Starting the Process....whats allowed, whats not, and what to expect

As I am sure some of you have seen, I have a DD2 that is a freshman. She plays on a high level 14u A team for an organization that has sent numerous players to DI, II and III schools.

My oldest actually verbally committed to play for a DIII, but has since given up on softball. She still may go to the school and possibly play, but right now she is not really thinking about playing. Now, with her recruiting it went quite differently then I expect my DD2 to go. We took DD1 to 3 clinics with the school, spoke to the coach a little at each one, and then he asked if she would verbally commit. It was pretty quick. She is a senior this year. I would say average player. No outstanding stats. We went and watched some of the games for the school and she would probably be a rotational player her 1st year or 2. May not be a starter till senior year, but still, getting some innings.

Now, DD2 is honestly a better player all around than DD1. She is also taller, faster, better bat and has a very high softball IQ. The travel team she is on is going to numerous showcases throughout the season. She was also told by the President of our organization, who also coaches the highest level 18u team, that he wants her to guest play at some of his team's showcases.

I know that the recruiting rules changed for DI. She has been sending colleges she is interested in her schedule for tournaments, link to her Youtube channel we made. Can the D1 coaches come watch and even tell us they are coming? Can they talk to just the travel team coach and not speak to us? What kind of contact can we have?

DII and below they are allowed to contact DD2 correct?

What can we expect from each level of school? What are they allowed to and not allowed to do?

What else do we need to be doing?

The travel team is definitely helping with all this, I just want to make sure we are covering everything we should be doing. Her #1 school is Coastal Carolina right now and if not there, she wants to play DI.

MoparFin said:

I know that the recruiting rules changed for DI. She has been sending colleges she is interested in her schedule for tournaments, link to her Youtube channel we made. Can the D1 coaches come watch and even tell us they are coming? Can they talk to just the travel team coach and not speak to us? What kind of contact can we have?

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In general let the D1 schools dictate and lead conversations with you. They are meant to know the rules. Much the same for the other divisions - they are just less restrictive.

For D1, in recruiting windows they can basically tell you if they are interested/not interested until Sept 1 Junior season. That is meant to be it on recruiting. They can discuss softball in general but they can't say things like 'she needs to get better at X to play for us" or "You are in our top ten" or specifics.

DII and below they are allowed to contact DD2 correct? What can we expect from each level of school? What are they allowed to and not allowed to do?

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Yes. There is not a lot of restrictions on these schools. D2 does have some windows they can't recruit in but they can offer and discuss openly. D3 schools generally recruit late age groups because they are not going to waste 2 years recruiting a freshman who then goes D1 in the end. You get a lot of 'We love you, but just don't know if you are going to be available to us.'

What else do we need to be doing?

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Going on to campuses as much as possible to see what your DD likes and dislikes. Do the admission tours - they are very valuable at many schools. [MENTION=10413]riseball[/MENTION] says it is more elimination than selection. Go to CollegeConfidential.com and have her put her preferences for school demographics (everything from majors, education selectivity, size, location, urban/city/college town, religious, sports offered, extra curriculum, tuition cost, etc, etc) and you will see a list of matching schools. Researching and maintaining a top 10-20 school list she is emailing and moving up and down based on feedback. Keeping track of camp dates and locations (so if you decide to go you can inform your coach early). And so on.

Most important - your DD needs to be comfortable walking up to a coach of a school she may have interest in and saying "Hi my name is XXX and I am interested in your school because YYY" - and then having a conversation. It is amazing watching their confidence build as they do this more and more.

marriard said:

In general let the D1 schools dictate and lead conversations with you. They are meant to know the rules. Much the same for the other divisions - they are just less restrictive.

For D1, in recruiting windows they can basically tell you if they are interested/not interested until Sept 1 Junior season. That is meant to be it on recruiting. They can discuss softball in general but they can't say things like 'she needs to get better at X to play for us" or "You are in our top ten" or specifics.



Yes. There is not a lot of restrictions on these schools. D2 does have some windows they can't recruit in but they can offer and discuss openly. D3 schools generally recruit late age groups because they are not going to waste 2 years recruiting a freshman who then goes D1 in the end. You get a lot of 'We love you, but just don't know if you are going to be available to us.'



Going on to campuses as much as possible to see what your DD likes and dislikes. Do the admission tours - they are very valuable at many schools. [MENTION=10413]riseball[/MENTION] says it is more elimination than selection. Go to CollegeConfidential.com and have her put her preferences for school demographics (everything from majors, education selectivity, size, location, urban/city/college town, religious, sports offered, extra curriculum, tuition cost, etc, etc) and you will see a list of matching schools. Researching and maintaining a top 10-20 school list she is emailing and moving up and down based on feedback. Keeping track of camp dates and locations (so if you decide to go you can inform your coach early). And so on.

Most important - your DD needs to be comfortable walking up to a coach of a school she may have interest in and saying "Hi my name is XXX and I am interested in your school because YYY" - and then having a conversation. It is amazing watching their confidence build as they do this more and more.

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Ok. Sounds good.

DD2 has picked out a bunch of schools she wants to go visit. We have plans of visits for some camps in the next few months. She's already been on 2. One she loved, its her number 1 right now. The other, like you said, was removed from the list, haha.

I did not know about that CollegeConfidential website, to thank you for that!

This may be helpful:

https://nfca.org/web_docs/EarlyRecruiting/ER-FAQ.pdf

As a point of clarification, a coach cannot have any recruiting contact with a PSA prior to September 1 of junior year. So the coach can't give a yes or no that they are interested or not to the PSA. The "yes we're interested" or "no we're not interested" communications can only occur between a coach and a third party. Direct contact is completely off-limits. See #26 and 27 on the link above.

That's great. Thank you,