06-24-2015, 05:49 AM
Thanks for the replies.
I understand that football admissions standards are lower than other sports or for the general student body, but even so, it's still tougher for a high school football player to get into Stanford than to any other school and they would have to work harder than their peers academically to be admitted.
My point in making the comparison was not that, but just that it seems Stanford has gotten to be more popular lately (even though it's still only a sliver of the HS football recruits) that more HS football players see Stanford as a destination school, rather than just the SEC or Big Ten. A goal that they start working hard to get into when they start high school and my pondering was why Stanford isn't seen as a goal by more elite womens high school basketball players when they enter high school as a goal to get into when they reach their senior year?
After all, a professional basketball career for women is not as lucrative as a NFL career, so that degree they get should even be more important. Add to that a very successful program helmed by a Hall of Fame coach and it seemed like we should have a wider pool to work with (even given our very tough admissions standards) as more young players entering high school would see Stanford as a combination of both an excellent degree that will propel them in any post collegiate career they may have and playing for a winning program that regularly wins conference titles and goes far in the NCAA tournament and work during those four years (high grades, excellent test scores, extracurriculars, etc.) of high school to have a better chance of being recruited and admitted.
Boston Card's explanation about going years between superstar players seems about right. I only started following womens bball closely when I was at Stanford in the mid-2000s, but it seemed like we had Nicole Powell for a while and then Candice Wiggins and then got really lucky to have Jayne Appel, Kayla Pedersen, Jeanette Pohlen and the Ogwumike sisters bunched together and now the pendulum has swung the other way.
I understand that football admissions standards are lower than other sports or for the general student body, but even so, it's still tougher for a high school football player to get into Stanford than to any other school and they would have to work harder than their peers academically to be admitted.
My point in making the comparison was not that, but just that it seems Stanford has gotten to be more popular lately (even though it's still only a sliver of the HS football recruits) that more HS football players see Stanford as a destination school, rather than just the SEC or Big Ten. A goal that they start working hard to get into when they start high school and my pondering was why Stanford isn't seen as a goal by more elite womens high school basketball players when they enter high school as a goal to get into when they reach their senior year?
After all, a professional basketball career for women is not as lucrative as a NFL career, so that degree they get should even be more important. Add to that a very successful program helmed by a Hall of Fame coach and it seemed like we should have a wider pool to work with (even given our very tough admissions standards) as more young players entering high school would see Stanford as a combination of both an excellent degree that will propel them in any post collegiate career they may have and playing for a winning program that regularly wins conference titles and goes far in the NCAA tournament and work during those four years (high grades, excellent test scores, extracurriculars, etc.) of high school to have a better chance of being recruited and admitted.
Boston Card's explanation about going years between superstar players seems about right. I only started following womens bball closely when I was at Stanford in the mid-2000s, but it seemed like we had Nicole Powell for a while and then Candice Wiggins and then got really lucky to have Jayne Appel, Kayla Pedersen, Jeanette Pohlen and the Ogwumike sisters bunched together and now the pendulum has swung the other way.