Recruiting Alert: Three Rules Parents Usually Break

Parents’ actions can be the reason recruits lose NCAA college eligibility or force a college to self report an NCAA rules infraction.

Watching NCAA coaches dodge parents at events would be comical if it wasn’t so serious. What parents do not understand is that coaches are avoiding parents for everyone’s sake.

Coaches can lose their jobs over contact with parents. And parents could cause their kids to lose freshman eligibility.

But too often parents are clueless about this danger. They press onward trying to give their athletes an edge. In fact, they are doing far more harm than good.

When parents persist and aggressively attempt to connect with coaches, their actions are seen as precursors to what the coaches will be dealing with if they chose to recruit those athletes. And it does not bode well for the prospects.

At NSR, we constantly advise our client-families regarding NCAA recruiting rules. Due to our proactive educational efforts, NSR prospects’ eligibility is seldom, if ever, called into question. That is another, unspoken, but key NSR advantage.

Here are three rules non-NSR parents most frequently break during the recruiting process:

1. Talking to NCAA coaches at tournaments, combines, showcases and other contests. This is not permitted. The NCAA has strict rules regarding when and how their coaches may contact prospects and their parents. To avoid breaking any of these rules, coaches avoid parents at all costs, at least until the event has been completed and the athletes have been dismissed by their coaches. If this happens, coaches are required to report this violation to the NCAA and no coach wants to be placed in the position to do this.
2. Family members running interference. The NCAA has stepped in and expanded the definition for relatives to include a long list of people.  Parents sometimes mistakenly ask family members to be the point person for them, but Division I now considers relatives and expanded family the same as parents. Taking this track could run afoul of the rules and cause the athlete to become ineligible as a freshman.
3. Asking for and receiving impermissible benefits. NCAA coaches are under the microscope during the recruiting process. To keep their positions, they are not allowed to entertain or provide benefits to parents or athletes which are disallowed by rule. Once more, when this occurs, the coach is under a mandate to report this to the NCAA. No coach wants the spotlight that such an incident will place on them.

At the end of the day, parents need to be well informed during the recruiting process. National Scouting Report is ready to discuss your child’s recruiting. An NSR scout can let you know if your child truly qualifies to be a prospect. Over 40 years of proven experience is waiting to provide help to your child.