Posted by Donald Wilkerson on
Aug 02 2010
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05:00PM PDT
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College basketball coaches across the country know plenty about Aaron and Andrew Harrison.
Before they had stepped on a high school campus, coaches had evaluated and pursued the now 15-year-old twin brothers. Several offered basketball scholarships.
As members of the Houston Defenders, their Amateur Athletic Union select basketball team, the 6-5 twins are dominant figures on the summer basketball circuit in front of hordes of coaches, many of whom hope to land the highly skilled pair. Their father — Defenders coach Aaron Harrison Sr. - estimates that each of his sons has more than 20 verbal scholarship offers and has received a dozen in the past two weeks.
"Their seventh-grade year was when they first started getting a lot of attention," said Harrison, who has coached his sons since they were 8.
But now, if the NCAA has its way, colleges will have to halt the common practice of pursuing elite middle-school athletes who are discovered in AAU programs. The NCAA's Division I Recruiting and Athletics Personnel Issues Cabinet has endorsed a proposal to ban verbal scholarship offers to recruits before July 1 in the summer between their junior and senior years in high school.
The proposal could be adopted in January or April and, if passed, would apply to all sports. But some believe the rule will be impossible to enforce.
"That rule is going to be impossible to legislate," Rice basketball coach Ben Braun said. "Kids are going to ask a coach, 'Are you going to save a scholarship for me?' And the coach is going to say yes. No coach is going to say, 'No, we'll talk to you in your senior year,' to a good recruit."
In an era of high turnover among college basketball coaches and immense pressure to win, everyone looks for an edge. When it comes to recruiting, that can mean offering players scholarships before the competition.
Recruiting and scouting services know this and help coaches keep up with the talent. HoopScoopOnline.com, a highly regarded source for analysis and coverage of recruiting and grass-roots basketball, ranks the top players nationally from sixth grade to 12th grade, as well as fifth-year prep-school players. It also offers a subscription service for college coaches.
But much of a college coach's homework is done in the July evaluation periods, when the NCAA permits coaches to attend certified non-scholastic basketball tournaments. With tournaments spotted across the country and several age groups participating in each of them, it serves as one-stop shopping for recruiting.
For top-level prospects, coaches quickly come calling, because the first scholarship offer can make a difference in a player's college choice.
"There's not pressure as much as it is the opportunity to be able to get him first and be the first one so they remember you," Memphis coach Josh Pastner said. "A kid remembers that they were the first ones there, and sometimes - but not always - that carries a lot of weight when it comes to making a final decision."
Second Baptist point guard L.J. Rose is another example. Ranked as the top junior point guard nationally by ESPNU, Rose has "too many offers to count," according to his father Lynden Rose. The younger Rose, who plays with Houston Hoops in the summer, led Second Baptist to a state championship game last season, was an all-state selection and competed abroad with USA Basketball's 16-and-under team in 2009.
Lynden Rose, a former University of Houston basketball player and a member of the school's board of regents, said his son got his first scholarship offer as a seventh-grader and an estimated dozen by the time he entered high school.
Verbal offers are non-binding. Coaches can rescind them at any time, and recruits can change their verbal commitment when they want. In basketball, players can't sign a binding letter of intent until their senior year during one of the NCAA's basketball signing periods, which typically fall in November and April. But that doesn't stop players from committing early in their high school careers.
Former Madison and University of Oklahoma point guard Tommy Mason-Griffin was heavily recruited at a young age . He got his first verbal offer from Baylor when he was an eighth-grader at Welch Middle School and verbally committed to LSU as a sophomore. After a coaching change at LSU, the 2009 McDonald's All-American reopened his recruitment before eventually settling on Oklahoma. He said the attention didn't affect his play, but he understands how it could.
"Getting that early offer puts you in the early limelight, and some kids don't know how to handle limelight and accolades at a young age," Mason-Griffin said. "It makes it seem like you've already made it. By the time you get (to the) 12th grade, if you haven't worked on your game, then those offers might go away."
Some believe a limit on early recruiting is unnecessary and question whether it can be enforced. Lynden Rose said limiting when a school can extend an offer might create fewer opportunities for scholarships. Pastner thinks some positives can come from an early offer.
"I don't think there is any slippery slope," he said. "In basketball, you know if a prospect is going to have an opportunity to be really good. If someone offers a scholarship in seventh grade or eighth grade, there's no negativity, it's not binding, and there are no legal ramifications. Sometimes it's better for the school and the prospect because it helps them make sure they're on the right path academically."
