Each year, along with its new class of first-year students, Wilfrid Laurier receives a new class of student athletes. These new recruits are brought in from all over the country to play for the Golden Hawks, and bringing them here is no small task. It involves a staggering amount of time, work and people.
โItโs really a non-stop process,โ said Patrick Crabbe, head of recruitment for Laurierโs football team.
โWe have a number of people who help us within our coaching staff. We go out and watch the Ontario Varsity Football League, the Ontario Football Conference and high school games.Weโre looking for guys who stand out. You tend to focus on the guys that you think are graduating the next spring, but Iโve got guys in my recruiting book now for 2011.โ
A prospective recruitโs final year โ or years โ in high school is a whirlwind of phone calls, e-mails and business cards, as recruiters canvass high school and junior leagues, trying to entice young athletes to play for their school. It culminates in a difficult decision for the players, who can be as young as 17.
โIt was a very tough decision,โ said Kitchener native, Candace Styles, who will play for Laurierโs womenโs hockey team this season. โI first talked to coach Rick [Osborne] when I was in grade 11 and I went on to talk to almost all the schools in the OUA. I really liked all of them, but I thought Laurier would be a perfect fit for me.โ
Scouting an incoming player is such an intensive process because often highly touted prospects can falter when they get to the next level. Therefore, in order to ensure that a talented high school player will be a success at the university level coaches and scouts need to watch players closely, sometimes for lengthy periods of time.
โOnce we pinpoint the players that weโre interested in, we try to watch them between eight and 12 times,โ said womenโs hockey head coach Rick Osborne. โWe get a chance to see them play in just about every situation, because we need to make sure we take the right player for our program.โ
Menโs basketball head coach Peter Campbell added, โSome players Iโve been watching since they were in grade 10. One guy weโre bringing in this year actually played in our spring camp when he was in grade eight and Iโve kept an eye on him since then.โ
With so much riding on these young players becoming an athletic success when they get to university, itโs easy to forget theyโre also under pressure to achieve academic success.
โWeโve got a lot of very good students on our team,โ said Crabbe. โA lot of our guys have tremendous averages in programs like kinesiology or business and we love to see that, because our number one priority is to make sure that every guy that plays for us leaves here with a degree.โ
Campbell, meanwhile, puts it quite simply, โTheyโre paying $15,000 to come to school, not to play basketball.โ
The student athletes also understand the importance of the academic aspect of their university experience. Osman Omar, a native of London, Ontario, who will join the menโs basketball team in September, said that the first thing that attracted him to Laurier was โthe academic side.โ
โThe kin[esiology] program has a great reputation. But I know itโs going to be a lot of work; Iโm definitely going to have to be more organized and use my time effectively,โ said Campbell.
Balancing schoolwork with a demanding athletic schedule is just one of the challenges these young men and women face as they enter university. They also experience the same huge adjustments that other first-years do as they transition into university life.
โBeing away from home will be tough,โ said Alex Anthony, who is coming to Laurierโs football team all the way from Victoria, B.C. โBut I have 70 new friends right away from football and I think meeting new people will really help me grow as a person.โ
Osborne shares a similar sentiment. โOur veterans take [the new recruits] under their wing right away,โ he said. โWithin a few weeks, they have 20 new best friends and are blending in perfectly.โ
While university will bring many challenges to first-year student athletes, it also brings a great deal of excitement.
โI canโt wait for that feeling of going to university,โ said Styles. โGoing away, being independent, meeting new people, itโll be incredible.โ