Some Interesting New NCAA WBB Facts

[Charliebball]

NCAA Research‏Verified account @NCAAResearch 7h7 hours ago
States w/ highest % of HS girls basketball players recruited by a DI school: 1. Maryland 2. Tennessee 3. Georgia 4. North Carolina

 

[Phil]

They are potentially interesting but I'd like to know more information.

For example, it is been my impression that the Midwest has been a hotbed of support for women's basketball. This impression is based upon reading "the only dance in Iowa" which is admittedly about an earlier era. However, I wonder if it is possible that the Midwest strongly encourages a large proportion of girls in school to play basketball more so than in the southeast. If that were the case it would make sense that the proportion of players who make it to a Division I school would be a lower percentage.

In other words, I'd like to see these ratios also expressed it as a percentage of population now not just of those who chose to play high school basketball. Maybe they tell the same story, or maybe they don't.

 

[UcMiami]

They are potentially interesting but I'd like to know more information.

For example, it is been my impression that the Midwest has been a hotbed of support for women's basketball. This impression is based upon reading "the only dance in Iowa" which is admittedly about an earlier era. However, I wonder if it is possible that the Midwest strongly encourages a large proportion of girls in school to play basketball more so than in the southeast. If that were the case it would make sense that the proportion of players who make it to a Division I school would be a lower percentage.

In other words, I'd like to see these ratios also expressed it as a percentage of population now not just of those who chose to play high school basketball. Maybe they tell the same story, or maybe they don't.

The other issue is the density of D1 schools in any give state - the eastern seaboard I suspect has a higher percentage to population that other areas which might explain Maryland being the top dog percentage wise - with probably 100 D1 schools within a 5 hour drive. And ranging from top 10 to bottom end of quality of program and educational rigor.

 

[Charliebball]

I forgot to mention that there are a number of other surveys regarding player's attitudes and numbers of players playing internationally on the same twitter page

 

[UcMiami]

Yeah - more interesting stuff there.
As an interesting exercise - there are 32 'foreign' players playing in the WNBA but that includes 8 who are dual citizens playing on a foreign national team like Lindsey Harding and another 5 who are Canadian which is a special case - so really about 20 of the about 144 WNBA players this past year were European, Asian, South American, African, or Australian - leaving 124 US/Canadian players. According to the stats on that twitter feed from Eurobasketnews - there are 181 NCAA basketball players playing world wide. With probably about 10 WNBA players not playing overseas in any given year (more/less?) due to rehab or other commitments/interests that makes about 70 NCAA players not in the WNBA making a living of some sort professionally playing ball.

What that number does not identify is if some of those 70 college kids were foreign students in the US or if they are only counting US kids in that total. If it includes foreign students one would guess they make up at least half of the total.

So maximum employment for US WCBB players is about 190, and minimum is somewhere in the 135 range. Not a great career choice!!! 95% unemployment!

 

[Wilderness]

I wonder whether the percentages are largely influenced by high school size. In a small, rural school, the girls' varsity needs pretty much every female willing to play - in many every junior and senior who tries out makes the team. Larger schools are necessarily more selective in who makes the cut and will be identified as a HS girls basketball player. New Hampshire has 88 high schools, with average school size 237 students.

 

[CONNMAN98]

They are potentially interesting but I'd like to know more information.

For example, it is been my impression that the Midwest has been a hotbed of support for women's basketball. This impression is based upon reading "the only dance in Iowa" which is admittedly about an earlier era. However, I wonder if it is possible that the Midwest strongly encourages a large proportion of girls in school to play basketball more so than in the southeast. If that were the case it would make sense that the proportion of players who make it to a Division I school would be a lower percentage.

In other words, I'd like to see these ratios also expressed it as a percentage of population now not just of those who chose to play high school basketball. Maybe they tell the same story, or maybe they don't.

There are so many variables that contribute to these percentages! I know when these stats are reported for HS football, some states have different ways of determining what is a HS player! Just varsity, JV, freshmen? Some HS's are 3 years, some 4 years. In football a state like Texas might have 100 kids on varsity (many kids just want to be on the team), while a similar school in another state might only attract 40 kids! Also some states (due to year round good weather) have many more sports for the girls to choose from.