By By Dan Powell
It is often said that champions are built in the off-season.
This slogan is not entirely true in college sports during the season into improving the team for years to come as they recruit the finest high school athletes from around the country.
The Pride program is no exception.
Over the last few weeks, several articles have been posted on the Pride’s athletic Web site about student-athletes signing national letters of intent to play for various teams at the University. Although these articles may be short pieces simply announcing the decisions of high school seniors to come play for the Pride, these signings are actually the culmination of years of scouting and recruiting work by the coaching staffs.
Pride men’s basketball head coach Tom Pecora said the evaluation process begins when players are in eighth grade. The team subscribes to some recruiting services that keep them updated on players to watch in the area as well as around the country.
“These services rate players like you would rate a stock if you were following the stock market,” Pecora said.
While recruiting players, coaches try to push several aspects of the University to the recruits. First, they stress academics. Those who choose to come here will gain a terrific education at one of the finest schools in the region, since virtually every player earns their degree. Other selling points include the school’s diversity and location. This is especially important to parents, who are often concerned that their son or daughter may be too focused on sports and miss the opportunity to receive a quality education.
After contacting recruits and gauging their interest in playing for the team, the coaches determine how to use their available scholarship funds to convince players to come play for the Pride. The better the player, the more money they are likely to receive. Both basketball teams depend heavily on the ability to use free education to entice players.As recruiting efforts become more serious, it is common for the coaches to invite recruits to visit the University and arrange to briefly stay with current members of the team. This visit is the most crucial part of the recruiting process. This is the coaches’ best opportunity to sell the University to a recruit so they often try to bring them in for major weekends on campus, such as Homecoming Weekend. Pecora estimates that 80 percent of recruits that visit the University end up signing to play for the Pride.
When a University is successful in recruiting, it will often translate to more victories on the field. Eventually, recruiting can lead to the establishment of a program that is a perennial winner, like Notre Dame football programs. Although the process starts anew every year, such a program makes recruiting much easier. Rollie Massamino, head coach of the 1985 National Champion Villanova Wildcats men’s basketball team who has recently helped the Pride during practices, insists that victory can be the strongest recruiting tool of all.
“Success begets success,” Massamino said.
The recruiting atmosphere is extremely competitive between schools as well.
“Recruiting is about the same everywhere you go,” Massamino said. “Everybody wants to win.” The coaches of each sport work hard every year to recruit some of the best players the region has to offer with the hopes of building one of the best programs around.