How High Gas Prices Will Affect Recruiting

Most people are taking seriously the recent gasoline hikes and how this is going to affect both their personal and business future. At rates approaching $3.00 per gallon, or more, for gasoline those people who have to drive their cars a lot are going to have to take a second look at the way they travel and how much they travel. This will have a profound affect on college recruiting because college coaches won't be able to spend as much time on the road scouting prospects or attending tournaments, and visiting with high school and club coaches. Most college athletic recruiting budgets are very limited and they already have to be creative in how they spend their allocated money. Of course, the big football and basketball programs won't be affected much, but this is only a small percentage of the overall college recruiting that takes place.

Colleges are not going to roll over and just give up on finding the better athletes to scout and recruit, of course, but they are likely to change some of their methods. More dependence on a quality outside scouting service is certainly something that most programs are going to find necessary. A good quality videotape of the prospect in a competitive situation is going to be more important than ever because this will eliminate the need for a personal scouting and evaluation visit by the coach. However, prospects are going to have to be educated on how to make the kind of videotape that a college coach needs in order to do a proper evaluation. Too many prospects are putting together tapes that only show them making perfect plays every time – they edit everything else out. Or, they may have some scouting service put a short video clip of them making perfect plays, on the Internet. These things are no good for a proper evaluation and it's just a waste of a college coach's time. In fact, this could actually hurt a potential prospect's chances of being recruited rather than help him/her. But in the future a good video that is properly produced and professionally edited will be a must for both the prospect and the coach who is evaluating the prospect.

Tournaments, showcases and skills combines are becoming the venue of choice for many coaches in many sports. Your better high school and club players are usually at these events and therefore a coach can see several prospects with just one trip. The key, of course, is to choose the best events, which will be well-established and run by reputable organizations. Cutting back on travel expenses means picking and choosing where you want to go for the best results.

Also to be considered is what effect high gasoline prices will have on the average college student. Undoubtedly, it's going to change a lot of people's thinking about where they go to college and how often they will be able to drive home. It will actually help colleges recruit kids from further away because these kids will know that it is no longer logical for them to choose a college close to home or just a couple of hundred miles away simply because they could drive home every week or whenever they wished. At $3.00 + per gallon for gas they're going to have to stay at school more and therefore they might as well consider a school farther away from home.

Everyone is spinning a little now in response to the dramatic increase in gasoline prices. Some are wondering how they are going to be able to survive in the business world and some smaller colleges are especially concerned about their ability to recruit athletes in the future. However, everything will eventually settle down and by making some adjustments in their methods colleges will still be able to recruit the athletes that they want.