College sports are just about as American as it gets. For many, they are one of the first things that come to mind when they think about the United States.
This sentiment extends to the players that make up the teams. College athletics are, naturally, predominantly filled with Americans.
This assumption of mine was challenged on Saturday when I attended the Arizona State vs. Arizona men’s tennis match.
A theme quickly emerged as the players were announced for the Sun Devils: most of them were not American. In the end, 7 of the 10 members of the Sun Devil’s tennis team were born outside the United States.
Perhaps other schools and teams should look to take a page out of the Sun Devils’ book.
As much as they realistically can, more college sports should look to expand their recruiting efforts and look beyond the American shores for athletes to bring in.
It is worth acknowledging that some sports lend themselves more to international recruitment than others, tennis being one of them. On the other hand, football is played mainly in the United States, and coaches would be hard-pressed to find a steady flow of international players that are good enough to justify the efforts it would take to recruit overseas.
That said, all sports should not be deterred from at least trying to recruit outside the United States.
It is such a vast and relatively untapped player pool. Being able to tap into it would be beneficial for two reasons: it would help enhance a team’s roster, and it would set that team up well to recruit internationally in the future.
A team gaining a recruiting foothold in another country could be massive for them in the long term. They would both likely be able to bring in the best players from that country consistently and increase the participation of said sport in that country, resulting in more talent coming from that country regularly.
It sounds obvious, but international players were taught the game differently and approach sports distinctly compared to their American counterparts. Coaches should strive to have a team filled with different backgrounds and mindsets in order to make the collective more versatile and unpredictable.
Bringing in international recruits would be a surefire way to accomplish this.
There is another case for schools to broaden their scope recruiting-wise, though it leans much more idealistic: doing so is a new way by which coaches can help develop their athletes as people.
Fielding a team that is an amalgamation of different countries and backgrounds would expose all parties, coaches included, to new perspectives and insights and would push them all out of their comfort zones.
For college students, stepping beyond your bubble and where you are comfortable is essential to growing and developing during such a pivotal period of your life. Coaches
should do all they can to ensure this happens, and recruiting more international athletes would be a significant step.
There are certainly no guarantees that teams would find extended, consistent success when recruiting outside of America.
However, they should put forth the effort. College coaches are obligated to field as competitive a team as possible and do all they can to develop their players as humans outside of their sport.
Bringing in more international student-athletes would be both a signal of all avenues being considered when improving the team and a concerted effort to expand the worldview of the student-athletes.
For any college coaches somehow reading this: Give it a shot.
