RECRUITING: It’s A Waiting Game At BC

In Division III recruiting, football coaches need patience as they watch D-I or D-II schools grab the top prospects.

The Daily News-Record | By Matthew Stoss

Bridgewater College football recruits seem to fall into two categories: those who know they’re Division III and those who aren’t sure.

Phillip Carter was in the “not sure” category.

Carter – a rising senior running back – said he didn’t officially commit to Bridgewater until late June because James Madison invited the 6-foot, 190-pounder to walk on – but with one catch: He’d have to move to defensive back.

“I didn’t even know about Bridgewater College,” said Carter, who was the Eagles’ second-leading rusher last season when he ran for 716 yards and seven touchdowns on 117 carries.

Carter, a Spotsylvania High School graduate, said he chose Bridgewater because coach Michael Clark didn’t ask him to switch positions and made him feel welcome.

“Our top recruits are at least on I-AA mailing lists, and they’ll make you feel pretty wanted – even if you’re not,” Clark, a former Virginia Tech assistant, said this week at practice.

Recruiting at Division III schools, including Bridgewater, takes patience. Clark and his peers have to wait until prospects have exhausted all hopes of playing at a higher level, something that lasts deep into the spring, before penciling in their future stars.

While Division I schools filled most of their scholarships two months ago, Clark said he won’t have a solid list of newcomers for at least another 1½ weeks as potential recruits weigh their options.

Due to the uncertainty, Clark must adopt a different recruiting strategy than his D-I and D-II counterparts.

“The most important thing is volume,” the 13th-year coach said.

And he wasn’t talking about decibels.

For Clark, volume refers to the number of bodies at practice in August. While the NCAA – and, indirectly, Title IX proportionality rules -- regulate recruiting classes for Division I and II schools, Clark doesn’t have to worry about roster limits.

Last summer, for example, about 135 players took part in preseason practice. Division I-AA JMU, by contrast, usually has about 90. Unlike D-I and D-II schools, Division III programs are forbidden from offering athletic scholarships, making larger rosters both practical and necessary.

If a student is playing football for free, it’s much easier for him to quit than it would be for an athlete on a football scholarship. Attrition – because of anything from lack of interest to a better offer elsewhere – is a fact of life in D-III.

“There are too many variables,” said Clark, who has taken the Eagles to the NCAA playoffs six of the last seven seasons. “If a I-AA school offers in June, I’m going to lose them.”

In Division III, admission deposits replace letters of intent, meaning football players commit to schools as any other student would: with a non-refundable deposit (Clark said it’s $300 at BC), which says he has agreed to enroll.

As of early this week, Clark said about 30 new players had turned in deposits at BC for next fall. However, unlike with Division I signees, their decisions are non-binding and players are free to move to other schools, which Clark said was the case with Cortez Thompson.

Thompson, a cornerback, agreed to play for Bridgewater but decided to walk on at James Madison at the last minute, leaving BC and his $300 investment. It turned out to be a good move: Thompson started as a freshman and helped the Dukes win the 2004 Division I-AA national championship as a senior.

With situations like these, coaches are often forced to wait a very long time to finalize rosters.

“Division III is a marathon, not a sprint,” Clark said. “You have to be in it for the long haul… We deal in large numbers because too many elements are out or your control.”

Just ask Jeff Highfill. The Eagles’ rising senior quarterback said he received interest from I-A schools, as well as from I-AA JMU, Richmond, Harvard and Elon. But at decision time, none of those schools had made scholarship offers.

“Once signing day is done, those spots go pretty quick,” said Highfill, who completed 121 of 202 passes for 1,723 yards and 14 touchdowns with six interceptions in 2006. “I just had to make the decision about if I wanted to do the walk-on route.”

If he had opted to join JMU’s football team as a walk-on, Highfill said, he would have been moved from quarterback to the secondary or outside linebacker – and the 6-foot-3, 195-pounder wanted to remain a QB. Also, Justin Rascati, who went on to become JMU’s winningest quarterback, had just transferred from Louisville.

“There are definitely more late guys,” Highfill said of Division III commitments. “After that signing day [in February for D-I], there are a lot of guys who thought they were going to a higher level.”

However, for Seth Little, those higher levels never were a factor.

Little, a Turner Ashby High School graduate, said he didn’t plan to play college football and thought baseball – his favorite sport growing up – might be his best chance at collegiate athletics.

“Charlie Newman got all the letters,” said Little of his star high school teammate, who now plays at JMU. “It was a very humbling experience [to see that]. I wanted to have that and that’s where Coach Clark came in. He made me feel wanted.”

The rising sophomore defensive back said he drew interest from other Old Dominion Athletic Conference schools like Hampden-Sydney and Emory & Henry, but chose Bridgewater because of his familiarity with the area.

Said Little: “The end of the year… that’s when a lot of D-III schools starting showing some interest, but Bridgewater was always the most persistent.”

And in the world of Division III recruiting, you have to be.

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NOTE: For an updated list of 2007 Bridgewater College recruits publicized by news sources, click here.