Guides

Division III offers no athletic scholarships, admission is decided by the admissions office alone, and the coach's job is to advocate for your child — not to guarantee a spot.

A pre-read is a preliminary assessment, made before your child applies, of whether the admissions office considers them a viable candidate — but a positive result is not a guarantee of admission.

To compete at an NCAA Division I or II school, your child must complete a set number of core courses in specific subjects, earn a minimum core-course GPA calculated on a 4.0 scale, and — as of January 2023 — no standardized test score is required by the NCAA for initial eligibility.

Each term has a specific NCAA definition that affects what your child is being offered and what either side is actually obligated to do.

When your child notifies their school they want to transfer, the school enters their name in the NCAA's centralized database — the Transfer Portal — which signals to other programs that your child is available and opens the door to contact from coaches; in 2024-25, roughly two-thirds of Division I athletes who entered the portal ended up at a new NCAA school.

Division I men's basketball has four named recruiting periods — recruiting, evaluation, quiet, and dead — and each one sets different limits on when and how a coach may make in-person contact with your player.