College recruiting budgets limit a college coach's resources

Coaches won't come to you – but they hope you'll come to them!

The pros have coaches and they have scouts.  In college, coaches and scouts are the same guys.

This highlights how little time college coaches really have to run around looking for recruits.  A top Division One school in the Big Ten – spent $27,500 on recruiting last year.

Now, that sounds like a lot – until you consider that is split between 23 different sports.  Even if your sport is getting a full third of that - how many round trips, including: hotels, meals, and plane tickets for one or two coaches will that buy?  Each recruiting trip cost about $500-$1,000 per coach.  With universities closely monitoring expenses on the balance sheet, coaches don't have the freedom to travel to every sporting event to recruit new players.  If you're one of the top recruits in the country, no sweat – you'll probably get seen because coaches want to evaluate the top talent firsthand.  What about the other 99% of recruits?  How will they get noticed, and what if a big Division One school isn't a good fit for you?  What if you're looking at a Division II school or Division III?  Some of these schools have recruiting budgets of only a few hundred dollars.

Standing in the shoes of a recruit, looking at the big world of college sports from the outside, it can seem like schools have unlimited power and resources; however, the truth is, they're stretched for time and money, too.  Coaches are looking as hard as they can for good recruits, and they can never find enough!

That's why it's so crucial for athletes to reach out to coaches.  Even the best-off, big-time college programs hardly have enough money, time, or resources to find as many athletes as they'd like or the quality they'd like.

So take the initiative and get yourself found.