Womens’ College Basketball Recruiting Similar to Mens’; Post-Collegiate Opportunities Still Lacking

Monday, April 28th, 2008, filed in PrepChamps News

An excellent article from Becki, the Editor of MyMag and the Editorial Director of MyYearbook, on both a standout player and coach at PrepChamps. Check out the article here, and for all those wondering or curious, you’ll get an inside look at the high school athletic recruiting process from Stonehill College’s Women’s Basketball Senior Captain Erika Stupinski and Women’s Head Coach Trisha Brown.

A couple of notes: while both women see the equality that Title IX brought to women’s collegiate athletics, - even in terms of scholarship money, etc. - Coach Brown was quick to note that the professional and/or post-collegiate opportunities are still not equal to that of men’s sports (think professional):

“’I think the WNBA has done well,’ said Trisha reflectively. ‘They’re increasing their number of franchises this year, but I haven’t seen tremendous growth in the WNBA. Where I think people anticipated that there would be more growth at this point… I don’t think post-college, the opportunities for really talented female student athletes are the same as the men have.’”

This is an interesting point, especially taking into account the flak professional mens’ sports organizations have taken in the past years: from strikes to doping to perjury to dog fights, the MLB, NBA and NFL are beginning to look more like treatment centers for troubled juveniles than they are professional sports teams looking for the public to follow, adore and endorse them . . . Meanwhile, I can’t remember a time when a WNBA player - let alone the league as a whole - came under fire for off- or on-the-court activities (somebody prove me wrong, please . . .)

Regardless the availability of opportunities down the road, team captain Erika noted that the recruiting process for her had been similar to what male student athletes go through:

“Indeed Erika’s own story of recruitment sounded fairly similar to many men I have interviewed on the same subject. ‘I was playing AU so I think the recruiting process really started my freshman year,’ said Erika, explaining the process that brought her to Stonehill. ‘I was playing in tournaments where college coaches are watching your games and stuff. You start getting letters from these coaches asking for general questionnaires and stuff. Sophomore and junior years, more of these coaches would be coming to more of your games…When you see the college coaches there watching you play and you know that you’re interested in going to their school…there’s definitely pressures in trying to make sure that you’re playing well.’”

Thanks to Becki for the great article, and to Erika and Trisha for their insights.

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Tags: athletic recruiting, high school student athletes, WNBA, womens' athletics, womens' high school basketball

This entry was posted on Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 5:11 pm and is filed under PrepChamps News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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