Athletics recruiting centers on relationships and persistence

Lee Corso sat in Mark Herrmann’s (M’81) driveway with a pen and paper napkin in hand. The Indiana football coach was trying to convince the talented young quarterback from Carmel, Indiana, to bring his skills to Bloomington. 

“He drew a map with every school in the Big Ten on it,” Herrmann remembers. “Then he went one by one and told me why I shouldn’t go to any of the other schools. I really enjoyed him … he was just as funny as what you see on television.” 

But as Boilermaker fans know, Corso was unsuccessful in his attempt. Herrmann, now director of corporate and foundation relations for the Krannert School of Management, became an All-American at Purdue and a member of the College Football Hall of Fame.

Technology has changed in the four decades since that meeting. Hand drawings have given way to texting, Twitter, and Facebook. But one thing has remained constant in the world of athletics recruiting — the key is creating a connection between athlete, coach, and school.

“It’s all about building relationships,” says Sharon Versyp (LA’89), the first Indiana Miss Basketball to play for the Boilermakers and the winningest coach in program history. “Recruits will have plenty of contact with the assistant coaches, but if they don’t hear from the head coach, they feel like they’re not a priority. It’s a 24/7 process all the time, especially when it comes to texting.”

The Search Begins

Before relationships are built, coaches have to find the athletes they want. Those hunting grounds range from high school and summer competitions to school-hosted instructional camps. The starting dates vary by sport, but in most cases the intensity begins to ramp up in the athlete’s junior year. 

To yield the number of recruits they need in any particular season, coaches start with a large prospect list. Versyp says her staff initially targets 10 players at each needed position and then narrows that to the top four or five. The recruits at each position aren’t put into tiers but rather are offered scholarships on a first-come, first-served basis. With a scholarship limit of 15, basketball typically adds between three and five players in any given year.

Football is different. With 85 scholarships to fill, and up to 25 players to sign each year, coach Jeff Brohm says his staff will watch thousands of prospects on film. They will go to areas such as Texas and California as needed, but he prefers to focus on a tighter geographic perspective.

“We want to build our nucleus from a three-to-four hour radius around campus,” says Brohm, a former standout quarterback at Louisville who spent seven seasons in the NFL. “We make a point of visiting as many schools within that area as we can, even if they don’t have a player in that particular recruiting year that we’re targeting. We need to build relationships that will hopefully pay off in the future.”

Before coaches can make visits to coaches and prospective recruits, they need to prove they know the rules. Regardless of experience, each coach must take a test every year. It’s an open-book exam of 30 questions; coaches must score at least 80 percent, or they have to wait another month before they can take the test again.

There is plenty to study. The NCAA rules manual is thick and sometimes complicated, even for those who study it for a living. Tom Mitchell, associate athletics director for compliance, admits that he looks at the book at least 25 times a day.

“I have a copy by my nightstand, one on my phone and one on my iPad. I have to make sure I keep up with the changes and can explain any nuances to the appropriate coaches,” Mitchell says.

Occasionally, a coach will inadvertently break a recruiting rule. When that happens, the coach will report the incident to Mitchell, who uses it as a teaching opportunity. He usually sends a letter of education to the entire staff that outlines what the violation was, without naming the coach or sport involved, and explains what the proper procedure should have been. The university submits the minor violations, typically 15 to 16 a year, to the NCAA to exhibit institutional control.

On the Road

With a knowledge of the rules and a target list of recruits in hand, it’s time for coaches to home in on their targets. During approved periods, they can make home visits to prospects. Those visits happen in almost every type of socioeconomic setting imaginable.

“I’ve been in places where the family met me at the car and made sure I left before dark, and I’ve been in houses that were so immaculate I was afraid to touch anything,” Versyp says. “But the common thread is that these are usually incredible people who are proud of what their daughters have accomplished, and they relate to the family network we have in our program.”
Versyp emphasizes the four As during her visits:

Andreona Keys is a senior for the Boilermakers. She suffered an ACL injury as a junior at Roswell High School in Atlanta, which she says scared several schools away. But the Boilermaker staff stayed true in its pursuit.

“Purdue was the first big-name school to recruit me,” Keys says. “I remember Coach V sitting on my couch wearing a Big Ten championship ring. I could tell that she and the staff were interested in me as a person and not just a player, and that they had my best interests at heart.”

Women’s swimming and diving coach John Klinge (CE’94) also emphasizes the big picture during his recruiting visits. An All-American swimmer for the Boilermakers, Klinge points to the academic reputation of the school and the family atmosphere around his program.

“I swam here. So did my wife, our men’s team coach, his wife, and our director of operations. We think we can sell a culture here that is unique among programs,” Klinge says.

Come and See Us

Getting prospects to visit campus is a crucial element in the recruiting process. Recruits may take an unlimited amount of unofficial visits, other than during designated dead periods. They pay their own way and typically take the trips prior to their senior years.

Each recruit is also allowed five official on-campus visits to different colleges. The schools pay for the travel, lodging, entertainment, and food of the athletes, within specified guidelines. For football and basketball, travel and meal expenses may also be covered for parents. The visits may last no longer than 48 hours once the recruit arrives on campus, so frequently accommodations are made for an off-campus hotel for those arriving late at night to avoid the clock starting early on the visit.

Itineraries vary by sport, but in most cases the recruit will meet with an academic adviser, get a full tour of the campus and athletic facilities, and watch the team practice. Recruits also will have social time to spend with their prospective teammates.

Keys still remembers her team activity. “They took us to a haunted corn maze, and a lot of the tall girls on the team screamed a lot,” she says with a laugh.

Visits also can include photo opportunities, but within defined boundaries. Mitchell says schools are not allowed to “celebritize or publicize” a prospect’s official visit. So while the school may photograph a recruit wearing a jersey (which, by the way, the recruit is not allowed to keep), it can’t do anything with that photo unless the prospect signs with that school. If the recruit signs elsewhere, the pictures are never used by the school. A new rule change enacted in August does allow the institution to give the photo to the recruit.

How then, do these pictures make it to social media while an athlete is still on campus? The recruit is allowed to have a family member take a picture and post on his/her Twitter account. And the school can then retweet that posting. 

That’s just one of the many nuances surrounding social media and recruiting. For instance, a team’s coach can follow or friend a recruit on social media, but can’t type an athletically related post (e.g., good luck in tonight’s game) to that recruit. 

“We have a staff member who does a very good job educating our staff and athletes on what is and isn’t permissible on social media,” Mitchell says. “In general, we tell the coaches to click, not type.”

It’s customary for a recruit to have a current student-athlete as a host during an official on-campus visit. When Herrmann visited Indiana, his host was quarterback Scott Arnett.

During Herrmann’s freshman year, as he was walking off the field following an Old Oaken Bucket loss to IU in Bloomington in 1977, he felt someone grab him from behind.

“Scott was screaming at me that they were going to beat us the next three years, too,” Herrmann says. “I guess he didn’t take kindly to me turning down his school.”

Arnett was right about one thing. The next three years were a sweep — but in the Boilermakers’ favor. The 1980 Bucket win remains the highest-attended game in Ross-Ade Stadium history, with 71,629 on hand to see a thrilling 24–23 Purdue win.

Closing Time

Once the tweets and texts have been exchanged and the visits have been taken, it’s decision day. For Keys, the final choice came down to Purdue and Boston College.

“I made a visit to BC first, and I wasn’t really impressed. Once I came here, I was sold, and at the end of my visit I told Coach V I wanted to be a Boilermaker. We had a big hug in her office,” Keys says.

For Herrmann, the choice centered on fit and comfort. “I sat down with Jim Young and he showed me the system he had run at Arizona,” he says. “I was a pure dropback passer, and I couldn’t see myself fitting at a place like Alabama or Nebraska running the option.

“He told me that if I came to Purdue, they would build the offense around me. That, and the fact that I could play close to home, helped me make the decision. I thought I could come in and make a difference here, and it all worked out.”

Brohm likes hearing from recruits that they plan on attending, but he’s cognizant that nothing is official until they sign on the dotted line.

“We keep recruiting right through to signing day. It’s a daily pursuit, because other schools are always going to look to come in and take what you have. That’s why it’s so important to build a strong relationship with the athletes that you recruit. You want them to stay strong and loyal to you no matter who comes calling,” he says.

And for former standout athletes like Brohm, Versyp, and Klinge, the thrill of landing that coveted recruit helps fuel their fires.

“We’re competitive people,” Versyp says. “There’s not a better feeling than to spend years in the journey and chase to bring someone into the program and they say yes. You’ll usually see us jumping around in the office when it happens.” 

Tim Newton (LA’81) is the director of external relations and communications for the Krannert School of Management. He is also the play-by-play announcer for Purdue football and women’s basketball on the Learfield Purdue Sports Network.