SoCalHoops Recruiting News

Recruiting Changes: NABC Calls Emergency
Meeting In Vegas Next Month--(June 7, 2000)

The National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC), which is the largest organization of basketball coaches in the U.S., comprised of   more than 4,700 members, from Divisions I, II, III, NAIA, junior college and high school,  held a special meeting of its board of directors at Overland Park, Kansas, and today announced that the NABC will hold an emergency meeting in Las Vegas this summer on July 16, timed to coincide with the adidas Big Time Tournament,  to discuss what action the coaches will take in response to the recent NCAA decision to alter the face of summer recruiting.  

Currently, the NCAA has approved legislation among its member schools that reduces the number of open-exposure evaluation days during the summer from 24 to 14 starting in the summer of 2001,  in the summer of 2002, the legislation eliminates entirely the current open period, to be replaced with a system which has not yet been formulated.  While the NCAA legislation contains a provision for the implementation of yet another committee which is charged with coming up with a new and reconfigured summer recruiting scheme, the common consensus among many pundits is that the NCAA intends to do away entirely with the summer recruiting period in 2002. 

We've previously published the full text of the NCAA legislation, and also posted the full-text of various press releases from the committees who worked on the legislation, and clearly while there are extremists among the ranks of college presidents, the NCAA has also gone on record as saying that they are not out to eliminate the summer period entirely, but just to reconfigure it using some as yet to be determined new model of recruiting, which is intended to reduce the influence of what the NCAA has deemed to be unsavory elements in the AAU/Travel circuit. 

Of course it is that very "as yet to be determined" aspect of the model, together with the rather extreme public statements of some in the NCAA (most notably several outspoken university presidents and administrators) who have struck fear in the hearts of college coaches, and who should be striking fear in the heart of every prospective student athlete and his or her parents who will potentially be recruited in the summer of 2002 and thereafter. 

The NABC issued a press release concerning the special emergency meeting (thanks to Jim Downs for alerting us to it), and while it's reprinted below in full, it and other information on the NABC's  position on summer recruiting, can also be found at the NABC website.

NABC calls emergency meeting
Coaches to Discuss Summer Evaluation Period

OVERLAND PARK, KAN. (June 7, 2000) -The National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) Board of Directors called for an emergency meeting of NCAA Division I coaches to discuss the NCAA's proposed elimination of the summer evaluation period. To facilitate coach's attendance at the meeting, the NABC board approved holding the special meeting July 16 in Las Vegas during the largest summer evaluation tournament attended by division I coaches and prospective student-athletes.  

"Hundreds of division I programs benefit greatly from being able to see many potential recruits in one place," NABC executive director Jim Haney said. "Currently, the NCAA will eliminate the summer evaluation period completely by 2002 to stave off unscrupulous individuals who have invaded the summer basketball environment." 

At the NABC board meeting May 10 in Minneapolis, the board of directors stated their opposition to the elimination of the summer evaluation period effective in 2002 (summer). "The board of directors vigorously oppose any elimination of the summer evaluation period," Haney said. "Individuals who have been cited as bad influences in summer basketball are few in number. There is a need to retain the summer evaluation period to allow approximately 300 division I schools the opportunity to evaluate approximately 2000 prospective student-athletes who play summer basketball." 

Attending the meeting was the NABC board of directors, which includes Gene Keady, Purdue University; Art McAfee, Jr., Morehouse College; Roy Williams, University of Kansas; Denny Crum, University of Louisville; Ken Kaufman, Worcester Polytechnic Institute; Kelvin Sampson, University of Oklahoma; Pat Kennedy, DePaul University; Jim Burson, Muskingum College; Mike Montgomery, Stanford University; Jim Seward, University of Central Oklahoma; Oliver Purnell, University of Dayton; Jim Boeheim, Syracuse University; Willis Wilson, Rice University. Also attending the meeting were Reggie Minton and Lon Kruger.

The NABC site also carried the following article, written by Ron Higgins who writes for the Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tennessee, concerning the various issues involved in the proposal to eliminate/replace the summer recruiting period with what currently exists, presenting what many believe is a majority view shared by most coaches in the association, a view which is contrary to that expressed by the most vocal critics of the current recruiting calendar.  Here's the article, published June 3, 2000 at the NABC site, which can be found at this link:

Coaches still unhappy with new recruiting rules

DESTIN, Fla. -- In the summer of 1983, Rod Barnes was a 6-foot, 156-pound high school senior-to-be point guard from Satartia, Miss. 

And he was thrilled when he was invited to showcase his skills to a crowd of college coaches at the B.C. summer camp in Milledgeville, Ga. 

"(Ex-Ole Miss coach) Lee Hunt saw me there, and I don't think they made a decision to sign me until they saw me play against other guys from across the country," said Barnes, now Ole Miss's coach. "I was from a small town, I hadn't gotten exposed very much and I don't think I would have been recruited for college if it hadn't been for a summer basketball camp." 

It's a reason -- and a personal one at that -- Barnes is among the many Southeastern Conference coaches angered by recent NCAA legislation that will outlaw summer recruiting by 2002. 

Currently, coaches can recruit for 24 days in July as they buzz from shoe-company-sponsored tournaments of blue-chip players to AAU national tourneys. The NCAA, concerned recruits are being heavily influenced by elite AAU coaches whose teams are funded by shoe companies, voted to reduce the recruiting period to 14 days in 2001 before completely eliminating summer recruiting the following year. 

SEC commissioner Roy Kramer favored the legislation, calling it "a statement that we've got to bring some things back in the system of college athletics in the higher education system." 

Retiring Kentucky athletic director C.M. Newton, who will likely become a consultant to the NCAA on basketball issues, said that "the coaches have been heard and listened to, but we work for the presidents (of universities) and they make the decisions." 

Most league coaches don't agree with Kramer and Newton, who coached at Alabama and Vanderbilt. 

"I don't think they know why they changed the rule, they're legislating against young people who haven't even started in college yet," Georgia coach Jim Harrick said. "It's crazy to think they can eliminate camps and the AAU? It's like, 'I'm going to close Nordstrom's because I can't stop my wife from shopping."' 

Harrick said that the elimination of summer recruiting will force athletic directors to increase recruiting budgets. 

"The whole idea of summer recruiting is the cost efficiency," Harrick said. "AAU coaches go to every nook and cranny of the country, find the players and bring them to us to watch. We don't have to go to them. It's amazing. There were 21 players from the state of Georgia last year in camps and I saw all of them in two weeks." 

The NCAA said because it will eventually eliminate summer recruiting, it will increase from 40 to 50 the number of days during the school year a coach can evaluate prospects. Kentucky coach Tubby Smith sees that as a negative.

"When I broke in the business as an assistant at Virginia Commonwealth in the late '70s, that was before you had a summer recruiting period," Smith said. "I remember during the season, I was only at six of our games out of about 30 because I was on the road recruiting. You never develop as a coach, and you get the label of being a recruiter. That's what we're about to revert back to." 

Florida coach Billy Donovan, who had top-five national recruiting classes in 1998 and 1999 that led his team to the Final Four championship game in April, said no summer recruiting will mean more recruiting mistakes.

"You're going to have more kids transferring out of programs because you won't have as much recruiting time to establish relationships with the recruits," Donovan said. "If they want to cut down and cut out the recruiting, then allow us to make more phone calls during the week to develop a relationship." 

Tennessee coach Jerry Green said the blue-chip camps and the AAU tourneys won't stop just because coaches won't be in the stands. They'll be replaced by recruiting services and Internet media. 

LSU coach John Brady and Arkansas coach Nolan Richardson said there are a couple of positives in the new rule. 

"I think it will localize your recruiting in the sense that you will know about the guys in your state but a lot of other coaches nationally won't," Brady said. "If you've got a great prospect in Abbeville, La., then say the University of Michigan has to come to Abbeville to see him play. They won't be able to see him at a summer tournament." 

Richardson, calling himself an "old school coach," said he hopes the rule change raises the importance of the high school coach in the recruiting process. 

"Maybe now, you won't have to talk to an AAU coach or other guys out there to get to a kid," Richardson said. "Because right now, a kid's high school coach means nothing. A kid's parents -- if he has parents -- don't mean nothing. I'm for any rule that hopefully gives the high school coach a voice again in the recruitment of a kid." 

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Ron Higgins writes for the Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tenn.

 
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