(1st- I've just looked at what I've written (and included quotes for) below, and it looks VERY wordy to me. Sorry in advance for those who would have appreciated it being explained more succinctly.--- but I am what I am I am.)
Anyways, just wanted to note the NCAA just passed recruiting rule changes for almost all*** the "Olympic" sports (they don't cover football or basketball). (***Women's lacrosse passed tougher rules LAST April, and those rules stay intact for that sport. From what I understand, softball is the one sport that asked to also fall under the tougher lacrosse rules starting this year. Those tougher rules for lacrosse, which I'll also mention a little below, were discussed in a thread last year (https://www.allbuffs.com/threads/bi...er-olympic-sports-follow.126064/#post-2209166).)
1st- the lacrosse rules as I understand them are, to put it simply, that no recruiting contact or communication (including the use of intermediaries like a recruit's club or high school coaches) is allowed until September 1st of a recruit's junior year of high school. (These new rules for the other sports seem much weaker than that to me.)
As to the new recruiting rules in place now for all sports except for football, basketball, lacrosse and softball- Here they are (quoting from http://www.ncaa.org/about/resources...ion-i-council-adopts-recruiting-legislation)- believe they can be broken down into 3 changes):
As to my own opinion-
Can't really say anything bad about moving the official visit dates up from senior to junior years. With almost everyone in, ESPECIALLY the team sports like (of the sports at CU) volleyball and soccer, committing early anyways, seems great to me that some recruits who hold off committing until their junior years will be able to use official visits to help decide their future (which I feel has already been the visits' purpose in football and basketball). Understand the budget concerns, but feel if you want to have the visits be most productive (again, to help a recruit choose the best school for them so as not to waste their or their future teams' time with later transfers, etc.), the more SERIOUS official visits the better.
The other 2 changes, I must say, just seem to me to be pretty half-as*ed. IF you're still going to allow all the other early contact and correspondence, which will probably STILL lead to a lot of early commitments, all you're doing by limiting ANY recruiting talk while a recruit and coaches are together is lessening their ability to feel each other out (while at camps or on unofficial visits), so you're lessening a recruit's ability to make as an informed decision as they otherwise could.
Note- the Volleytalk thread discussing the changes (already at 8 pages- http://volleytalk.proboards.com/thread/73472/division-council-adopts-recruiting-legislation?page=1), linked to an article that has quotes from some coaches, including our volleyball Coach Mahoney (https://volleyballmag.com/ncaa-recruiting-042018/). Here's the parts related to him and his quotes-
"
...
Most larger Division I programs, of course, recruit many years out. There are some in the volleyball world who think that contributes to so many players ultimately transferring. In the NCAA news release, it said, “The new recruiting model allows potential student-athletes more time to make thoughtful decisions about their next steps after high school. The shift was supported by the national Division I Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.”
Perhaps, but as Colorado coach Jesse Mahoney said, “Our ’21 recruits, we can’t talk to face-to-face for two more years, which seems odd.
“If the idea is to slow things down, that might happen, but if the idea is to create a better meeting of the minds, I’m not sure that’s going to happen because you’re still going to have kids commit early with less information and I think that’s unfortunate.”
...
"
Anyways, just wanted to note the NCAA just passed recruiting rule changes for almost all*** the "Olympic" sports (they don't cover football or basketball). (***Women's lacrosse passed tougher rules LAST April, and those rules stay intact for that sport. From what I understand, softball is the one sport that asked to also fall under the tougher lacrosse rules starting this year. Those tougher rules for lacrosse, which I'll also mention a little below, were discussed in a thread last year (https://www.allbuffs.com/threads/bi...er-olympic-sports-follow.126064/#post-2209166).)
1st- the lacrosse rules as I understand them are, to put it simply, that no recruiting contact or communication (including the use of intermediaries like a recruit's club or high school coaches) is allowed until September 1st of a recruit's junior year of high school. (These new rules for the other sports seem much weaker than that to me.)
As to the new recruiting rules in place now for all sports except for football, basketball, lacrosse and softball- Here they are (quoting from http://www.ncaa.org/about/resources...ion-i-council-adopts-recruiting-legislation)- believe they can be broken down into 3 changes):
- "official visits now can begin Sept. 1 of a prospect’s junior year in high school instead of the first day of classes for senior year."
- "Additionally, athletics departments can’t participate in a recruit’s unofficial visit until Sept. 1 of the recruit’s junior year in high school, and
- recruiting conversations during a school’s camp or clinic can’t happen before Sept. 1 of the junior year."
- (Take this with a grain of salt, and it's not in the article I quoted above, but some in Volleytalk are also saying, I believe, that there might be changes coming up to the recruiting calendar. Most notably some (or all?) of January might become a dead period for coaches to go out recruiting. At least in volleyball, that's historically been a month when coaches have hit the road to recruit by going to some early- year club tournaments, which obviously couldn't happen now IF the Volleytalkers are accurate. Some others mentioned, however, the dead period does not restrict official visits, so that January might become a good month for those IF that's true. (With high school volleyball generally being a fall sport, assume many players wouldn't want to take official visits from Sept.-November, as they wouldn't want to miss their teams' matches. Then the holiday's pop up, etc..)
As to my own opinion-
Can't really say anything bad about moving the official visit dates up from senior to junior years. With almost everyone in, ESPECIALLY the team sports like (of the sports at CU) volleyball and soccer, committing early anyways, seems great to me that some recruits who hold off committing until their junior years will be able to use official visits to help decide their future (which I feel has already been the visits' purpose in football and basketball). Understand the budget concerns, but feel if you want to have the visits be most productive (again, to help a recruit choose the best school for them so as not to waste their or their future teams' time with later transfers, etc.), the more SERIOUS official visits the better.
The other 2 changes, I must say, just seem to me to be pretty half-as*ed. IF you're still going to allow all the other early contact and correspondence, which will probably STILL lead to a lot of early commitments, all you're doing by limiting ANY recruiting talk while a recruit and coaches are together is lessening their ability to feel each other out (while at camps or on unofficial visits), so you're lessening a recruit's ability to make as an informed decision as they otherwise could.
Note- the Volleytalk thread discussing the changes (already at 8 pages- http://volleytalk.proboards.com/thread/73472/division-council-adopts-recruiting-legislation?page=1), linked to an article that has quotes from some coaches, including our volleyball Coach Mahoney (https://volleyballmag.com/ncaa-recruiting-042018/). Here's the parts related to him and his quotes-
"
...
Most larger Division I programs, of course, recruit many years out. There are some in the volleyball world who think that contributes to so many players ultimately transferring. In the NCAA news release, it said, “The new recruiting model allows potential student-athletes more time to make thoughtful decisions about their next steps after high school. The shift was supported by the national Division I Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.”
Perhaps, but as Colorado coach Jesse Mahoney said, “Our ’21 recruits, we can’t talk to face-to-face for two more years, which seems odd.
“If the idea is to slow things down, that might happen, but if the idea is to create a better meeting of the minds, I’m not sure that’s going to happen because you’re still going to have kids commit early with less information and I think that’s unfortunate.”
...
"
