University of Texas at San Antonio

How cool is it that at 15-years old you know where you are going to college and how you are going to pay for it!?  It sounds crazy, insane, and exciting!!!  Then add that the school is a division 1 university and you get to play the sport you love there for 4-years!!!

In early December 2014 Hannah was offered a roster spot for the softball team at the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) along with a very nice scholarship! Hannah and the rest of us couldn't be more happy!

Hannah's goal for years has been to play softball at a division 1 university.  To help her reach her goal it has meant a lot of time traveling and money spent on playing softball all over the country.  From Huntington Beach, California to Orlando, Florida! UTSA as well as two other universities were in Hannah's top 3, however with almost 300 division 1 schools the odds of being able to play softball at one of your top schools is very unlikely.  We had noticed that the UTSA coaches had been watching Hannah play softball all over the country this past summer.  Then in mid October Hannah's select team softball coach called Hannah and told her that UTSA was very interested in her and wanted her to come for an unofficial visit in December!  In December we met with the coaching staff and they took us all over campus and lunch.  At the end of the 8 hour day they sat us down, told us why they wanted Hannah to play for them, what their goals were for Hannah if she were to play for them, and then how much scholarship money they were offering her to play for them.  Watching Hannah's face light up when they were talking to her made me so happy.  It is so wonderful for a parent to see their child's hard work pay off.  To sweeten the deal for Brent and me is that Hannah will live and go to school only 20 minutes away from home.  For the last few years when this college recruiting process started we knew it was a big possibility that Hannah could attend college anywhere in the country.  With her being able to attend UTSA she is down the street and not in a snowy, cold climate.

Hannah with Head Coach Michelle Cheatham

Hannah will play for the UTSA Roadrunners in their 2017/2018 season.

The number one question I get when people hear that Hannah has already been recruited to play softball at a D1 college is, "Isn't that against NCAA rules?"  Softball is a weird thing and no one is sure why softball recruiting is so different from all the other sports.  For some reason college coaches will recruit a girl for softball as young as 8th grade!!!  None of it is official, all of it is labeled "unofficial" and the college coaches, select team coaches, parents, and players have figured out how to skirt around the NCAA rules without breaking any rules.  For example a player can email, text, mail, or call a college coach all they want.  The college coach can not respond but if they happen to pick up the phone if the player calls then they can talk to the player all they want.  Hannah had one college coach tell her select coach to have Hannah call him at a certain time so they could talk!  College coaches can talk to a player and their parents all they want at a college softball camp.  It has to be this way until September 1st of the player's Junior year of high school.  Notice that Hannah is verbally committed to UTSA.  That means that nothing is in writing.  The UTSA coaches offered Hannah a roster spot verbally and Hannah said yes.  Letter of Intents are not signed with student athletes until fall of their Senior year.  The whole thing is silly really but you have to play the game or you get left behind.  The general rule of thumb for softball is that if you haven't verballed with a D1 college by September of your Junior year of high school then you probably won't be playing D1 softball.  For pitchers and catchers it is a year earlier.  Here is a website to visit to see what colleges have verballed what players and their graduation years.  GoldFastpitch.com Verbals