Prep Football

In Wednesday's post, we ran part of a Q & A with PJ Fleck, recruiting coordinator and wide receivers coach for Northern Illinois University. Fleck downplayed the importance of high school combines to college coaches in general and gave his insights so to why, in spite of this, we are seeing more and more of these events in prep football. Today, we post the rest of the interview. OK, so we know you don't show up at these combines. The NCAA has specific restrictions on contact. So how do coaches evaluate a student-athlete?

Continue reading "RECRUITING HAS BECOME CRAZY, part 2"

I used to love going away to summer camp. Was there anything better than the smell of watered down powdered eggs in the morning?

But this post isn't about Sleepaway Camp. It's about prep football camps and the cottage industry of combines and competitions that has spun off from them.

Continue reading "RECRUITING HAS BECOME CRAZY"

Prep football, and covering prep football, is no longer an August-November pursuit. Although summer camps are nothing new, they have developed and spun off a cottage industry of

QUARTERBACK COMBINES, LINEMAN COMPETITION AND LINEBACKER CHALLENGES

Continue reading "Camps, Combines and Competition"

Are swirling in college and prep football. The topic- early signing date.

If you are a recruited high school student athlete, a college coach can offer you a scholarship at the start of your junior year. Football is the only sport where that commitment is verbal for 18 months! The rules say you can't sign with a school until February of your senior year. Why is this creating problems? Like you would expect from 16 and 17-year-old teenagers, many are changing their minds, verbally committing to a school their junior year, only to sign with another when it is time to put pen to paper.

Continue reading "Winds of Change..."

At 5'7", Mike Emerick is not your typical volleyball player. With the dimunitive stature of a prep football kicker, he chose to play sport where a premium is given on one physical characteristic.

Continue reading "College Athletics? Reality Check 101, Part 3"

There are well over 100,000 high school students in this country who also play sports, from prep football to prep tennis. For some, kicking the soccer ball around is nothing more than an after-school activity, a calorie-burning alternative to a job at the mall. For others, it is serious business. Sports is perceived as more than a way to stay in shape, it is a vehicle to a different lifestyle, a meal ticket to a college of their choice, expenses included. 

Continue reading "College Athletics? Reality Check 101, Part 2"

There is an ongoing ad campaign by the NCAA that at the end of each advertisement, has a punchline that's hard to ignore-

"Most NCAA student-athletes will graduate in something other that sports"

Continue reading "College Athletics? Reality Check 101..."