Newbie question

If a program doesn't fill the maximum amount of scholarships available for a year, does the amount not used carry over to the next year? I would think so but college football rules don't always make sense to me. Would've googled but I couldn't shorten search terms

 

Wait. What's your name again?

 

No, it's use-or-lose. Otherwise a team could really game the system by stockpiling a few a year and then going on a spree.

 

If I recall correctly, new scholarships are limited to 25/year (or a total of 50 during any two year period to allow some leeway). Often the deciding factor on how many scholarships are available is not the scholarships per year but the total of 85 on scholarship at any one time.

Early enrollees (admitted in January) can be counted against the previous year's total, so if only 20 scholarships are given in one year, up to 5 early enrollees can come in January of the next year and be counted against the the previous year's total. Again, I think 50 over a 2 year period is the limiting factor here.

For those who know better, please feel free to correct my faulty memory causing any misinformation here.

 

85 is the magic number. You can tweak numbers you recruit year to year, but the 85 players on scholarship remains. Unless there are players leaving this spring, this class is limited on numbers.

 

You can, however, do what a lot of schools do, and overbook on scholarships like airlines do on seats. Then after they've already been enrolled on campus and moved into their dorms, you suddenly tell the ones at the bottom they don't have a scholarship any more.

 

Seems to be two different answers here. One saying you lose the allocated scholarships and the other that you have up to 25 each year. Which one is it? I ask because it seems like at this point Herman should save more space for next year unless it's a stud or position of need, not that he gives a damn what I think but still.

 

Omniscient.one

 

I knew that!

 

Got Saban?

 

Let me start by saying the rules have changed over the last 5 years so this may not be gospel.

The scholarships are not lost and the numbers can be juggled in many ways.
85 is the max limit on active scholarships.
25 is max number that can be assigned to a year.

It used to be that if 25 were not used last season due to the 85 limit (say only 20 spots were available to reach 85) AND scholarship players leave the program before their eligibility is up, new players can be assigned to the newly vacated scholarships. Say 3 players transferred, you could conceivably add 25 for the new class plus fill 3 of the 5 spots unused from the previous season for 28 signees for the new year if the 85 limit allows.

I am not sure this is still valid based on this rule from the NCAA Manual:

13.9.2.3 Limitation on Number of National Letter of Intent/Offer of Financial Aid Signings—Bowl Subdivision Football. [FBS]
In bowl subdivision football, there shall be an annual limit of 25 on the number

of prospective student-athletes who may sign a National Letter of Intent or an institutional offer of financial
aid from December 1 through May 31. [D] (Adopted: 1/16/10 effective 8/1/10, Revised: 1/14/12 effective 8/1/12)


It appears to me that the old interpretation is still valid based on 15.5.6.3 which describes when a signee can be counted and to which year.

To limit this practice, a limit of 28 was put into effect for a class a few years ago but I can't find that rule. The intent appears to be to allow a team to maintain 85 scholarship players even with unexpected exits.

2016-2016 NCAA Manual: http://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/D117.pdf

Now add gray shirts who come in with a class but do not receive financial aid until the following year thus not counting against the 85 until they receive the aid. Or are those the blueshirts. Now add the walk-ons (hoping for possible future aid or just want to be part of the program) and preferred walk-ons (probable but not guaranteed to receive future aid). Don't forget the Greenshirts, the early enrollee guys that graduate HS early and come in for the Spring semester. Sheesh!

Bottom line is 85 total max scholarships, 25 max per year if 85 allows plus a few more to fill vacated scholarships spots.

UT has about 13-14 graduating scholarship players + 3 known early vacancies in Foreman, Locksley and another I can not remember + unannounced attrition. Think 16 to 20 is my guess. 14 verbal commits are known at this time. we'll know more in 13 days.

 

Backin the day this was not a problem.

 

Negged...

 

Also: Ships are for one year and are renewable. If a player is expendable or a problem usually there is a story about them transferring. The four year free ride does not exist.

 

That is technically correct, but I believe there was a movement a few years ago to allow schools to guarantee a minimum of 4 years either on a football scholarship or a "school" scholarship if the coach no longer wants the player. This was back when they also said the school was responsible of all medical bills if the player is injured.

Sabre or Godz probably can correct me.

 

Believe I remember hearing that and think we had someone that had an issue that prevented him from playing. Under those circumstances the young man would no longer be a player.

With a couple of exceptions Alabama has had 25 players listed on Rivals for the past ten years. When considering red shirts and extra years for injuries they must toss a very large number of players out the back door every year. At least compared to the average team. Of course they are well known for being the biggest over signer in the country.

 

Between this and the pro football style of organization w/ analyst, the "secret" to Saban's success?

 

Those aren't mutually exclusive. 85 is the most you can ever have at one time. If you only have 84 one year, you don't get to have 86 the next year.

Honestly with that restriction I'm not even sure why you need the limit on only adding 25 from one year to the next. If a team has enough guys graduate, leave early, and transfer that they only carry over 55, why not let them add 30 to get to 85?

 

New coach comes into a loosing program, cuts all the old coaches players and recruits 85 of his guys? I know that's extreme and unlikely but possible if you don't have a per year limit.

 

I thought these rules were aimed at trying to improve the graduation rates (or at least progress toward graduation) for college football players by encouraging college coaches to keep players around if the coaches wanted a full complement of players for their team.

 

Right. 85/25

 

The 85/25 is the hard 'n fast rule of schollies per year. And yet....

In 2015, Texas signed 27 players. It would have been 30 had TE Devonaire Clarington, WR Gilbert Johnson, and DT Du'Vonta Lampkin qualified for admittance.

In 2016, Texas signed 28 players all of whom made it in. Other schools exceed the 25/yr limit as well. So, what's the "catch?"

According to AthleticScholarships.net, there are legal ways around the limit:

Scholarship Rules
The NCAA has two basic scholarship limits: a limit on counters and a limit on equivalencies. It’s a bit circular, but a counter is a student-athlete who counts against scholarship limits. In equivalency sports, the scholarship limit is based on the total amount of athletic scholarships awarded to counters. In football, there is not just a limit on 85 scholarships per year, but also a limit on initial counters, that is athletes who are on scholarship for the first time. Initial counters are capped at 25.

Counters are normally any student-athlete who receives an athletic scholarship, partial or full. But in sports like football and basketball, counters also include any student-athlete who was recruited and who receives financial aid from the school. This is to prevent abuse by schools who might have “walk-ons” who were recruited then given “non-athletic” scholarships from the financial aid office.

In NCAA-speak, recruited does not mean what it normally means. A prospect is recruited for financial aid purposes if one of the following things happens:

• A coach has in-person contact with the prospect off-campus;
• The prospect takes an official visit to the campus; or
• The school sent the prospect a National Letter of Intent or other written athletic scholarship offer.

Because of this definition, there’s a lot of recruiting that can happen without a prospect being considered “recruited”:

• Coaches can evaluate prospects any number of times.
• Coaches can call prospects any number of times.
• Prospects can take unlimited unofficial visits to the campus.
• Coaches can make verbal scholarship offers to prospects.

So a prospect can be heavily recruited, in the traditional sense, without being considered recruited according to the NCAA.

Scholarships When No Scholarships Are Available
So if a school you’d like to play for has no scholarships available and simply walking on is not an option, how can you find a way onto the team? There’s a number of ways, both athletically and nonathletically related.

Non-Athletically Related Aid
In sports other than football and basketball, student-athletes who do not receive an athletic scholarship can receive non-athletically related aid without restriction. In football and basketball, to maximize the amount of non-athletic aid an athlete can receive, they must be non-recruited under the NCAA’s definition.

If an athlete is recruited and plays football or basketball, he or she may not receive institutional financial aid without becoming a counter and counting against the scholarship limits. Outside aid like federal Pell grants or state grants would be allowed, but the athlete could not receive any of the need and even academic aid a school offers.

To be a recruited athlete but still meet the definition of nonrecruited, athletes should focus their recruiting efforts with the coaching staff around phone calls and unofficial visits. If you let the coaching staff know you are interested in walking on provided you can get other aid, they will be careful to not change your status as recruited vs. nonrecruited.

Future Scholarships
Another option is to receive a scholarship later in your career. For many sports, that might mean walking on for a year before receiving an athletic scholarship. In football, the more common scenario is to walk on for two years rather than just one. The reason is after two years, a school can give an athletic scholarship to a walk-on without counting the scholarship against the limit of 25 initial counters, and instead count the scholarship against only the limit of 85 overall counters.

Counting in the Future
In football, an athlete generally counts as an initial counter in the academic year he first receives an athletic scholarship. The biggest exception is for midyear enrollees, where the school typically has some flexibility to push the initial counter back to the following year. But there is a rarer exception that could help athletes enrolling at any time.

An athlete can be put on scholarship and not be counted as an initial counter until the following year if:

• He was not recruited; and
• He signs the scholarship after the start of fall practice.

The athlete would count against the limit of 85 overall scholarships that year. But he would not count against the 25 initial counters until the following year. This can be a useful way to get a scholarship at a school which has run out of its initial counters for a year, but still have some of its 85 scholarships available.

These are not dirty tricks or cheating and athletes and schools should not think of them that way. They are ways to allow athletes to participate on the teams they want and still get help paying for their education even though a team has hit the scholarship limit for a certain year. And they are open to be used by schools [that] are facing scholarship reductions.

 

Whew, more angles to the scholarship game tan I was aware of. You need a legal staff to assist with recruiting.

 

Re: scholarship "renewal"

They are all a 1-year "contract" of sorts. They have to be renewed every year. Every player has to re-sign his grant or scholarship paperwork every year. As a previous poster stated, there is no 4-year athletic scholarship. A coach can decide to pull your scholarship, decrease your scholarship money, or increase your scholarship money (if not already a full ride) as he/she sees fit (and usually with the approval of the AD). But "pulling" a scholarship (i.e. not renewing an annual scholarship) is rarely done, as it would create a poo-storm of bad PR and would definitely hurt future recruiting efforts.

 

Never imagined that complexity. I was asking only because I hope Herman doesn't settle in this class and take away scholarships for what I hope will be a more attractive program at the end of next year. But then again he knows much more than me (yes, I know this is ironic given my user name, which btw is meant to be facetious).