To see or not to see: camps face changes

Sporting News, The, Oct 13, 1997 by Mike DeCourcy

He spent less than a week at the Nike All-American Camp, but of all the hours he has played and practiced the game, Jeff Boschee calls it "probably the best experience, basketball-wise, of my life."

A 6-1 senior guard at Valley City High in North Dakota, he arrived at Nike with almost no reputation and left as the point guard Kansas dearly wanted.

Boschee knows he owes his future with the Jayhawks to the Nike camp and wants other players in his circumstance to get the same opportunity. But who asked him? Well, we did, obviously, but the people who run the game aren't as interested in the opinions of those who play it.

An influential group of athletic administrators--increasingly aware that shoe companies, camp operators and unqualified or unscrupulous amateur coaches have turned recruiting into more of a cesspool than it already was--drafted a proposal to shift the focus toward evaluating talent in high school and junior college competition, and in regional camps to be run by USA Basketball.

The National Association of Basketball Coaches adopted a six-point plan for changes in the recruiting calendar, including shifting the early signing date from November to approximately mid-December. This would give coaches time to watch prospects play for school teams. Others want to eliminate summer recruiting and early signing altogether.

All this will be considered at the October meeting of the NCAA Management Council, although action is still several months away.

There appear to be some good ideas in these proposals, but remember, the growth of the club/camp recruiting structure was fueled by NCAA and high school regulations.

Players joined amateur teams after their high school coaches were ordered to stop coaching players outside of the high school season. The summer evaluation period was created so NCAA schools could save costs, with more players collected in 10 or 20 places instead of scattered across the country. The early signing period shifted the emphasis for recruits to what they did in the summer.

"I think the summer has grown more complex and over the past couple years has really heated up," says Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany, a member of the panel that pro posed the changes. "A lot of people have contributed to an environment that is a maze of conflicts of interest and very unhealthy."

There is no question he is right. More players are joining teams offering glamorous trips and free equipment, or more. Shoe companies changed their attitudes toward elite players they invited to camp, attempting to ensure that those who turn pro out of high school sign endorsement contracts.

But simply removing the college coaches from these events may not eliminate them. Players are almost desperate to be seen and properly evaluated, with the value of college scholarships racing past six figures and pro contracts into nine digits. They'll still play for clubs and attend camps, if only for the benefit of recruiting analysts whose ratings will be that much more precious to college coaches.

Boschee also played in five major summer tournaments, and his only complaint was being too exhausted to play in a sixth. He says he saw nothing unseemly and found, firsthand, the positives of summer recruiting.

He averaged 27 points per game as a high school junior, and that, combined with his play with the Minnesota STREETS club team, got him on some recruiting lists. But it was not until he showed up at Nike that major schools got excited.

The summer recruiting period was similarly beneficial for such players as center Terry Rogers of East High in Memphis, who proved he was one of the nation's top big men, and Anthony Glover of New York's Rice High, who suggested he was not just a 6-4 power forward, but a 6-4 power forward who could play with the best.

"It's going to be so much harder for college coaches to find players who aren't big names," Boschee says.

Mike DeCourcy covers college basketball for the Cincinnati Enquirer. E-mail him at decourcy@sportingnews.com and see his responses at www.sportingnews.com our AOL site (keyword: TSN).