Jordan Medeiros, Football, Bridgewater State College
Aaron Lucas, Football, Lewis and Clark College
Ross Walthall, Football, Brown University
Michael Javorski, Football, Boston College
Kimo Thorpe-Barofsky, Football, Trinity University
Tony Macarena, Football, California Lutheran University
Matt Lavender, Football, Sacramento State University
Justin Fabrick, Football, Lewis and Clark College
Levi Cohen, Football, University of Colorado — Boulder
Christian Prudhomme, Football, Emory and Henry College
William (Doyle) Bode, Football, Fort Lewis College
Peter Singer, Football, North Carolina State University
Joe Dallessandro, Men’s Basketball, Rochester College
Diego Pons, Men’s Basketball, West Virginia Wesleyan College
Darrell Farr, Men’s Basketball, Phoenix College
Nick Markovich, Men’s Basketball, Point Loma Nazarene University
John Gonzalez, Men’s Cross Country, Central College
Fernando Arroyo, Men’s Cross Country, Morton College
Benjamin Stajduhar, Men’s Golf, Johnson County Community College
Mike Wenz, Men’s Lacrosse, Chestnut Hill College
Josh Sturges, Men’s Lacrosse, Carthage College
Christopher Forte, Men’s Lacrosse, Cal Poly — San Luis Obispo
Jasper Gantick, Men’s Lacrosse, Monroe Community College
Kevin Hartsough, Men’s Soccer, Whittier College
Andy Thomson, Men’s Soccer, University of Pittsburgh — Bradford
Kellen Muldoon, Men’s Soccer, University of Massachusetts–Amherst
Jose Ferreiro, Men’s Soccer, Allegheny College
Rory Landis, Men’s Soccer, Kalamazoo College
Jerrod Adams, Men’s Soccer, University of Great Falls
Alejandro Almodovar, Men’s Soccer, American University
Connor Stockton, Men’s Soccer, Lesley University
Schad TenBroeck, Men’s Soccer, California State University — Stanislaus
Brent Meinhold, Men’s Soccer, Flagler College
Colin MacMahon, Men’s Soccer, Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey–Newark
Matthew Yates, Men’s Soccer, Shepherd University
Alexander Obbey, Men’s Soccer, University of Louisville
Tyler Smith, Men’s Swimming, Carthage College
Stephen Hardy, Men’s Tennis, James Madison University
Cooper Smith, Men’s Tennis, Lawrence University
Aaron Moody, Men’s Track, Christopher Newport University
Alex Evans, Men’s Track, Paradise Valley CC
Kyle Stazi, Men’s Track, Ithaca College
Wyatt Harvey, Men’s Track, United States Coast Guard Academy
Nerman Bajric, Men’s Track, Eastern Washington University
Andrea Pinarski, Softball, Dominican University
Patricia Phillimeano, Softball, Occidental College
Katie Billingslea, Softball, Concord (WV) University
Makenzie Jones, Softball, Hesston College
Hannah Woodruff, Softball, University of Alabama – Huntsville
Ashley Walker, Softball, Walsh University
Emily Nalan, Softball, Central College
Kelli McDonel, Softball, St. John’s River Community College
Cheyenne Radcliff, Women’s Basketball, Southwestern (AZ) College
Jennifer Kreger, Women’s Basketball, Mansfield University of Pennsylvania
Ashlin Sanders, Women’s Basketball, Lincoln (IL) College
Brittany Davis, Women’s Basketball, St. Gregory’s University
Emily Larson, Women’s Basketball, Viterbo University
Gabrielen Alvero, Women’s Basketball, Pacific Union College
Dominique Thomas, Women’s Basketball, Glendale (AZ) Community College
Meredith Kussmaul, Women’s Basketball, Hope College
Tyla Warren, Women’s Basketball, University of Saint Mary
Cassie Clayton, Women’s Golf, Texas Christian University
Sarah Tuffey, Women’s Soccer, Pacific University
Melissa Plain, Women’s Soccer, Catawba College
Vianey Lopez, Women’s Soccer, New Mexico Highlands University
Alexandra Santoro, Women’s Tennis, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania
Caty Compton, Women’s Track, William Jewell College
Aleah Hordges, Women’s Track, Savannah State University
Jazmine Dupee, Women’s Track, Drake University
Idia Omogiate, Women’s Track, DePaul University
Kaitlin Davidson, Women’s Volleyball, Fresno Pacific University
Stephanie Viane, Women’s Volleyball, University of Wisconsin — Whitewater
Alexandria Drake, Women’s Volleyball, Case Western Reserve University
Chelsey Corgan, Women’s Volleyball, Lander University
Sarah Griest, Women’s Volleyball, San Jose State University
Robert Chilson, Wrestling, Ohio University

Erin McMullin is a 2009 Grad from Nazareth Academy in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  Through 2007, her PR’s include 100m (12.53), 200m (25.18), Long Jump (16’8″), and Triple Jump (32’11″).  She is a conference champion in the 100m and 4x100m and will be earning her 4^th varsity letter this summer.  After her junior season, Erin was named Team MVP.  She currently holds a 3.3/4.0 GPA and scored an 1100 on her SAT. She has accepted a Scholarship at Rider University and will compete for the Broncs in 2009.  Rider has added a great piece to their puzzle by adding Erin McMullin.

College Recruiting Experts tend to use the word tradition a lot.  “So and so is a traditional powerhouse and Coach X always gets great recruits.”  But times change as seen in this brief statement by Sports Illustrated’s Luke Winn on how one current basketball recruit views traditional powerhouse Kentucky in a different light than most commentators.

Side note: After hearing that Henry and his brother, C.J., picked Kansas over Kentucky, I thought of a conversation I’d had with C.J. at the Jordan Brand All-Star Game in April. C.J. walked on to John Calipari’s Memphis team last season and was still wearing a Memphis hat at the game, and when he compared Memphis to Kentucky, he said something surprising: “Kentucky doesn’t have the same ‘oomph’ to it that Memphis did. There’s more tradition at Kentucky, but what [Calipari] was building at Memphis was different.” Whereas every coach views Kentucky as a major upgrade over Memphis, not every player feels the same way.

I wanted to share that thought to make two points.  One, every recruit needs to evaluate programs on their own.  Student-athletes need to go on visits, meet coaches and truly take the time to analyze each program.  They can’t afford to simply follow conventional wisdom because coaching situations change too quickly.

The second point also has to do with change.  College Recruiting today is constantly changing to the point where recruits can’t afford to follow the advice or rely on the experience of someone who went through the recruiting process even a few years ago.  Things just move too quickly and its very hard for a 17 year old to make a sound decision without up to date guidance.  That’s exactly why families turn to NCSA.

For the class of 2009, their high school career is quickly coming to a close as graduation is just around the corner.  Hopefully, all of the athletes have committed to a college team for next year, but for those who have yet to find an athletic home, there is still time!

NCSA is still receiving requests from college coaches looking for 2009 graduates to fill their roster needs.  As long as you are realistic and open minded about what opportunities might still be available, it’s not too late!  

If you are still hoping to play college athletics and are interested in learning about what opportunities still exist, call 866-579-6272 or make sure to contact NCSA today by clicking here!

When I describe how college coaches are willing to travel further than ever before to recruit potential scholarship athletes, most people assume I am describing football and basketball.  Unfortunately, this assumption couldn’t be more false.  Smaller non-revenue sports are recruiting in areas that would have been impossible only a few years ago.  The New York Times chronicles how the University of Notre Dame has slowly built a top college lacrosse team by recruiting nationally.

Notre Dame comes into the tournament as an example of lacrosse’s expanded geography and as a pied piper in terms of promoting the game in nontraditional areas. Notre Dame’s leading point scorer, Neal Hicks, comes from the lacrosse hinterlands of Georgia. He is joined by players from Texas, Washington, Ohio, Michigan and North Carolina.

“We’re like the United Nations,” the Notre Dame assistant Gerry Byrne said. “We don’t care where you’re from or what your ZIP code says. If you can play, we’ll recruit you.”

The Irish just don’t collect talent from nontraditional areas, they also cultivate it. Coach Kevin Corrigan is in his 21st year, long enough to be around when South Bend was considered a frontier for college lacrosse.

For the past decade or so, Corrigan and his coaches have traveled to places like Portland, Ore.; Seattle; San Diego; San Francisco; Houston; Austin, Tex.; and Salt Lake City to conduct clinics. Corrigan said he could not draw a straight line between those clinics and the recruitment of specific players, but he said there was a different kind of payoff, one linked to a belief that the biggest thing holding back the game’s growth is a lack of qualified coaches and referees to teach it.

“Wherever you go, you’re struck by how they’re thirsting for someone to do something like this,” he said.

Notre Dame’s efforts and other like them have increased the talent pool making it possible to recruit nationally.  Now many schools feel comfortable looking for talent in areas once thought barren of talent.

The national recruiting phenomon is why many athletes and colleges look to NCSA to bring both sides together.

NCSA Recruiting Analyst Randy Taylor was profiled by Taylor Bell of the Chicago Sun Times this weekend on his Locker Room Prep Talk blog.  Thanks to Taylor for helping us spread our athletic recruiting education across America.

Taylor was an all-state lineman for coach Joe Marini at LaSalle-Peru in 1974, played under Bob Blackman and Gary Moeller at Illinois, was a grad assistant under Moeller, was an assistant on Mike White’s staff until after the 1984 Rose Bowl, then coached at Kansas State, Nevada-Las Vegas, San Jose State and UCLA.

Today, he is football recruiting coordinator for Chicago-based National Collegiate Scouting Association. He has launched an extended program for Division I coaches to see film of hundreds of players from the Chicago area and across the country. He also does a lot of public speaking to educate athletes and parents about the recruiting process.

“My role is to evaluate players for colleges,” he said. “I watch a lot of tape to help colleges evaluate talent. And I travel three times a month to combines, clinics and camps to talk about the recruiting process and help kids and their parents to understand what it is all about and to make them realize that recruiting today starts when they are freshmen.”

Taylor said the Internet and recent NCAA rules have changed recruiting. Thanks to the Internet, there are no more secrets. Coaches are able to find prospects more easily and are able to enlarge their recruiting boards. But the NCAA has placed more limitations on them in the form of 85 scholarships (down from 105), shorter evaluation periods, fewer phone calls, fewer contacts, all in an attempt to create parity at the college level.

“My job is beneficial because colleges have to whittle down their list of prospects and I help them before they get the information,” Taylor said.

He said the recruiting process has been impacted by a trend to early commitments, concern over character issues and the ability to separate the good evaluators from others and the good recruiters from others.

Penn State coach Joe Paterno started the early commitment frenzy in the mid-1990s after losing some of the leading prospects in western Pennsylvania. Vowing that it never would happen again, Paterno set about to being recruiting players earlier than ever and pressuring them to make commitments earlier than ever before. Other schools had to follow his lead or get trampled in the stampede.

“You have to show kids some love. Once he shows he can play, you have to recruit him. You have to make that move before anyone else and try to lock them down within your state,” Taylor said. “Ninety percent of kids stay with the school they commit to. But it’s much tougher to recruit a kid if he has made a commitment to a school.”

It might sound silly to do a background check on a teenager before offering a scholarship. But it has become part of the recruiting process. Can he play? Can he get into school? Will be be a problem when he gets here? It is all part of running a clean program. And nobody wants to read about their star quarterback on the front page of the local newspaper for being arrested for drunk driving or getting into a fight at a campus bar.

“You can’t cover it up if a kid breaks the law when he’s on campus. All the information is out there on the Internet. There are no secrets. You can’t look the other way if a kid gets a DUI or is arrested for robbery,” Taylor said. “One of the biggest problems is off-the-field activities. Once kids get away from home, from people who keep an eye on them, they have peer pressure and no longer are controlled. So they go out and create problems.

“Alumni put a lot of pressure on coaches and athletic directors. I don’t believe a coach can be held responsible if he didn’t see a problem coming, if he did what was necessary to keep a clean program. He can’t control them all at night. They have to become adults faster than other students. It is part of the growing-up process.”

The coaches’ job is to evaluate them and develop them, not baby-sit them. Some are very good at it. Some are better than others. The best ones usually produce championship teams and send players to the NFL. Others eventually find another line of work. The pressure to do the job better than anyone else is enormous.

“You start with the feet and work your way up,” Taylor said, explaining how he evaluates talent. “Is he athletic? Does he have instincts? Can he run? When a coach has the ability to identify players and build relationships with the athlete, his coach and his family and people in the community to the point where the player can’t say no, then he has a chane to get him. But it also is important to know when to cut your losses, to get out because you can’t get him.”

No matter what position, Taylor said it is most important to look at an athlete’s feet. Can he move his feet? Is he flexible? Can he bend his knees? “That’s what I look for,” he said.

Can a defensive back flip his hips? Can an offensive lineman bend his knees? Can a quarterback use his legs and hips and shoulders to get velocity on the ball? Does a kicker have leg speed? Can linebackers turn and run? Can they backpedal at full speed? Do offensive and defensive linemen have arm length?

If you can do those things, you probably have a future in Division I. And Randy Taylor probably is looking at you on film.

Coach Bob Hurley Sr. tirelessly works to help his players use their basketball skill to receive a college education.  NCSA shares his passion to help student athletes maximize their life potential using sports.