LSC Coaches Recruit Athletes That Fit the Best

Blurb: The road to college athletic success starts well before the season does. Coaches all over the country attempt to recruit athletes to better their teams, academics and campuses.

Story:
“Great players make good coaches great,” said Vincent Maloney, the Lyndon State women’s basketball coach. And in order to find those great players coaches need to look for them through recruiting.

College coaches span quite the radius around their school looking for interested athletes. At Lyndon, it's about 100 miles, but some coaches go all over the Northeast looking for the best athletes to make their teams better.

When recruiting, the coaches like to sell the area: the mountains and the outdoor activities attract college athletes and adventurists.

Joe Krupinski, the men's basketball coach at LSC tries to sell the improvement of the team he/she will be playing on. He tells his recruits “you can be a building block in turning this around.”

“Recruiting is the life’s blood of your program,” said Bill Johnson, Lyndon’s sports information director, who coached basketball for 28 years before coming to Lyndon.

Unfortunately, Lyndon State doesn't quite have the budget to offer scholarships and it certainly doesn't have the budget to pay many recruiting coaches who can travel nationwide. However, networking proves to be quite helpful when convincing athletes to step through Lyndon's doors. Chris Ummer, Lyndon's athletic director, used a local summer camp to recruit players.

“Bringing in solid athletes to make the program stronger, builds the team and helps the campus as well,” is how Maloney sums up recruiting.

While Krupinski puts it into one sentence,“It is about finding your niche and finding guys who are a good fit at your school and your level.”