Back in September 2012, the NCAA issued an interpretation that a team which was not organized under the auspices of a scholastic governing body was considered a nonscholastic team. This included many postgraduate institutions and prep schools. This fall coaches were told Findlay Prep and Huntington Prep were not scholastic teams. As a result, men’s basketball coaches could not evaluate those teams during most recruiting periods. Attaching the nonscholastic designation to a football team is even more restrictive since FBS football coaches have no nonscholastic recruiting periods like basketball’s certified events.
Under the new interpretation, there are now two ways for a team to qualify as a scholastic team:
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A team which is affiliated with a secondary institution and includes only students at that institution is a scholastic team regardless of whether it is under a scholastic governing body. If a team does not meet those requirements, like a team of home-schooled students for instance, it can still be considered a scholastic team if it operates under a scholastic governing body.
This gives much more flexibility to Findlay Prep, Huntington Prep, Prime Prep, and other secondary institutions in how they administer their teams. They no longer need to be part of the state high school athletics association, which frees them up to play national schedules and invitational tournaments. This should free coaches up to evaluate at those events as well, along with practices and other organized activities like open gyms.
John Infante, who writes for the Bylaw Blog, is a Sporting News contributor. Follow Infante on Twitter: @John_Infante and @bylawblog.
