#7 Academics & Recruiting:
Grades count. College football coaches want to
see talent, character and academics. And as scary as it sounds, colleges now track and accept non-binding verbal commitments from kids that have not played a single down of freshman football.
The competition is fierce so don’t provide recruiters any reason to cross your son off their watch list based on academics. Understand the difference between the “overall” GPA which includes puff classes and the “core courses” GPA which focuses on math, science, English, foreign language, etc. There are 16 core courses that must be completed in 8 high school semesters and as of August 2016, a 2.3 GPA will be required in those core courses to be eligible for an athletic scholarship to Division I and II schools. Also, while both Div I and II require a total of 16 core courses, the two divisions have different core course requirements – this is key if your son is on the bubble between Div I and II.
Football parents need to be very familiar with the NCAA academic eligibility requirements well before the freshman year because core courses start the freshman year of high school.
Check out www.eligibilitycenter.org for NCAA core course tracking tools and further information.
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