The best thing to do after a big showcase tournament is to go home and wait for college coaches to contact you. Wrong.

Actually, really wrong. Too many players think that once they've been to a showcase, their work is done. They think that they'll be contacted if coaches saw them play and liked what they saw. This is a recipe for failure.

When it comes to learning how to get recruited for a tournament like the Pepsi Showdown, for example, there are three key components:

1. Telling the coach you're going to be there


2. Playing in the tournament


3. Finding out if the coach saw you play

Not following through with the third step is like buying ice cream, bringing it home, and then letting it melt on the counter. What a waste!

So here's what you should do when you get home from the Pepsi Showdown. Email each of the coaches on your list and ask them if they were able to see you play. Include a quick synopsis of how you played and how your team did in case they didn't see you. It should take no more than an hour. There are three possible outcomes:

1. The coach saw you play and loves you


2. The coach didn't see you play, but appreciates the update


3. The coach saw you play and feels like it's not a great fit

Oh, the last one. It can sting a little bit. But actually, it's a good thing, because it allows you to focus your recruiting on the colleges responded positively.

The Pepsi Showdown is a great opportunity to get seen by college coaches and convince them that you deserve a spot on their team. But here's the rub: there are a lot of players who are going to be there. This is how to get recruited at any tournament you play in this spring, you have to stand out.

There are two ways to do this. The first, obviously, is to play well. The second is less obvious, but probably more important: you have to get them to see you play in the first place. You can't just hope that they'll randomly show up on the sidelines of your game. Here are three simple steps you should take to convince coaches to come watch you play at a tournament:

1. Find out which college coaches will be present. Email them and ask if they'll be there. Ask your coaches if they know which college coaches will be in attendance. Look at various websites for lists.


2. Make sure you have an up-to-date profile that college coaches can easily access. Include photos, grades, test scores, and your soccer history. Make sure that your information makes it into the event's player profile book.


3. Email the coaches with dates, times, and locations of your games. Tell them that you would really like it if they can see you play and name specific reasons why you think that school is such a good fit.

This should take you no more than an hour. It's amazing how a small, but concerted effort on the right recruiting activities can make a major difference.

It takes guts to email a college coach.

The mother of one of our customers shared a powerful story with me this week. Her daughter just signed with a Division I team. But things didn't always look like they'd turn out this well. At first, her daughter was very tentative about emailing college coaches. The question "Why would they want to hear from me?" kept coming up on the ride home from practice.

She got over the initial hurdle and started contacting college coaches, but she didn't hear back from anyone immediately. She dusted herself off and sent another round of emails. Ever so slowly, the responses started to trickle in. And then the trickle became a flood. In some cases, she was receiving contact from coaches who hadn't responded at first. Her confidence surged with each response and she was emboldened to send more.

This is a great story. It shows that writing the first email is tough, and that there are setbacks along throughout the recruiting process. And it demonstrates the importance of taking the risk to contact college coaches and being persistent even when they don't respond.

One thing that struck me so much about this particular story is the point about confidence. Let's face it, cold-emailing a college coach and saying that you want to play for him/her can be a bit humbling. If you don't hear back, it can hurt. It's easy to see how some players get deterred from contacting college coaches very quickly.

But here's the upside: persistence pays off in a big way. When coaches don't write you back, it's okay. The first time you hear back from a coach, it's thrilling. You feel a surge of confidence that says, "Yes, I can do this." Ride that wave and send five more emails. The more you write, the more responses you'll get. And the more responses you get, the closer you'll be to a great college career.

Let's face it: sending emails to college coaches can be intimidating. But emailing a college coach is important, for a variety of reasons. Not only does it put you on the coach's radar, it also shows the coach that you possess valuable qualities: persistence, assertiveness, boldness, etc. Every college coach hopes to find players who match this description.

Last weekend was a recruiting bonanza. President's Day is always that way. Everyone, college coaches included, is looking for an excuse to go somewhere warm.

The conventional wisdom goes something like this, "I go to a tournament and college coaches watch me play. If they like me, they'll contact me." Don't listen to that line. The silence after a tournament can be deafening, and often demoralizing.

The thing is, the lack of contact is really more about college coaches than it is about you. It's a huge headache for coaches to digest all the information from a tournament, which can take weeks to process. Inevitably, players the coach liked get lost in the shuffle.

All this points towards one thing that you have to do after a tournament: email coaches and ask if they saw you play and what they thought.

This can feel like a tough requirement. A lot of players wonder, "Who am I to demand a college coach's opinion?" The thing is, you have the right to know.

After seeing you play, college coaches owe you an honest opinion on where you stand. They may need to see you play again, but at the very least, they should let you know if things are moving in the right direction, or if you should look elsewhere.

Either bit of info is really helpful. If they think you're the right kind of player, that's a huge step in the right direction. If they don't, you can focus your recruiting on other coaches who are interested.

by Avi - With National Signing Day behind us, recruiting is heating up for the Classes of 2010 and 2011. Now is the time for sophomores and juniors to start to place themselves squarely on a coach's radar by developing an NCAA recruiting schedule.

In this episode of the show, we discuss simple but powerful steps that 2010s and 2011s should take to assert themselves and make sure that when Signing Day comes around next time, they have a spot on a college team. Click below to listen:

What a week! February 4th is National Signing Day, the day that 2009 college recruits sign for a team. The next day, college coaches wake up and trudge back to the office to start it all over again, ready to focus on their next recruiting classes.

February 5th is National E-Mail a College Coach Day. That's the day that your name should show up on a college coach's computer. You want to place yourself squarely on his radar for the next college sports recruitment cycle. This is true whether you've been emailing a coach for a while, or are making contact for the first time.

Emailing even one coach is a huge gesture. It's a way of saying that you're going to take the college sports recruiting bull by the horns; that you're going to take control of the process. By going to OwnTheProcess.com you can take the pledge along with thousands of other high school athletes to email at least one college coach on National E-Mail a College Coach Day.

What should you say in this email? The first thing to do is check out the team's website. Most college teams update their websites right away on National Signing Day, to introduce their new players to the world. See who these new players are and learn about their backgrounds. Then write your email.

Start your email by congratulating the coach on finishing his recruiting, and share an observation that shows that you actually checked out the team's website. Something like, "Since I'm from Illinois, it's cool to see that you've got two new players from here. I actually played against Cameron in high school this season."

Next, explain that you're eager to prove that you're right player for his team, so next year, you'll be one of the new signings that go up on the team's website.

The most important thing is to stand tall, assert yourself, and say, "I'm going to take control of this." Emailing at least one coach on February 5th does exactly that. Don't miss out on the opportunity to join thousands of other players around the country to establish yourself on a coach's recruiting radar.

There are 5 steps you have to take to win in the college recruiting process. Taking these simple steps is how you make a college sports team.

The second step in learning how to get recruited is introducing yourself to college coaches. Introducing yourself to a college coach can be an intimidating part of the college recruiting process. But here’s an amazing fact: they want to hear from you. When you introduce yourself, you’re making the college recruiting process easier for everyone.

(Learn the other steps: Previous: Find good-fit schools; Next: Build relationships with coaches)

Here are some ways you can help introduce yourself more confidently:

• Do a little research on their college so you know what you’re talking about.
• Write a great cover letter that conveys your enthusiasm about competing for them.
• Send them a thorough, well thought out recruiting profile to show your athletic and academic pedigree.
• Demonstrate that you’re academically qualified for the college.
• Include action shots and pictures of you so they can put a face to a name.

Of course, college coaches hear from a lot of athletes, so you have to make yourself stand out. This is why it's important to formulate a good strategy for the college recruiting process.

It's one thing to write a college baseball coach. It's a completely different thing to get his eyebrows to perk up; to get him to say to himself, "This is someone I need to keep an eye on." A lot of emails show up in a college coach's inbox. In this episode of the show, we explore two great ways to get a coach's attention because, after all, writing to college baseball coaches is important.

Click below to listen

There are a few things you need to keep in mind when emailing a college baseball coach. First of all, consider the time of year, day, week, etc. Baseball is a spring/summer sport, which means that coaches are bound to be busy during these seasons. Calling or writing a letter to a baseball coach at, say, 5:00 P.M. on a spring Friday, when the coach might have a game, probably isn't the best idea. On the other hand, writing a message on an autumnal Monday morning is an excellent strategy.

Remember, too, that coaches get a ton of emails, regardless of time of year. Sometimes your email can get lost in the fray, and a coach won't respond. That does not mean you should stop trying. All it means is that every email you send should be unique, and should accurately indicate your interest to the coach. That way, when your email receives the attention it deserves, a coach will remember you.

by Avi - One of the coolest things I've seen in a while came from Hope Spangler, one of our CaptainU athletes. She put together a "Who I am" slideshow of photos, text about herself, and quotes from her friends and coaches.

College coaches love this sort of stuff. Why? Because it's personalized. It's not spam sent to a gazillion coaches. Rather, it's something that Hope clearly spent some time on. College coaches love it when athletes put some imagination into their recruiting. So if you're wondering how to get recruited, know that there are many right ways.

Imagine the boredom of reading through 50 generic emails. Then, suddenly, a breath of fresh air like Hope's slideshow. Or, someone who used green as the font color on their email. Maybe green itself text isn't that interesting, but it's the start of something different. That email goes on to tell a hilarious story about stalling twenty times while learning to drive a stick-shift. Now we're talking! That's good, interesting stuff that's going to bring a smile to the coach's face. It's not even about sports, but it's enjoyable for a coach to read.

Wham! Just like that, the kid with the green text made herself a little different from the 49 other people the coach heard from that day. National Signing Day for the Class of 2009 just passed. Now college coaches are looking for their next recruits. How do you get on their radar? It just requires a little creativity.

This is where recruiting can get really fun. I'm sure Hope had a good time putting that slideshow together. Start with a 5-minute brainstorm. It doesn't matter if the ideas are goofy, just write them down for now and then think about them when you're done brainstorming. Try two of the ideas you come up with and see what happens. In all likelihood, you'll get more of a response from coaches than if you send 25 coaches the exact same email.

Phew. The dust has settled. The college athlete recruiting tournament is over and now the waiting game begins. Will I hear from any coaches? Will they call? Email? Show up at the front door?

It helps to know what a college coach is dealing with when he returns from a tournament. He's just seen hundreds of players, taken pages of notes, and now has to reconstruct what he saw and who he liked. It can take weeks.

Some coaches aren't so, ahem, organized. Often, players they like fall through the cracks. To make sure this doesn't happen, you should always email coaches after a tournament. Remind them that they saw you play. And ask them what they thought.

Even coaches who are organized and able to quickly process all the information from a tournament often take weeks to get back to a player. Imagine opening your inbox only to find that you have 382 emails to respond to. It can be overwhelming for coaches.

This is why persistence is so important for players in college athletic recruiting. Especially after tournaments, players often feel like that was their big chance. If the coach didn't contact me afterward, they think, he clearly wasn't interested. This is where you have to soldier on. You have to keep contacting coaches until they give you a definitive response. Are they interested? Yes or no?

To get a response, you have to persist.

You know you need to do it. But still, you sit there at your computer watching the cursor blink. Does the coach want to hear from me? Am I imposing on his time? What should I say? Will he respond? What happens if I don't get a response?

Here's what you have to know: college coaches love getting emails from recruits.

Getting emails from players makes college coaches' jobs easier. It also tells a coach a lot about the player. It means that the player is willing to take a risk.

College coaches realize that you have to "put yourself out there" to contact them. Let's face it, coaches can be intimidating, it's hard to know what to say, and it takes some guts to ask them to recruit you. The cool thing is, that's exactly what coaches are looking for: go-getters. Coaches want players who get out on the field and do what it takes to get a result.

How you recruit is therefore a great example of how you'll perform in college. Athletes who do what it takes to get a result in recruiting are often the athletes who will succeed on a college team. So learn more about contacting college coaches.

Ahhh, winter break. Egg nog, 14 hours a day on the Wii, and a Mount Kilimanjaro of presents. It's the perfect time to kick back and do absolutely nothing -- uh, if you're trying to not make a college team.

If, on the other hand, you actually do want to play in college, you can get huge recruiting mileage out of your winter break, and still get plenty of solid time on the Wii. Here's what your New Year's resolution should be: by January 1st, you should find a group of 10 schools and send the coaches at those schools an email with a link to your CaptainU profile.

Not a big deal, right?

Sit down at the computer and resist the temptation to go to Facebook or ESPN. Instead, search for a few of the college teams that interest you. Have a look at their team pages, their rosters, and their coaches' info. Boom. Done. 5 minutes a team. Just like that, you'll have learned a ton. Enter a few quick thoughts on your CaptainU Recruiting Log. Do you like the school? If not, dump it.

Repeat this 10-ish times. Look, that's less than an hour total.

Next, create a great CaptainU profile. Throw a few pictures on it. Add your grades and test scores. This can be accomplished in 15 minutes. Finally, write a quick note that you can send to each of your coaches. Include the link to your CaptainU profile. Each time you send an email, personalize it with a few details about that specific school. College coaches will appreciate it.

All told, this can be done in 2-3 hours. Spaced out over 2 weeks, that's 8 minutes 34 seconds a day. Come on. You can make this happen and still beat Halo 3 893 times!

Finding colleges, let alone ones where you can play a sport, is a daunting challenge for high school students. The sheer number of colleges is enough to make most 17 year-olds a little jittery. To be successful in recruiting, the athlete has to drive the recruiting process forward. But there are lots of moments in the college recruitment process when a parent's guidance and assistance are invaluable.

As parents, concentrate on what is right for your child. If he's not Harvard material, don't push him in that direction. If she wants to explore a lot of other activities, maybe Division I isn't right after all. Most importantly, don't be overbearing. Instead, think of yourself as teammates trying to win the recruiting game together. The cool thing is that this can be an exciting, collaborative experience.

Here's how parents can have a hugely positive impact on recruiting:

• Help your kid identify 10-ish colleges that seem to have the right combination of sports and academics.


• Sit down together and write a cover letter. Help edit, but don't censor.


• Practice recruiting phone conversations at the kitchen table. Play both roles, so your kid gets to see what it's like to be on the other end of the line.


• Help keep all of the recruiting materials organized and your CaptainU recruiting Logs up to speed.


• Make sure that your kid maintains regular contact with each college coach.


• Address the financial issues — which are a complicated aspect of the college selection process that will stump most kids.


• When your kid reaches an impasse, help him work through it.


• Speak to college coaches only when you absolutely must. Otherwise, let your kid do the talking.

Your most important job is to keep the vibe positive. There are always setbacks in recruiting. How you deal with them will help set the tone for your kid. Emphasize the point that this is an exciting opportunity in which your family can take control of the college recruitment process.

Regular communication with college coaches will strengthen your cause and help you develop your relationships with coaches.

Through letters, phone calls, and e-mails, you can demonstrate to a coach that you are committed to becoming a member of his volleyball, soccer, or basketball team.

This will give the coach a reason to seek you out specifically at a camp, tournament, or regular season game. Regular communication will put you in a position where college coaches are eager to evaluate your ability.

Learn more about contacting college coaches.

Contacting college coaches is a critical component of successful recruiting. If you want to get recruited, you have to put yourself in front of coaches. We interviewed 40 top college coaches and here's what they said about what captures their attention and how they choose which players to send a response:

1. Use email - Contacting colleges coaches by email is really the only way to go. Coaches spend most of the day at the computer. Sending physical mail just makes it that much harder for them to respond. They have to manually enter all your information before they respond to you. If you contact college coaches by email, they can just hit respond and write you back.


2. Be specific - Your email should contain specific details about the college you're contacting. Let's face it, college coaches get lots of recruiting email. And a lot of it, quite frankly, is spam. Your email should show that you've researched the school and that you didn't just send the same letter to a zillion coaches.


3. Include a player profile - Your email should arrive with a recruiting profile that includes pictures, video, statistics, and all your academic info. The more filled out your profile, the more likely you are to get a response.