LINKS FOR PLAYERS INTERESTED IN PLAYING COLLEGE SOFTBALL
NCAA - The National Collegiate Athletic Associations official website. There is a lot of information on the website. Below are just a few of the items out there.
NCAA Eligibility Center - If you are planning on playing Division I or II softball (or any other sport) you need to register with the NCAA through this website. There are numerous resources and guides that will help you understand the process. Please pay particular attention to the courses you are taking during high school. They must meet NCAA standards in order to be accepted. If you plan on playing Division III, you will need to contact the school directly. There is a fee to register. This will be the repository for all academic and athletic information.
NCAA Courses - You will need your high school's code in order to search eligible NCAA courses.
NCAA Eligibility Center - If you are planning on playing Division I or II softball (or any other sport) you need to register with the NCAA through this website. There are numerous resources and guides that will help you understand the process. Please pay particular attention to the courses you are taking during high school. They must meet NCAA standards in order to be accepted. If you plan on playing Division III, you will need to contact the school directly. There is a fee to register. This will be the repository for all academic and athletic information.
NCAA Courses - You will need your high school's code in order to search eligible NCAA courses.
NCAA Softball Webpage - NCAA softball page for Divisions I, II & III
College Board - Official website used to register for PSAT and SAT. Also great website to use to search for and narrow down colleges you might be interested in attending.
College Board - Official website used to register for PSAT and SAT. Also great website to use to search for and narrow down colleges you might be interested in attending.
RECRUITING PROCESS
This section is based off various articles and talking with a number of college coaches. Should be used only as a guideline.
Freshman Year
1. Education - This is the start of a good foundation to begin building upon for the remainder of your high school career. Meet with your guidance counselor and discuss with your parents.
2. Homework - Try to educate yourself as much as possible on the recruiting process. There is a ton of free information on the web to review. Below are two websites that have good information, but do not pay for anything. Recruiting services and be expensive and do not guarantee that you will play collegiate softball. Just look through the website to glean as much FREE information as possible.
College Sports Scholarships
AthNet
Freshman Year
1. Education - This is the start of a good foundation to begin building upon for the remainder of your high school career. Meet with your guidance counselor and discuss with your parents.
2. Homework - Try to educate yourself as much as possible on the recruiting process. There is a ton of free information on the web to review. Below are two websites that have good information, but do not pay for anything. Recruiting services and be expensive and do not guarantee that you will play collegiate softball. Just look through the website to glean as much FREE information as possible.
College Sports Scholarships
AthNet
3. NCAA Eligibility - See link above to register.
4. Get the Word Out - Start the process of trying to determine schools you might be interested in and start contacting them. They may not reply, due to NCAA rules, but you will at least get on their radar.
Sophomore Year
1. Education - Continue the process of getting good grades, register for the PSAT and begin preparing for the SAT/ACT. Use the College Board website to help in this process.
2. Skills Video - This is most likely the way you will be initially evaluated. The video should be no more than 5 minutes long and should highlight your skills. The video can be short clips from games or a more structured "staged" workout where it is just the player alone showing off her strong points. Forks Thunder is exploring ways to help facilitate this step.
3. Get the Word Out - Continue to get the word out. Followup with coaches. Send them your schedule of torunaments and invite them to come out and watch.
4. Continue Developing Skills - Continue working on developing and improving your skills.
Junior Year
1. Summer Before Junior Year: EXPOSURE - Could be most important time to gain exposure. Make sure you contact the coaches of the schools you might be interested. Consider attending evaluation camps and clinics, as well as any camps/clinics the schools have to offer.
2. Education - Stay focused on your grades and register for the SAT/ACT tests at College Board.
3. Official Contact from Coaches - College coaches can begin contacting prospects based on the NCAA calendar. Be sure to respond to any emails promptly and keep sending emails to any coaches you have already established relationships with and continue to express interest in playing for their school and program.
4. Un-official College Visit - Try to visit any potential colleges you are interested in and possibly see a game. For Division II programs see if you can schedule a visit with the coach and see if you can have an individual workout.
Senior Year
1. Summer Before Senior Year - Continue to play tournament ball, keep in contact with coaches and attend and camps or clinics.
2. Education - Stay focused on your grades and register for the SAT/ACT tests at College Board.
3. Official College Visits - Once the school year begins, colleges can start inviting prospects to visit campus.
4. Financial Planning - As everyone knows college can be very expensive. Again there are a number of resources available to help in this process. It can be very time consuming and tedious, but trying to find out as much information as possible will help. The most important website to visit is the FAFSA website. The Free Application for Federal Student Aid offers a lot of information regarding various types of aid, eligibility and various tools. You must fill out a FAFSA each and every year for each child attending college. If you do not fill this out you may be ineligible for any school aid, loans, grants, etc.