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Athletic Goals: Playing Club or Travel Basketball
Some parents will remember the days when college basketball opportunities were earned entirely in the high school gym. The college basketball recruiting process has changed significantly since those days, and playing club basketball is now a critical part of the recruiting process.
Spring and Summer Events
College coaches are allowed to evaluate players at tournaments and competitions during designated Evaluation Periods. In general, you'll find JUCO, NAIA and NCAA Division II and III coaches attending high profile events in April and July, while NCAA Division I coaches attend these events in July only. Naturally, it is convenient for coaches to be able to see multiple potential recruits at one multi-day event. Consequently, these events have become very important in the recruiting process.
Teams that play at these events are interchangeably called club basketball teams, travel basketball teams or AAU basketball teams. Try-outs for club teams are competitive and players on the team tend to be among the top high school players in the area. Some teams participate in events sanctioned by AAU (the Amateur Athletic Union), including a well-attended national AAU event, but many, if not most, events attended by college coaches are not AAU-sanctioned.
Each year in late spring, NCAA publishes a list of certified events that can be attended by Division I college coaches. This list is updated as applications are received and processed for events. You can generally find this list by using Google to search "NCAA basketball certified events". The summer 2010 certifed event list is found here.
Selecting A Club Team
If you are not familiar with club basketball teams in your area, visit rivals.com and look for the rivals preps website for your state. In other words, californiapreps.rivals.com covers club basketball events in California while mdhigh.rivals.com covers club basketball activities for the state of Maryland. On the basketball recruiting pages, you may find articles about events, players and teams in your area. You may also find club teams but looking at the list of teams that are registered at the national AAU events or high profile events held in Las Vegas during July.
Club teams are currently facing a number of criticisms and its useful to understand these criticism in choosing a club team.....