The One-Sport Squeeze: Pressures on HS Athletes To Specialize

Greg Bennett is a retired Athletic Director at Lewistown High School in Lewistown, Illinois. I asked Greg to share what he did as AD at a small school to develop a culture where coaches, athletes, and parents saw the value of participating in multi-sports. 

Greg not only shares some of the ways he worked to establish a multi-sport culture, but also touched on some of the pressures placed on athletes to specialize. 

Here are Greg’s thoughts…

Due to the fact that my service as Athletic Director was at a small school, I thought that it was very important that all of our coaches “be on the same page” on the issue of specialization. As the vast majority of our athletes were involved in two or three sports, the coaches had to control their territorial feelings toward their players. 

At the beginning of each school year, either in a group meeting or on an individual basis, I made it a point to remind the coaches to “play nice” with each other and to support each other’s programs.  I reminded them that we were all one athletic program and that all of our decisions should be based on what was best for our students. 

Although we never had any issues with a coach specifically telling an athlete not to play another sport, there were instances where coaches “encouraged” athletes to continue participating in their specific sport outside of their official IHSA season. This “encouragement,” which sometimes caused players to participate in AAU or club sport activities during other sports seasons was definitely counterproductive. Sometimes a player was simply overburdened by playing multiple sports at the same time. In other cases, the athlete may have ended up dropping out of a school sport to devote more time to the non-school activity. 

As the A.D., I did address the issues of specialization at parent meetings and in individual consultations. I always let the parents know that they should follow the chain of command in addressing any problems and concerns. I also informed them that they should contact me with any issues that could not be worked out with individual coaches. 

There were a few occasions in which parents asked me about coaches wanting their kids to participate in non-school programs. I always informed them that any pressure to do so or punishment for not doing so was inappropriate and would not be tolerated within our district. 

In my opinion, one of the biggest problems facing high school athletic programs today is the insidious influence of AAU and club sports. They push specialization and lure families into spending large amounts of money, in hopes of securing elusive “full ride” scholarships that are very few and far between. They also weaken high school programs in general by eroding school spirit, camaraderie, and the tradition of team coming first.

One of the many great points brought up by Greg…

HS coaches, Club coaches, and/or AAU coaches can all put a pressure not only on the HS athletes but also the parents of HS athletes. The coaches apply the pressure that if the athlete doesn’t focus on just this one sport, they won’t get a scholarship. And they promise that if you play with this Club, Travel, or AAU team, you will get a scholarship. 

My last year coaching, 9 of our players were 2-sport athletes, 6 of our players were 3-sport athletes, and none of our players were 1-sport athletes. We still managed to win 20+ games and a Regional Championship. And three of our players were voted the MVP in the WB6 Conference in another sport. 

Thoughts for parents, athletes, coaches, and AD’s…

1- If high school sport has the majority of the players just doing that sport- does that say something about the culture of the entire athletic department?

2- If high school sport has the majority of the players just doing that sport- what are pressures or promises that are being made to these athletes?

3- If a high school coach tells an athlete they should just focus on one sport, the parents should tell the athletic director this. 

4- Parents and athletes should critically examine promises that AAU and Club coaches make, and analyze the profit the organizers make.