College Coaches Staying Put Was The Right Call posted by Bryan Rose

This is the time of year when college coaches gather around and play the game of musical chairs to see who will be the next coach where. We have already seen it with Billy Gillespie being replaced by John Calipari. But one coach, at least, seems to have bucked the trend.

Mike Anderson agreed to a new extended contract at Missouri, keeping him a Tiger for the next seven years and ending rumors that he would jump ship to coach Memphis.

And signing that contract may have been the best decision Anderson has made all year (and this from a coach who took his team to the elite and an impressive win over that same Memphis team).

In his time with Missouri, Anderson has transformed the Tigers from a mid level contender in the Big 12 to conference front-runner, with a flashy style and up pace game plan that he perfected at UAB. With all that going for him, why would he even consider Memphis?

Granted Memphis is one of the premier programs in college basketball, but that is because of the success that Calipari had. Anderson is doing to Missouri what Calipari did for Memphis. Building a strong, lasting program from the ground up.

Anderson's style of play (Missouri scored 102 points in the elite eight game against Memphis) is sure to attract top-level recruits who will excel in his fast breaking system. Add to it the national television exposure recruits will get when Missouri travels to the likes of Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas. Conference USA simply cannot contend with the Big 12 for that kind of exposure.

So with all that in place for Anderson, signing a contract extension was a no-brainer and a win for college basketball as Missouri will remain a contender with their fun to watch style for years to come.

Inbound link contest winner announced! posted by Earn Money Blogging

A big thanks to everyone who participated in the "Inbound Link Contest".  We have a winner!  A big congratulations go out to Marija.  Thank you for all your hard work on this.  While we had a lot of people participate, Marija was able to win with only 4 links!  So it wouldn't have taken a lot to win this contest!  We'll be having another contest soon so stay tuned.

The whole purpose of this contest was to get our bloggers networking with other webmasters and to start to build up their inbound links which will help their traffic.  Even a few links can help you with the search engines as they will see you as more of an authority on your topic the more inbound links you have.

To learn more about marketing your blog check out this post: http://www.nbabasketballonline.com/sports_content-rev_share_faq.html#my_faq_2971

Marija's blog can be found here.  If you're a Knicks fan, check it out: http://www.newyorkknicksnews.com/marijak

The original post announcing the contest can be found here: http://www.nbabasketballonline.com/bloggers/weblog/2984.html

And if you're not already signed up with Google AdSense and making money from your blog, check out our Revenue Share FAQ page: http://www.nbabasketballonline.com/sports_content-rev_share_faq.html

RECRUITING HAS BECOME CRAZY, part 2 posted by Jon Kerr

In Wednesday's post, we ran part of a Q & A with PJ Fleck, recruiting coordinator and wide receivers coach for Northern Illinois University. Fleck downplayed the importance of high school combines to college coaches in general and gave his insights so to why, in spite of this, we are seeing more and more of these events in prep football. Today, we post the rest of the interview.

"What we look for is consistency. In game film, we want to see consistency. The big thing is a kid coming to our camp. We can have a (recruit) at our place under our format. We can have our own watch and properly evaluate a recruit. This has become a premium which is why our camps are so important."

Before a athlete is invited to a camp, someone has to know they exist. When is a good time to start the process?

“Parents need to do their research. Sit down with your son or daughter and prioritize what they want in their future. Scholarships are hard to come by, so you need to stay one step ahead of competion. In my opinion, kids don't mature until junior even senior year. My advice is to sit down with the high school coach and see where they legitimately fall. This is the year to get on the recruiting path. The main thing is they must love what they do.

How should it be presented? 

"We’d like a highlight tape and 2 game films, with drills at the end. All on one DVD."

RECRUITING HAS BECOME CRAZY posted by Jon Kerr

I used to love going away to summer camp. Was there anything better than the smell of watered down powdered eggs in the morning?

But this post isn't about Sleepaway Camp. It's about prep football camps and the cottage industry of combines and competitions that has spun off from them.

We addressed this in Friday's post. Today, we have insights from someone who can speak from authority. PJ Fleck is the recruiting coordinator and wide receivers coach at Northern Illinois. He is in his 2nd season as a coach at Northern. Fleck is responsible for the Huskies' recruiting efforts.

How much stock do you put in these things? 

"All these combines, we get the results, but it's someone else's watch, someone else's ruler, someone else's scale. We used to attend these, but now we can't (the NCAA prohibits Division 1 coaches from evaluating student-athletes at independently held combines). We'll get information from a big one, like a Nike camp, but stay away from the little ones." 

Why are you seeing so many of these combines/challenges/7-on-7’s? 

"Kids are learning so much about plyometrics, about their bodies, which helps their game. But there are a lot more trainers today, more of these performace enhancers. Kids are going to other places besides high school to be trained. So trainers are running their own (camps, combines). Recruiting has become crazy. You still need to have the high school (coach). Recruits still need personal development. 

Coming in a later post, Fleck reveals how he evaluates a recruit and the best time for a student-athlete to start the process...

Inbound link contest - Win $100! posted by Earn Money Blogging

To try and motivate our bloggers to get inbound links we're going to have a contest to see which blogger can get the most inbound links to their blog. The contest begins now and ends July 31st, 2008. To be entered in to the contest all you have to do is go out and get as many websites to link to your blog as you can and at the end of the month send us an email listing all those links. All links must be active from August 1st through August 7th when we'll be judging the entries - a winner will be announced on August 7th. All entry emails must be received by Midnight on July 31st, 2008. You can email them to sportsfan@nbabasketballonline.com

We're going to impose some restrictions on the types of links you can get so please see below for the full list of links that do NOT count.

To get started simply go to Google and find other websites and blog that are about the sports and teams that you write about. Email the website owner and ask them for a link by explaining that you think your blog would be a good resource for their readers. Or offer to write a guest post for them with your by-line and URL at the bottom of the article. Or offer to exchange links with them by writing a quick write up of their site and a reciprocal link back to them. Some webmasters will be happy to add you to their blog roll even if you don't give them a link back (which is ideal) but some may want you to link back to them - you can easily do this with a quick blog entry on your blog about their website.

To learn more about inbound links and marketing your blog in general check out this post:

Think you're being recruited? 3 ways to know for sure... posted by Jon Kerr

July 1st is a key date in the recruiting process for most sports. With the exclusion of basketball, it is the date college coaches can initiate phone calls with prospective recruits.

If you are a prep football player, a phone call will not be your 1st contact from a college, but it's an essential step on the process. Sort of like when you ask someone out. If you don't at least ask, you'll never get a yes. Of course, there's always the chance you'll get rejected, but I digress (not that I would know anything about rejection...I have friends that have had this experience).

9 days into this "contact" period, if you haven't gotten a phone call from a coach, that doesn't mean coaches aren't interested. It just might mean they aren't interested- yet. Here are a handful of ways to know if you are on a college coaches' My 3 list (OK, I know it's My 5, but this is a blog, and short and sweet wins the day):

1. Voice Mail is full. When you consider the limited contact the NCAA allows coaches to contact recruits, when the phone rings in early July, this is the first sign you are on the list. And when I say on the list, I mean the no-wait-for-a-table list at Gibson's, not the we-have-plenty-of-open-booths at IHOP kind of list. If coaches are calling, they are interested.

2. Can you come over and play? I remember growing up, when I was new to a neighborhood, making friends was always a bit scary. Especially when I would wander the streets dressed like this-

Winds of Change... posted by Jon Kerr

Are swirling in college and prep football. The topic- early signing date.

If you are a recruited high school student athlete, a college coach can offer you a scholarship at the start of your junior year. Football is the only sport where that commitment is verbal for 18 months! The rules say you can't sign with a school until February of your senior year. Why is this creating problems? Like you would expect from 16 and 17-year-old teenagers, many are changing their minds, verbally committing to a school their junior year, only to sign with another when it is time to put pen to paper.

You can imagine this is not sitting well with college coaches.

A recent poll in the the Daily Oklahoman said most Division 1 college football coaches favor moving the early prep football signing period up, to sometime during a prospects senior year.

Two  Big Ten coaches voted against changing the date, including Illinois head coach Ron Zook. A lightening rod for controversy since he took over Illinois, Zook has consistently landed top recruting classes since he arrived in Champaign 4 years ago. Illinois fans believe Zook has done it by sheer force of personality and hard work.

Others are not so sure.

It's not surprising someone accused of questionable recruiting tactics would be in favor of the status quo. This gives the coach of an opposing team more time to recruit a player, even after he has verbally committed to a school, in hopes of convicing that player to change allegiances.

The topic is is bringing out spirited debates amongst high school and college coaches. Thoughts on this blog are welcome.

College Athletics? Reality Check 101, Part 3 posted by Jon Kerr

At 5'7", Mike Emerick is not your typical volleyball player. With the dimunitive stature of a prep football kicker, he chose to play sport where a premium is given on one physical characteristic.

"They like height," said Emerick.

Since no pill or creme could help Emerick shake his "Little Mike" nickname and help him grow taller, he knew that in order to get to the collegiate level, he would have to outwork everyone else.

Which he did, working with strength and speed trainers in prepartation for a collegiate career. When Mike arrived at  Lindenwood University  in the fall of 2006, he may have been the team's best athlete.

But after his freshman year, a year where he saw little playing time, all of that hard work and training had yet to gain the notice of his coaches.

So when told the team had a new recruit coming in who could do all the things Mike could do, only the kid stood several inches taller, Mike started to reconsider his decision to attend Lindenwood. He decided to  redshirt his sophomore year, which allows a collegiate student athlete to sit a year out.

"(Coach) wasn't giving me a shot," said Emerick about Lindenwood head coach Ron Young. "If you outperform a player, you should earn the spot," referring to workouts and practices where Mike clearly believed he had played better than some of his teammates.

Let's take a step back from this story and examine the larger issue. How did things get to this point? First off, it's apparent Mike and his coach didn't have a regular line of dialogue.

College Athletics? Reality Check 101, Part 2 posted by Jon Kerr

There are well over 100,000 high school students in this country who also play sports, from prep football to prep tennis. For some, kicking the soccer ball around is nothing more than an after-school activity, a calorie-burning alternative to a job at the mall. For others, it is serious business. Sports is perceived as more than a way to stay in shape, it is a vehicle to a different lifestyle, a meal ticket to a college of their choice, expenses included. 

Or is it?

"The truth is, less than 1 percent of kids in this country get athletic scholarships," said Jack Renkens, a former college basketball coach and president and founder of Recruiting Realities.

Renkens travels the country speaking on issues surrounding the collegiate recruiting process. It is a murky subject, where the lines are blurred between fact and fiction.

"Very rarely does an athlete get to pick the school they've dreamed about their whole lives," says Renkens.

Yesterday, we began the story of Mike Emerick, a volleyball player from Gurnee, IL who will be a junior this fall at  Lindenwood University in St. Charles, MO. Mike fell into the less than 1 percent catagory as a good portion of his 1st year expenses were picked up by the  NAIA school.

"I liked the players, I liked the school and I liked the money," said Emerick. 

In exchange for scholarship money, Mike had to perform on the court. Told before the season he would be the team's 3rd Libero, a defensive position, it didn't take long for his coach to re-evaluate that decision.

College Athletics? Reality Check 101... posted by Jon Kerr

There is an ongoing ad campaign by the NCAA that at the end of each advertisement, has a punchline that's hard to ignore-

"Most NCAA student-athletes will graduate in something other that sports"

If you are a high school student-athlete with dreams of playing your sport in college, here's a bit of advice. You may want to inject a few facts into your ambition, even if it may permanently ground it.

A recent  NY Times article cited the gowing divide between the culture of reality in college athletics and the expectations of those who want to participate. An analysis of  NCAA data reveals the average college athletic scholarship is just north of $8,700. With the average cost of a public education in Illinois close to $20,000 per year, private upwards of $30,000, those who play and their parents need to get real.

AND FAST.

Take the case of Mike Emerick. A 2006 graduate of Warren High School, Emerick was an honor roll student and varsity volleyball player. While his friends enrolled in brand-name colleges, Emerick chose the decidedly off-the-radar Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri, because it gave him the opportunity to continue to play the sport he loved.

"I didn't know anyone going in," said Emerick, who will be a junior this fall. "As an athlete, you just don't know what to expect."

Over the next 20 months, from August 2006 through this past May, Emerick experienced emotions ranging from excitement, to anxiety to downright dispair.

It is a cautionary tale for anyone thinking about playing collegiate athletics.

Vanderbilt signee Bennett shot to death (AP)

A high school football star who had been signed to play at Vanderbilt University was shot to death Thursday by his mother's ex-boyfriend, police said. Officers heard gunshots as they arrived at the home where Rajaan Bennett, 18, lived with his mother, Powder Springs Lt. Matt Boyd said. Inside they found Bennett, a running back at McEachern High School, dead of a gunshot wound. [read full article]

From Yahoo! Sports