Recruiting guides

Your child needs an individual AAU membership to compete in any AAU event, and you buy that membership directly through the AAU website.

Under rules that take full effect for students enrolling in fall 2027 or later, NCAA Division I and II basketball players can receive up to five years of eligibility, provided they first enroll in college no later than the academic year following the year they turn 19.

The NJCAA limits your child to two seasons of basketball, regardless of how long they attend a juco.

D2 basketball programs can award up to 10.0 scholarship equivalencies per men's team and up to 10.0 per women's team, coaches divide those funds among multiple players rather than giving every player a full ride, and scholarships are awarded year to year with no guarantee of renewal.

The NAIA and the NCAA are separate organizations with separate eligibility rules; a freshman seeking to play NAIA basketball must meet at least two of three standards — a minimum high school GPA, a minimum test score, and a top-half class rank — and must register at PlayNAIA.org, while NCAA Division I requires a 2.3 core-course GPA across 16 approved courses, and the sources do not publish a single GPA or test threshold for Division III.

The AAU charges youth athletes $22.00 for a regular membership or $24.00 for extended coverage, and charges coaches and other non-athletes $55.00 or $57.00 for a one-year regular or extended-benefit membership.

To start an AAU basketball team, the club organizer must register a club with AAU, then register every athlete and every coach as individual AAU members.

The AAU boys' basketball season runs from September 1 through August 31, with the World Championship held in early July each year.

Juco basketball is college basketball played at two-year schools that belong to the National Junior College Athletic Association, the governing body for two-year college athletics.

AAU clubs set their own tryout schedules and roster sizes — the AAU's published rules govern age and grade eligibility, membership requirements, and coach background checks, but the AAU does not publish a standard tryout process that clubs must follow.

Whether your child earns a spot through recruiting or a tryout, the NCAA requires them to register with the Eligibility Center and meet initial-eligibility standards before they can participate.

A D1 offer is a commitment from a coach, not from the NCAA — the NCAA sets limits on how many scholarships each program may award, but the coach decides who gets one, how much it covers, and whether it is renewed each year.