By Domenico Montanaro
The influence of amateur club basketball has grown to incredible heights in recent years. From the depths of the amateur clubs has emerged a countless number of summer leagues, tournaments, travel teams and camps. Almost every high school athlete will participate in these events in hopes of attaining more expsosure and being spotted by a college that would not have normally seen them during the season playing for their high school.
A lot of what has happened within those practices, games, tournaments and camps, however, has come under intense scrutiny over the years. Everything from payment scandals to the involvement of sneaker companies has left many high school coaches, college coaches, parents and NCAA officials skeptical of their value.
The NCAA has mandated that by next summer the time in which college coaches can view and speak to high school athletes be cut to only two weeks. The NCAA is also hoping to eliminate summer recruitment entirely by 2002.
Starting next week, the Times/Ledger will publish its first installment of
