THE US EXODUS - Any Opinions?

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Obviously, the exposure that the student athlete receives down south is to their advantage. The interesting aspect is how come the US schools are now finding Canadians attractive.

To that I have three thoughts on how this came about:

1) Clearinghouse Changes:

The core course component is tough for Canadian students to obtain if they have started planning on taking the correct level right away. There's little time to catch up - and it's even worse now that a fifth year of school will only count towards one credit. By going down south, students can reclassify and gain an extra year of eligibility while playing in a "basketball focused" environment with the added exposure of playing with elite programs.

What does the US school gain? They can have a player who is a year older than his grade, with more size and polish. (See - Olu, Tristan, even Junior and Myck) Once that player becomes a senior, he's essentially a fifth year high schooler, without the stigma, and the student gets the clearance! It's a win-win!

2) Growth of OBA/Raptors

It's great to see our minor club system develop and provide strong training and a court-basketball programs. Even without this, check your streets - no more street hockey - it's hoops in driveways and in the school-yards. The demand has been developed to grow the leagues and develop kids as young as 6 and 7. In turn, a new generation of coaches and basketball supporters who grew up in a basketball friendly environment over the past 13 years are now bringing up a new generation into our communities. Wait until the LTAD programs really take shape at the club level. . . . Then we'll really see that exodus take place!

What does the US school gain? Better training and kids who play team ball - not just street.

3) Deal or No Deal!

Grassroots Canada has done a tremendous job showcasing our youth in the states. While many people have varying opinions about Ro, there's no doubt that he was the pioneer in the current wave of players going down south. Since CIA Bounce became more active last summer, we're now doubling the exposure and opportunities for players to be seen at major tournaments. With more kids seeing this success and the allure of getting a free education one day are taking the bait.

What does the US school gain? Fresh meat. . . . (See above for Grade Quality) but really, being offered an opportunity to go to a prep school doesn't equate to an opportunity to gain exposure and actual real playing time. Remember, these programs first serve themselves, the student athlete second. Over the past two years alone, Junior C, Jason C and Cristian K. have become part of the American system - where you may not be at the same school during your time down south. Again, these decisions are both impacted by both the player's needs and the reality of their school situation. Nonetheless, going down south turns players into commodities - certainly something that is not the “norm” in Canada.

I agree with the analysis provided by the original poster. Some of these kids are getting bad advice. The dislocation and disruption they suffer from moving and changing school systems really can't be justified in some of these cases. I suspect there are also major financial costs.

Yes, I can understand a young person trying to better position him or herself for a four year scholarship at a university, so it is not always a poor career choice to make a move to a US prep school. But we've also seen some of these guys bounce around from prep school to junior college and then out of basketball.

I think that in any of these cases where they guys don't end up completing university it can be adjudged as a failure of sorts.

The motivation to face better competition and to get more exposure is alluring. However, some of these players need to be realistic and would be better off staying at home. That is where good advice from parents and existing coaches and teachers can come in -- if the young person wants to listen.

The characterization of players as 'fresh meat' for the system also is troublesome.

If a player with a legitimate shot at a division one scholarship moves to get better competition, facilities and coaching a move to a prep school might be justified in some cases. But no young person should, in an ideal world, be moving anywhere to try to find an easier academic situation. It is the academic training they receive that most of them will be using in the work world, not the basketball skills they obtain.

I fully agree with Observer....

I also find it interesting that the only scholarship that is really being pushed is a sports scholarship. Is an academic scholarship too hard to work toward? It is amazing if a lot of these kids spend as much time and focus on their academics as they do in basketball what kind of options will be available to them.

Which makes me wonder what is truly the real reason for going to the States? To ultimately get a scholarship so that they can get a free education to be prepared for the work or "real" world? Or is it fame? Yes there is excellent basketball training and exposure (that is just a tool to getting a scholarship). If is truly academics why do some kids keep bouncing around from junior colleges, schools, etc if they really want an education. Why are they looking to get into the D1 schools when they can get scholarships at other levels or even in Canada (I know sometimes some scholarships are partial)? Better education or to be in the lime light? What happens if you get injured or did not focus on academics where does that leave you?

I think it is a great opportunity to be able to play ball at a higher level and get your education paid for. I have no problem with using your talent (brains, basketball, music, other sports) to get a scholarship if it is for the ultimate goal of academics and academics is put first.

Don't get me wrong playing against more and better competition and high level training will do good for Canada in the long run in athletics but academics should always be the ultimate reason for seeking a scholarship or going to prep school. Basketball as mentioned before is a crutch to get you there. Only a few get to make basketball a career. Parents and coaches need to reinforce this.

Hey I agree with a lot of your points, however, majority of these kids that go down south need a change of environment. Majority of the kids who have gone south from our program were in some tough situations either at home or at school they were attending and they needed change in order to have some chance at succeeding in post secondary school. Please also keep in mind that a lot of the kids and parents are the ones who want their child to take these opportunities and to be honest I can’t blame them. Right now if you haven’t noticed many youth are struggling to succeed in our education system for various reasons (that’s a whole new topic…. black focused schools etc. we can talk on that another time) which we can discuss another time. All these guys are doing really well at the moment in the classroom and I hope they keep it up. I’m not saying Canada can’t get it done but for majority of these guys it wasn’t happening for whatever reason. And as long as the kid and their parents are happy I don’t see what the problem is.

As far as the eligibility requirements go, we as a program are completely aware of the rule and so are the schools they are attending and as long as they get there 15 cores in the required time (4 years) they will be ok and they can take or upgrade for there 16th in there last year. So yes they may be reclassed but they still have to meet the four-year requirements and both the respected schools and ourselves are perfectly aware of it. What I think needs to happen is our High Schools need to become aware of it and maybe we might have more guys that qualify and or not running around last minute trying to get qualified.

In regards to surrounding yourself around people who will give good advice…….is that you????? Please, most of the folks in our program are teachers or managers of companies making enough money to survive and understand the importance of education!!! So please, instead of crying about the fact that kids are leaving and pointing fingers at people ask yourself the question WHY????????? And when you’re finished with that question ask yourself another one WHAT CAN WE DO TO FIX IT??? This needs to be your focus and not trying to hate on kids and coaches who feel they are giving them another option. As for the kids being treated as meat…….we have coaches here in Canada that do the same thing example letting kids play while a child is failing or getting 50% average and the coach still lets him play and when the season is done, now the coach is putting his foot down come on please… or coaches here trying to make a name for themselves by using the kids……come on it happens all over the world.

There is systemic challenges that need to be addressed in our schooling system. As an educator, I welcome the desire for the NCAA to say if you wish to be a student athlete at this level - you need to achieve a certain level in the classroom. I'm saddened that the proper academic preparation is not always provided for young athletes at the proper time. Moreover, there are still those students who don't want to embrace the warnings and take little care in preparing themselves academically - let alone enroll in the courses that will allow them to keep doors open whether be in the US or Canada even.

If more of our schools in Canada ran "programs" whereby the student athlete has the opportunity to grow and thrive both on the court and in the classroom, we wouldn't be addressing this thread. Take Eastern as an example - having 3 students receive scholarships last year is remarkable. Moreover, many of their players earn their diplomas with the opportunity to move onto the post-secondary level that fits their needs. I think we need to be celebrating the kids like Alex Hill (going Ivy League) and even kids like Reynold Walters and Kingsley Costain who were able to get the most out of themselves academically and athletically to parlay their craft into a free education.

The "Fresh Meat" connotation was meant as no disrespect to our boys, but rather a concern over the American Preparatory school system inequities in academic/athletic priorities. I agree, this is still a problem here in Canada, but our schools should be embracing the opportunity to make change and cultivate the homegrown talent - particularly in the face of these stringent measures set forth by the NCAA.

Canadianhoopsfan,

I understand where you are coming from, but, in my opinion you can't paint every individual with the same brush. Yes, there are some kids that may be leaving for some of the wrong reasons that you started in your initial argument. Now, there are players in the GTA who are better off leaving because they don't have the necessary family support, academic support and proper training. They are actually better served leaving familiar surrounds and going elsewhere to find the structure, discipline and support that is lacking in their own home or life in general. It is a complicated issue. In my opinion, you're focusing on area. Some guys are leaving for reasons such as increased exposure, better competition or an easier curriculum which will enable them to pass throught the NCAA Clearinghouse. Many others are just taking advantage of the opportunity to play against the best competition. They are capable students and mature beyond their years. People strive for the best and sometimes those opportunities are not here in Canada.

Great discussion! It is certainly a personal decision and most people in life make their share of good decisions and bad decisions. The one thing I fail to see on this site is the promotion of Canadian College (CCAA) and University (CIS) basketball. Unfortunately we get inundated with US media and so our kids tend to see only the NCAA. Not to suggest for a minute that CCAA or CIS are better (even comparable) than the top level of D1 NCAA ball but I certainly will suggest that the top 20 CIS teams would compete very well with the mid majors in D1. Perhaps with the new CBC spors channel that is required to show primarily amateur sport we will see more CIS and CCAA basketball. But I suggest to the kids in Toronto in grade 7 - 12 go to Ryerson, U of T and York for CIS and Humber and Centennial to take in a game or two and you may be pretty impressed at the level of play. You can proably get in for $5 to $10 or your High School Coach may have a connection for a one time pass.

Here's a challenge for the High School coaches ... take your Junior and Senior teams to at least one CCAA or CIS game in 2008/09.

In Ontario the Universities are now permitted to provide up to $3,500 for athletics as long as you achieve an 80% grade 12 average. In addition you can get academic scolarships of $1,000 upward if you achieve 80%. Tuition and books will run you $5,000 - $7,000 for general arts programs, so if you live at home you'll have more than 70% of your costs covered. Most coaches will also assist you to find a summer job to earn the rest of the money you require.

Out of all the Canadian High School players that graduated across the country in the past 5 years maybe 50 are playing in the US. There are probably 500 playing in Canada. Your odds are probably greater to play in Canada.

This doesn't even touch on the quality of your education.

Let's promote Canadian !!!

Anyone who feels it is wrong for kids to go south should offer a better solution that personally meets the needs of the individuals choosing to leave. In life you have to take risks to gain rewards. It is better they explore the opportunity to try and making it in a tougher situation than to be too scared to try. If it doesn't work out it is not as if they will be exiled from Canada. To the point that the top CIS schools could compete with mid major D1 schools, I will believe when I see it. I would like to see CIS schools play the Canadian college schools first.

We are all citizens of the world. If there are better opportunities anywhere in the world we should not be afraid to try it. It is not about patriotism. It is about trying to compete with the best and getting an opportunity to get to the highest level. The odds are slight but definitely worth pursuing.

BBWorld seems to be in a very small world. If you are a Cdn, you are a Cdn. There about 90 Cdn in NCAA I and another 20 in II. CIS is not NCAA I, UBC and some others were looking at joining NCAA II. Simon Fraser when it had a national recruiting was NAIA! Last year after the real season started (late Oct) was NCAA I 16 vs CIS 1; NCAA II 4 vs CIS 1; III was NCAA 4 vs 1 CIS win; NAIA 17 wins, CIS 5 wins. On bashing US colleges I believe the 6 playing in the Ivy League are okay? Don't forget about Thompson River U, Trinity Western U, Lethbridge, U of Winnipeg, etc. Sounds similar to the people who critized Steve Nash for going to Santa Clara, rather than Simon Fraser!

I agree with "winordie" wholeheartedly. The scholarship acquisition process is much more complex and diverse than most people think. For some it is simply matter of finance. I got recruited to go to University of Toronto, York University and Western University. However, my average is 77.5 % so it not enought to get some academic money or athletic money in my first year. I have 10 American schools offering to pay my tuition, room and books. I only had to pay board. If you do the math, it is much cheaper to go to school in the US....No OSAP loans, No working two or three jobs to pay for school, no second mortgage or anything like that. THe Canadian schools could not offer me anything and the American schools are covering 80% of my school expenses. The Canadian schools are telling don't go to the STATES but are not offering anything really worthwhile. NOW WHAT DO YOU EXPECT THAT MOST STUDENT ATHLETES WOULD DO? Pay for school or take the scholarship. I took the scholarship...got a good education and graduated debt free allowing me to get a good start in life.

Some want the opportunity to play against the best competition out there. People want to strive to be the best and unfortunately the best basketball players are not here in CANADA. Just like Russians, Swedes, Americans and Finnish people come here to play hockey. Others need a change of scenery because they been surrounded by a lot of negativity and come from a bad neighborhood or household. That scholarship serves as a way out that situation. Like I said, it is complicated. I'm not anti-Canada, however, I am pro-choice.

I'm new to this site but this is a great discussion. I believe that as long as the athlete, parents, and coaches do their homework nothing is wrong with going to the States - if it is a good fit. I played at a couple of CIS schools while my brother got a full ride to an American school. I got to see both sides and we each had a great experience. One thing that I did notice about the States was the support of the alumni. If you go there, work hard, be a good person and student there is a good chance that some alumni will hire you once you graduate. I'm not saying that there aren't good alumni in Canada but it just seemed to me that they take more of an interest down south. I know this probably won't change any minds on this discussion but I just wanted to put this point out there.

I have some concerns about what Bounce CIA has posted. The first (and perhaps least significant) concern is with the two questions you pose ("why are the kids leaving" and "what can we do to fix it?"). You start out by saying that there is no problem because the kids you send south are happy and so are their parents, but now you want us to ask what we can do to fix it??? If there is no problem, then what do we have to fix? I get the feeling that you at least recognize that there is a problem and that perhaps there is something we can do to fix it???

More importantly, however, I do not think that your justification (perhaps rationalization would be a better term?) for treating kids as meat really holds any weight. Just because we have coaches here in Canada treating kids as meat as you suggest, does not make sending them south so they can be treated as meat okay. Should we not be looking at alternatives and better ways to treat our elite basketball players then as meat here or in the U.S.? By saying "come on it happens all over the world" really scares me as a parent, coach, and educator. Many things happen all over the world that I would not wish on my worst enemy. It does not make it right, it just reinforces how big of a problem it is. So, if we are sending our kids to the U.S. and they are being treated as pieces of meat (as you seem to condone), then perhaps our focus should be doing whatever we can to protect these young men from these vultures in Canada and the US and not legitimizing it because it is "what happens all over the world".

Having said all of this, I am not against kids pursuing opportunity. I do believe, however, that they need to do so realistically, with good guidance and support, and with a legitimate opportunity to be successful. We read a lot on this forum about people from such and such a school or club team going to the States and we celebrate that achievement and I believe that we should celebrate it. However it seems, at times, that people are boosting their club, school, or what have you rather than that player's accomplishments. I think that it is great that these programs provide players with opportunities to participate and be successful (isn't that what sports are all about?). Still, we need to remember that in the end it is the player's talent, work ethic, and drive that got him to succeed and that the program was more about the experience, opportunity, and enjoyment for the player and not the reason for his success. Remember, it is the player with the above mentioned qualities that is achieving success and not the program from which he came. We all want successful programs, but a successful program is not one that sends the most players to US colleges. It is one that provides opportunities, a quality experience that players will remember for the rest of their lives, and a fun and exciting atmosphere to play a sport that we all enjoy.

I think there are a couple of situations being discussed here and the issues and implications are somewhat different in my mind.

If a young person who is in his or her last year of high school is recruited by a US university or junior college for an athletic scholarship, I agree that he or she should make a reasoned decision as to whether an offer is in his or her best interest athletically and more importantly academically. In many cases you can make the case that it can be a good decision to accept a Division One (or Two) scholarhship which can permit the young person the opportunity to complete a degree without accumulating substantial debt. In this case we are dealing with a decision about what *post secondary* institution to attend *after* graduation from high school.

I distinguish between this situation and that of a young person who has *not yet finished* high school and who is recruited to go to another high school in another location (or another country) to play basketball in order to better position him or herself for a potential future scholarship at a university. And he or she is also usually recruited there because it is expected that he or she will help that team win more games. There are some differences here. First, you are often dealing with a younger person. Second, you are interrupting the high school learning continuum for what is generally a non academic reason. I think these situations may need closer scrutiny and may not always be in the best interests of the student athlete.

Ideally, I think it is usually preferable for a young person to finish high school at his or her local school in his or her local community with their family and other support systems around them. There may be some cases where this is not in the student athlete's best interest but I think a very strong case would have to be made to justify them.

As a case study, I remember that kid Sokoloski (seven foot six) who left one high school for another GTA high school after grade 11, was declared ineligible there, then went to a prep school in the US, declared himself for the NBA draft after high school, then couldn't play college ball, and was never drafted.

I can't think that in retrospect that all of those moves can really be seen as having been good ones. Yet undoubtedly some people told him that at least some of the moves (which first occurred when this fellow was 16 or 17 years of age) were in his best interest. He probably would have been better to have stayed at his original high school. But the allure of different coaching, different competition, more exposure etc. was just too great.

I don't think that his is a unique case. There are others, but we need not go through them here.

For some of these kids it works out well and they land a D-1 scholarship after a year at a prep school. However, these other types of cases, which don't work out so well, also need to be considered when sorting through the issues we are discussing.

We can intellectualize this issue all we want but the bottom line is this is an opportunity where kids in these prep schools get specialized training, smaller classrooms and network of people who love, respect and promote basketball. Most of programs put extreme pressure on the kids to get good marks or they lose their scholarship. There are diploma mills out there and tthere is corruption but that is not exclusive to basketball. This talk about treating kids as meat is a rank overdramatization. There is not a lineup of US recruiters/coaches handing out cash to Canadian talent for Canadian talent.
They are also right in the mix so less talented kids get an opportunity to get University scholarships they would have no chance get here because they would not get noticed or have the network of people looking out for them. Even if everyone of our best kids left to play in the US the only ones who would miss them is us, the small community of hoop fiends. Trust me no one else would care because they don't play hockey.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that kids shouldn't persue the NCAA if that is what they want to do. If that is your dream try to live the dream. What I am suggesting is that the Canadian alternatives should be promoted and the CIS and CCAA athletes should be congratulated and celebrated for their accomplishments. If a kid in grade 9 or 10 knows that 80% is the entry level for a scholarship that is a worthy goal to shoot for. We've all seen too many excellent basketball players falter because they didn't have an adequate education and weren't prepared by their parents/ mentors/ coaches for the SAT's and or GPA. Yes the Ivy league schools are excellent and there are many other excellent US academic institutions. It's not a competition between Canada and the US it's about giving our kids the opportunity to better prepare for the future.

There are a few statistics bandied about in this discussion. I don't have access to these stats but perhaps someone can tell us. In the past ten years how many Canadian males went to D1 or D2 schools on basketball scholarships? How many came back to Canada after their first or second year? How many averaged more than 10 minutes playing time? How many graduated?

Of course the other alternative if you want to be a pro basketball player is skip Canada and the US entirely and skip over to Europe and check in with a pro program... you can do this as young as 14 I believe. This is more akin to the Candian hockey experience pre '68

This may be the best discussion I have seen on this site. Good comments and opinions from all sides. Much better than the "who's better than who, tom, dick or harry" debates.
Everyone's is different and certain situations that are better for some may not work out for others. One concern is these very young people away from their families.
Not getting a scholarship is not the end of the world. also doesn't mean you are not an amazing player. I just hope things works out for all.