Last year, the entire sports community had to make difficult decisions in response to the coronavirus pandemic. At the college level, the NCAA made numerous announcements that impact current college athletes and recruits. This included a ban on in-person recruiting for D1 college programs through June 1, 2021.
Now that the NCAA has resumed its regular recruiting rules and activity, Next College Student Athlete (NCSA) is here with a few tips for student-athletes take control of their recruiting process.
Manage your online presence
Even though the dead period has ended, maintaining an online recruiting profile is still a crucial part of the college recruiting process. The pandemic has financially impacted many college programs, which means coaches may not have the budget to travel and evaluate recruits in person. An online profile allows recruits to showcase their key metrics, highlight video and academic accolades for college coaches to review. If you’re athlete doesn’t already have an online recruiting profile, they can create a free NCSA profile. Included with every new profile is a free 45-minute recruiting assessment, where families will meet with a recruiting expert to ask questions and create a game plan.
Call college coaches
Athletes have been able to contact college coaches throughout the dead period, but coaches haven’t been able to respond, which makes it difficult to build a relationship. Now that the dead period is over, student-athletes should pick up the phone and call the college programs on their list of prospective schools. This direct, real-time form of communication gives the student-athlete an opportunity to convey their interest in the program, get their questions answered and build a relationship with the coach. For tips on contacting coaches, check out NCSA’s guide.
Attend summer camps
If your athlete hasn’t already registered for summer sport camps, now is the time. After over a year of not talking to D1 coaches, this is the perfect opportunity to not only meet face-to-face, but also have the chance to be evaluated and make a good impression. To help you prepare for the 2021 camp season, NCSA has put together a guide to making the most out of your camp experience this summer and a full list of sports camps near you on its camps page.
Update your highlight video
After an extended period of canceled and postponed sporting events, athletes are finally back to competing. This gives athletes a great opportunity to capturing fresh competition footage to update their highlight video. If you’re looking for advice on how to capture and edit footage, check out NCSA’s guide to creating a highlight video. If you’d like help editing your video, NCSA has a video editing team to help you turn your raw video footage into a cohesive video that will capture the attention of college coaches. Learn more here.
To learn more about what athletes should be during now that the dead period is over, create a free NCSA Recruiting Profile and one of our recruiting experts will reach out to answer your questions.
