Jennifer West

Straight from the mouth of a mid-major D1 coach a few minutes ago. I told him I needed to write this stuff down and share with everyone. We were talking about a few players that I work with and he was telling me about how ridiculous recruiting is getting. "Everyone's running out of roster spots... so we are all like, 'this guy sucks' [when watching a player] because he's not an absolute dude. And we're all passing on good players because you'll probably be able to find an older or more experienced guy down the road". "We basically have 3 different recruiting classes each year. High school, JC, and portal. And you don't even know how many roster spots you're actually gonna have". "We have so few roster spots that we are grading kids on such high scales. Like a high school guy has to be a starter as a freshman or we can't recruit him. And then if he shows up and actually starts as a freshman for us he'll probably leave and get more money from a bigger school. So you can't win. And then we just end up sitting in a holding pattern." "The value of a single roster spot for us has gone up a ton because the total amount of spots we have has gone down, but the dollar amount per spot has gone up with scholarships increasing. So we are investing more in these guys, and expecting more." This is the sentiment amongst most D1 coaches at this point and honestly a large population of D2 and D3 programs that are incentivized to be patient and wait for an older guy rather than recruiting young. High tier academic schools operate on a different timeline, and there are certainly some other exceptions. But this is the new reality for most programs. Players and families... do not assume that you are the exception and that this doesn't apply to you!