Scoreboards

• High school websites are yet another way in which college coaches try to achieve the slightest edge over the competitors
• College coaches rely on high school basketball statistics to effectively recruit the top high school players

The success of a college basketball program depends a great deal on the ability of the coach when it comes to high school basketball recruiting. The competition among coaches for the top high school prospects is intense, to say the least. The scramble to get commitments from the top prospects in high school before your competitors is a 365 day a year race. In fact, the importance of recruiting and the need for any edge possible has led to a whole new industry in basketball.

With so much importance placed on the incoming recruiting class for a college basketball team, a coach must use every resource available to get an upper hand on his or her competitors. To fill this void, several websites and magazine publications that provide crucial high school basketball statistics have sprung up in the last decade alone. There are several websites available that provide a wealth of information on the top high school prospects at their respective positions. They even go so far as to rank the top players in the nations for each position on the court.

In addition to the numerous websites dedicated to high school basketball recruiting there are also several magazines that focus solely on this subject. They basically provide the same features as the previously mentioned websites but with their own “expert” rankings of the top high school prospects. All these media outlets do very well since every coach is looking for even the slightest edge over his peers.

But all the statistics and rankings in the world can’t compare to seeing what the top players can do in competition. One would think that the best place to do this would be at the hundreds of high school basketball games that take place during the season. But in reality, the games the college coaches prefer to watch are played in the top summer leagues across the nation. These basketball tournaments are sponsored by some of the biggest shoe and equipment manufacturers in the basketball industry. Teams pick the top players from their areas and travel across the nations to play other teams who follow the same practice. College coaches love this format because it allows them to see the top players in the country in one place while also competing against each other.

Competition is fierce among college coaches for the top prospects so there always bound to be some unethical actions from coaches in an effort to get ahead. These actions could be anything from gifts such as clothing or cars to even cash payments. In an effort to level the playing field among all the colleges and universities the NCAA has strict rules and guidelines governing the recruiting process. When teams violate these rules, they’re subject to various penalties such as restrictions in postseason tournaments. But even these penalties can’t prevent the minor violations that occur every day during the high school basketball recruiting process.

The drive to have a successful college program can often force coaches to make difficult decisions on whether to sacrifice their ethical beliefs in order to sign the best players available.