Video has become a need to have in your recruiting process. With recruiting video, college coaches can recruit student-athletes from the comfort of their own homes or offices. Many student-athletes will have highlight reels from their high school or club season. This is something that you should be constantly updating as you continue to improve your skills.
What is a Highlight Reel?
A highlight reel is a recruiting video used to showcase your best skills for college coaches. This video consists of all of your best clips in a live-action play. In today's college recruiting process, athletic video is a must. Learn how to create an effective highlight reel to catch a college coach's attention.
What Makes a Good Highlight Reel?
Putting together an eye-catching video for college coaches to watch is important. Coaches use video to know if they want to move forward with a student-athlete, see them play live, or learn more about them. Follow these steps to put together an effective highlight reel:
- Use the Five-Star System: When reviewing your raw game footage, rate your clips using the 5-star system. 1-star clips are your worst plays, and 4 or 5-star clips are your best plays. You should only include 4 or 5-star clips when building your highlight reel.
- Order Matters: When putting together your highlight reel, ensure you have your 5-star clips at the beginning of your video. College coaches do not have the time to finish a 7-minute video, so ensure they can see your best clips.
- Keep it Short and Concise: A highlight reel should be 15-20 clips. This averages to be a 3:15-minute highlight reel. College coaches do not have the time to watch long highlight reels, so even if you have 5-10 clips, any video is better than none!
- Show a Variety of Different Skills: Throughout your highlight reel, show various skills, not just one skill. A highlight reel shows college coaches exactly who you are as an athlete.
What Should I Not Put in a Highlight Reel?
When building your highlight reel, keep it short and concise. Learn about exactly what not to put in your video to ensure you are getting the coach's attention :
- All Your Recruiting Information: Your highlight video should have one title card with brief information. This should include your first and last name, graduation year, position, and the club or high school team you play for.
- Deceiving Video Effects: There is no need to add elaborate video effects to your reel. All you need to add is an isolation effect, an arrow, or a circle when editing your video.
- Clips less than 4 or 5 Stars: Your highlight reel is a short video for college coaches to be able to see your athletic skills. Make sure you are only including your best clips that showcase a variety of your skills.
- Poor Quality Footage: When filming at events, showcases, tournaments, or games, make sure you are filming at an elevated angle for coaches to see the full plays. You do not need to use an expensive camera. Just ensure you can capture the full plays.
What Should I Do After I Create a Highlight Reel?
Once you’ve created a highlight reel, it’ll be important that you message college coaches with your new footage. Make sure you add your video to your SportsRecruits profile, then use the messaging system to let coaches know about your new footage. Learn more here about how to introduce yourself to college coaches over email.