Madson Buchbinder

In July of 2010, I wrote an article discussing 16 lessons our family learned during the water polo recruiting process as my son worked toward and was recruited by and admitted to an Ivy League school.  The following year, my daughter was recruited to run cross country/indoor track/outdoor track and has just started at a D1 university that is highly ranked in both academics and athletics.

 The recruiting process was different for each of my children, due to the differences in the size of their sports, the level of objective evaluation involved in each, and the types of schools they were targeting.  I was also interested in the ways in which the recruiting process was the same.  In a series of two pieces, I’ll explain those similarities and differences so that people going through the process can learn from our experiences.  In this first post are six new things that I learned and that I did differently from our first recruiting experience to our second.  In my second post, I will confirm six constants – things that proved true no matter what the sport or the school.

1. I changed my mind about filling out every profile form that comes in. In my article about my son, I recommended you fill out all the profile forms the colleges send you and send back a note.  That was because water polo is a small sport with a small number of colleges – only 40 – D1 college teams.   I have new perspective on this advice because we couldn’t do that with my daughter. Track is a popular sport, and my daughter happened to be a popular athlete.  She was nationally ranked in her sport, and received several letters and profile forms each week. They were sent to our school coach, beginning her junior year.  She had to prioritize which schools she was interested in attending, so we devised a system to rank her targeted schools.  We added the college ranking from the US News and World Report list of top universities, to the school’s NCAA cross-country finishing rank the previous year to come up with the top 20 combination schools for her to focus on.  She filled out profile forms, responded to coaches’ letters, and sent out updates to those 20 schools.  To get to know her “Top 10” coaches and schools, we hosted several coaches in our home, my daughter made unofficial visits to those schools, or she went to sports camps on the campus.

2.  How and where the student/athlete is ranked, depends on the sport. In this very important regard, sports like swimming, track and field, and rowing are very different from subjectively evaluated sports like water polo, soccer, and football.  When my son was communicating with colleges about playing water polo, it was critical for him to be proactive and send them information and get their attention. He sent articles that were written about his games, honors and awards he received, and forwarded his SAT scores and transcripts when it was appropriate.  In many cases my son introduced himself to coaches who may never have known about him had he not initiated contact.

My daughter is a runner – results are all time-based.  At any given time, starting in 9^th grade, coaches across the country could see her latest accomplishments on websites like MileSplit, and how she ranked nationally.  As soon as she ran a very fast 800 at the California State track and field meet during her Junior year, she started getting mail and was on many coaches’ lists.

3.  I had no idea that coaches would want to come to our home.   I was aware that this is common in football and other big sports but having a coach fly across the country to come to our house was a shock to me.  We had some lovely, long visits with great coaches from top academic/athletic schools.  It helped me to read the Recruiting-101 article “What is the Point of In-home Visits by College Coaches?”

4.  I now believe that if a school really wants you they will call you on July 1 before your senior year. In my original article, I said, “Don’t worry if you don’t get a zillion calls on July 1.”  That is still true – you don’t need a zillion, but both of my kids received July 1 calls from their top choice schools and ended up going there.  I see now that if they don’t call you, you’re down on the list.  My son had a top D1 school on his list early on, but by spring of his Junior year, we realized that coach was never using the “R” word – “Recruited” –in conversations with my son.  Nor did he call on July 1.  My son focused on his other top choices and never looked back.  There is a Recruiting-101 article that spells this out, “If I Haven’t Received any Recruiting Calls from College Coaches, What Should I Do Right Now?”

5.  At some point, the athlete and a parent must “face the music.”  You should meet with the coaches at his/her top 5 schools and find out who is really serious about recruiting you and getting you admitted to that school. It will save you a lot of headaches and time if you find out the timeline and be realistic about what you hear.   My daughter and I made a 5-school east coast trip to meet with her top choice coaches in June after her Junior year.  One coach told her he was looking for someone with a faster 800 time than hers so we took the hint and scratched it off the list.

After our east coast trip, my husband and daughter made an appointment to meet with her “dream school” coaches, to find out where she stood with them.  I sent them her grades and scores ahead of that meeting so they could get a thumbs-up or thumbs down from admissions.  She was lucky – when the meeting happened, it was clear that she was a top recruit for that school.

6.  It is important for a parent or other adult to accompany the student athlete to meetings with coaches. Although it is the child’s process and decision, parents do have a role to play beyond “organizer.”  I was good at pointing out my daughter’s training regimen, accomplishments and strengths which she was uncomfortable bragging about. I would accompany her on trips when she was trying to “sell herself.” She was happy to have me by her side in case she got nervous. On the other hand, when it was time to get decisions and commitments from her #1 choice, I sent my husband to that meeting.  He is a tough but realistic business person and was a much better person to be there with our daughter to get the details of the commitment and close the deal. Of course there are times when it’s not appropriate for a parent to be anywhere close by. When our daughter went on her recruiting trips, where the point was for her to meet the girls on the team and see what college life was like at those schools, both my husband and I stayed home.