How Club and High School Coaches Can Help Athletes Get Recruited During Coronavirus
“Finding-A-Way” through the recruiting process from Next College Student Athlete on Vimeo.
You’ve probably dealt with a lot of changes in the past few weeks regarding the coronavirus and how it has affected your athletes. It’s an uncertain time and your athletes are probably looking for answers that many coaches may not have at this time. Fortunately, all of us here at NCSA Team Edition are here to help in any way we can. That’s why we hosted this online recruiting class led by Senior Recruiting Coordinator John Pugliese, a former college basketball coach at the D1, D2 and D3 levels. Make sure to check out the video and the important information below to get some much-needed answers.
Recap notes
7:16: What is happening?
15:40: What athletes should be doing now
22:00: How a free NCSA Recruiting Profile can help
32:50: Keep your athletes accountable
40:10: Help athletes individually
45:12: Using your free Team Edition account
53:28: Three takeaways
57:15: Audience questions
What is happening?
Several different recruiting rules changes are occurring, and more may come. The NCAA has extended the recruiting “dead period” for all D1 and D2 sports through May 31st. Coaches are not allowed to meet face-to-face with a recruit off-campus or do any in-person scouting. They have also encouraged all colleges to stop all official and unofficial visits. However, recruiting has not stopped; coaches and recruits can still communicate over email, phone, text and social media.
What athletes should be doing now
More than ever, athletes should be staying proactive in the college recruiting process. While they may not be able to compete right now, they can still move their recruiting and training forward. It’s important to stay sharp, keep improving grades and even keep a recruiting journal to track progress.
As we all deal with the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic, digital communication is one of the few ways that college coaches can still actively recruit student-athletes. In response to the NCAA’s recent suspension of in-person recruiting, college coaches and recruits are now even more heavily relying on email to stay in touch with one another.
Utilizing your free NCSA Recruiting Profile
With a free NCSA Recruiting Profile, athletes have a powerful tool for digital communication that connects them to the world’s largest college sports recruiting network. College coaches logged in more than 80,000 times last month to NCSA’s network to find athletes looking for opportunities. With an NCSA Recruiting Profile, athletes can upload their highlight or skills video, school transcript, coach references and much more—all information that is viewable by college coaches. All your athletes should have this right now.
Video is more important than ever
College coaches can’t travel to events right now, but they can look at athletes’ highlight and skills video from home. Your athletes should be uploading video with recent clips and new skills right now. Make sure these focus on athletes’ best attributes and not on what they’re trying to improve. And skip the warmups and music.
Keep your athletes accountable
It’s easy to get complacent without a plan. Make sure your athletes stay proactive by hosting virtual meetings, preferably twice per week. You should also set expectations and provide some sort of recruiting homework for athletes—like emailing X number of college coaches, building a new target list of colleges and updating highlight videos. You can even bring in a guest speaker to get the team excited.
Help athletes individually
Sometimes athletes need that extra push to get going, and that’s best done on an individual basis. Try planning weekly 15- to 20-minute check-ins with athletes and their parents and taking notes that can be shared. You can also research programs that fit your athletes or provide feedback on their highlight or skills video. You can also connect with your former athletes that are now competing in college to network with the college coaches that they know.
How a free Team Edition account can help
Many of these tasks can be easily managed with a free Team Edition account. You’ll be able to track the recruiting process of all your athletes, many of whom could already be on NCSA’s recruiting network. You’ll be able to:
- Provide your athletes with a free NCSA Recruiting Profile in the largest college coach database.
- Track athlete activity and promote accountability through an easy-to-use dashboard.
- Know which colleges are recruiting your athletes and suggest the right athlete for them.
- Contact and network with every college program in the country.
Major takeaways
- More than ever, right now is the time for the athlete to be proactive in the process.
- You’ll need to do more to keep athletes on track in recruiting during COVID-19.
- How are you tracking data? Team Edition can help.
