5 More D1 Opportunities within 24 Hours: The Power of Reworked Highlight Film

Open Letter From a Former Championship NCAA D1 College Coach/Recruiting Coordinator

I’d like to give you information that can transform your recruiting journey.

There are fundamental truths to the recruiting process that will never change.

1) On most occasions, you have 10-30 seconds to impress a coach with your film before it gets closed.

Brutal? No.

Coaches get so many emails added onto their daily responsibilities, they have to sort through them quickly.

2) There are quality college coaches and not quality college coaches.

But, let’s focus on truth #3 since you have probably already heard this.

3) There are skills that are position specific that are more important than other skills.

It is called a priority checklist in your job description. Let’s take a look at the setter priority checklist:

1. Setting

2. Defense

3. Serving

4. Blocking

If you have a setter that cannot locate a ball, specifically to the outside and opp hitters (who are the most important players on the court due to volume of attempts) you will NEVER win consistently at a high level.

Never.

You simply will not succeed in your conference let alone win a championship without a setter that consistently sets pin hitters that are great attackers.

You have a friend who disagrees with this? Feel free to reach me at davidbeckvolleyballcoaching@gmail.com and we will review the box score from your friends matches and film.

A setter that can’t set an outside in a perfect pass, or clean up bad passes to their hitters is the equivalent of:

1. A heart surgeon who can clean their hands, prep for surgery, motivate the team, get to the table, but can’t operate on the heart.

2. A garbage man who wakes up early, clocks in, drives the truck to your house, but is unable to pickup the trash. You know, the most important thing.

Now, you can play a middle tier club national bracket and pass decent and set your star middle over and over again and have a nice season. But that’s not college volleyball.

Fundamental truths and position specific priority checklists come to light more and more the higher level you go with small deviations around the fringes.

Now, quality college coaches will disagree on the fringes, where to order serving, and blocking for example, depending on their system too.

To each their own.

But, as soon as the fringes become the first priority (and god forbid you’re not even good at the fringes and that’s your first clips in a highlight film – you get closed out) that coach creeps into not quality, and for some, barrels into non quality status.

Example we all know – “I need a tall setter who can block!”

I cannot tell you how many setters I have looked at that are tall and can “block” but cannot set an outside hitter to save their life.

No good. You’re off the list. Why risk the fate of the college program?

Coaches need to do their job and train, but some skills are better off being recruited than trained and hoping you get better at the very thing that gives a team an opportunity for success.

It's not that there isn’t a college coach who won’t take you if you’re a setter who can’t set a pin. Maybe they’re the best setter trainer in the world, maybe they are hubristic (usually hubristic). But we are focused on gaining the attention of the majority of quality college coaches – isn’t that who you want to play for anyway?

I recently reworked an opposite’s highlight film into a feature film.

We included the collegiate level plays only, in order of the priority checklist for an opposites job description.

Within 24 hours, she had:

5 NCAA D1 programs, including a NCAA Tournament team she had been previously emailing with no response get back to her with various responses of requesting a phone call, say they’re coming by her court to watch, and camp invites.

Now it is up to her and her team to go perform when it counts.

I am so happy for them. I am hoping more come in once the weekend is up.

Actually as I write this post a 6th school has reached out about a phone call. Awesome.

Will reworking your highlight film give you 5+ more D1 opportunities? That depends on your current talent, approach touch, etc.

She is a D1 talent that needed help in this part of the process.

Maybe you are a mid D3 talent level, but a poor highlight film is diminishing your opportunities at that level. You have to shoot in your current range and possibly adjust along the way on your list depending on feedback you get or don’t get and be open to other opportunities.

Takeaways?

Sometimes the recruiting process is not about patience, sometimes it is about getting your hands on better guidance.

Maybe your best plays are buried in the 1:30 mark of your Hudl page 3 pages down that 99.99% of college coaches won’t take the time to sift through.

Maybe your film is out of order or maybe you are putting plays that aren’t collegiately appropriate and you need help. Maybe no one at your club can help you or say they can but are just winging it themselves.

Note* It is dishonest to say a reworked highlight film will guarantee more opportunities. Maybe yours is already fantastic (few are). However, it is part of the holistic process in college recruiting that demands execution at a high level to solicit more opportunities along your journey to commitment and get your foot in the door with programs. I hope you enjoyed.