***HSCP***

The Spring Sport Dilemma, why your senior year

may be too late !
You are the captain of your team, you lead the league in scoring, you have a 88 mph fastball, you are a 4 year letterman and you have a 3.4 gpa and scored 1250 on your SAT's, so where are all the college coaches, where are all the letters, where are all the phone calls, why aren't you being recruited. The answer may be that you are a senior who plays a spring sport and maybe you weren't a strong player junior year or didn't contact any college coaches or didn't play summer ball or didn't attend any camps after your junior year.
If you play a spring sport such as baseball,softball, tennis, lacrosse or field hockey, and you are a senior and maybe you reside in a northeast region that does not allow you to get outside till April, you are already behind the recruiting 8 ball because your spring season may not count for much. By this time, most coaches have already finished recruiting for their new freshman class that will start in September and they are already looking for potential recruits for next year, so now they are at your games in May and June looking at Junior's and even Sophomore's.
In December of 2004, the University of Providence announced they signed 11 lacrosse players from 9 different states to National Letter of Intent's. For these players, their recruiting process ended long before their spring season will start their senior year.
So what can you do ?
The first step is to avoid putting yourself in this situation. I know your Junior year may seem like a long way off from college but you need to realize that if you play a Spring sport, college coaches are already watching you, wondering if you have what it takes to play at the college level. For those of you who may not be ready to contact coaches in your Junior year because you feel your skills are not where they need to be there are a few options.
Play in a summer league - This will give you more exposure to the game itself, other players, and college coaches. In reality, playing high school athletics is becoming one of the worst ways to get recruited. College coaches don't have the time to attend your high school games because their season is taking place at the same time and are less likely to attend high school games because they know they will see fewer players and fewer players with a high level of talent. The summer circuit is becoming extremely important for all college coaches to recruit at summer tournaments.
Attend a Summer Camp - This will also give you more exposure to your sport, exposure to other players in your state or region and as an added bonus many camps are run by college coaches and many camps are at colleges so this gives you an opportunity to meet some coaches and check out some schools.
Take some private instructions - There are two main benefits to this, one is that you will learn a great deal more working with someone one on one and get more work in than you would working out as a group or team and two, you will work with someone who can provide you with references when the time comes to show your skills to college coaches. If your spring season of your senior year will not help you that much, contact coaches in the fall and winter and say well, I worked out with so and so and here is a recommendation from him as to my ability and work ethic.
Contact coaches in the fall or winter - You should be doing this anyway, but coaches will realize you play a spring sport and they will realize that if you are a senior that they may not get a shot at seeing you play much before it comes time to select a school. In this case you need to sell yourself to the coaches by any means necessary, such as athletic resumes, recommendations, articles, video's, phone calls, letters, meetings and so on. The more lessons you take and the more camps you go to, the more you will have to show to the coaches.
Attend a Junior College - Attending a Junior College can offer you many benefits that you may not be aware of. Junior College can prepare you for life in college, both the work and the every day living. Junior College gives you exposure to better athletes than in high school. Junior College gives you a chance to show other colleges that you can handle their work if you had poor grades or test scores in high school. Junior College gives you another year to impress college coaches and gives you an additional chance at receiving an athletic scholarship if you were not lucky enough to get one right out of high school. Junior College gives you the chance to see if you really want to be a student-athlete in college.
Contact college coaches to see if there are available slots - Believe it or not, there may still be some scholarship money available in the spring and you would be wise contact coaches and asking them this. Perhaps they didn't find the players they needed or some players decided to go to another school or some current college players decided to end their career early. Be advised, if you call some coach in May or June and ask for a scholarship, they are going to wonder what the heck you have been doing for 6 months and why you are calling them so late. Be honest, tell them you were not that good a player last year and only recently developed your skills, or you were not sure you even wanted to play in college, or you had no idea how the recruiting process worked and no one helped you in the process of contacting coaches.
Don't wait till the last minute, contact coaches your Junior year and introduce yourself and tell them that you are interested in continuing you athletic career at the college level and that you are working hard to make yourself a better person and a better player and a better student.
Coaches will realize that you are still young and still have another year of High School, so they will look for improvement leading into your Senior Season. One of the best things you can do is to take some private lessons or play in some tournaments before your senior year, then when it comes time to send your recruiting packages to coaches the fall and winter of your senior year you can say things like, "I took the summer to take pitching lessons with (Instructors Name) he was a former pitcher in the majors and was very impressed with my ability and work ethic, here is a recommendation from him." Or I took the summer to play with a traveling team and gained exposure to many different players that were all very skilled, I not only held my own, but I was the leading scorer on our team was awarded league honors for such and such, and I am looking forward to having a very strong senior season both academically and athletically."
Even though the coach may not have a chance to actually see you play, there is still plenty you can do to project yourself as a talented athlete who works hard and has success at any level.