Recruiting

It is 12pm on a saturday and I am sitting in the NSU press box entertaining guest. But these just aren't any guest, they are recruits looking to come to NSU and run run track/cross country. Recruiting is when a coach contacts high school seniors and tries to pursuade them to attend their program. I asked my coach what was the hardest part of recruiting and he replied with "making phone calls". He told me how some nights he will call up to fifty recruits to get their attention on NSU's program. As the recruits came in for their visit to NSU they were greated by the coaching staff and current athletes on the team. Coach had ordered about what looked like thirty pizza's and who knows how many drinks for the recruits to enjoy. After all the recruits received all their food they sat at a large table with me and my fellow athletes. We had to try and entertain the recruits and answer all their questions. After we ate it was our coaches turn to try and awe the recruits with his coaching philosophy. Coach began talking about every little detail that goes witht the program, from weight training to the type of snacks given out on meet days. Observing this whole recruiting day amazed me that coaching entails so much more than just coaching. The coach has to be a good salesman if he wants to land good athletes. I could tell my coach was stressed the whole day by how he kept going through his notes. Thats when I realized coaching is only a percentage of what the job is made up of. I could tell by how stressed he was that this was very important.

Everyday I go to track practice but I have never really noticed what my coach goes through to run the team. I am studying the subculture of coaches to see what the up and downs are of being a college coach. Yesterday at 3:30 I was at practice when my coach walked up wearing his usual khaki shorts with a blue and white colar shirt sporting an NSU logo. He had already made our workouts for the whole week, something he does sunday night before every week. When he met up with us we were standing behind the Unviersity Center and he gave his usual speech of everyday matters and get the most out of each workout. One thing I do seem to notice about coach is that he seems to be stressed a lot, which I can understand when he is just one person trying to coach 55 other athletes. I wanted to get away from my coach and observe a coach of a different team that was in action. That is when I decided to watch the men's basketball team in action at 7:30 against Palm Beach Atlantic. Gary Tuell is the head coach for the Sharks. I could hear the coach encouraging his team as soon as they came on the floor just for warm-ups. I could see the highs and lows a coach goes through during a game as coach Tuell was walking up and down the sideline coaching his team either in fustration or encouragement. At the end of the game NSU pulled out an 76-68 victory the ended with the both coaches on each team shaking hands. I will continue to try and get more in depth of what a coaches job consist of not only at practice or during competiton, but what they are doing in their offices and away from the sport.

My Blog

Hello everyone, this will be my first time ever using a blog so I hope it is not a total disaster. My blog will consist of observations I collect on the subculture I choose to study throughout the semester. Hope you enjoy!