Football Recruiting Process Begins Sept. 1 For Many High School Juniors

Online, August 30, 2010 (Newswire.com) - September 1 marks the formal beginning of the recruiting process for tens of thousands of football players entering their junior year of high school across the country. On that date, National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) regulations allow the highest-level college football programs (NCAA Divisions I and II) to begin sending recruiting materials to those student-athletes.

"At this stage of the process, recruiting materials are usually form letters expressing the college's interest in the player. Questionnaires are usually included too," said Ray Grasshoff, author of Beyond Friday Nights: College Football Recruiting for Players and Parents.*

"Players who hope to play football in college should always complete and return those questionnaires," Grasshoff said, "to ensure that college coaches have as much information - especially vitally important contact information - as possible."

Without that, college coaches won't have a needed starting point for taking a further look at a player and evaluate him, Grasshoff explained.

Receiving a letter from a nationally ranked football program is good news that's tremendously exciting to players and their families. But those players and families should also understand what those letters are - and what they are not.

"If a player gets letters from a college, that's certainly a sure sign that he's of some interest, probably because he is performing well as a high school player, or has the size, weight, strength or speed to get that attention," Grasshoff said. "But hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of other juniors are also receiving those letters from that same college.

"Getting a form letter at this stage of the process means simply that a player is on a college program's mailing list," Grasshoff noted. "It doesn't mean that the player is being recruited, but only that the college probably wants to evaluate him to determine if he should be recruited to meet that team's needs."

Hopefully, a college's interest in a player will increase as he performs well throughout the season, and communications will become more personal, through telephone calls and email messages, Grasshoff said.