With the early signing period for women’s college golf ending about a week ago, I wanted to examine the numbers and see how they compared to last year’s. Last year, the average National Junior Golf Score Board (NJGS) ranking for a player who signed at a Division I Institution was 589. This year, during the early signing period, there were 89 players who signed at D1 schools. Of these, the average NJGS for all Division I signees was 186.3, with an average scoring differential of 5.25, and approximately 1/3 of signees coming from in-state. The average for the Power-5 Conference signees was 89.8 and the average for elite academic schools, including Stanford, Ivy League and Big Ten was 107.9.

An important question is “what do we know about the 186-ranked player in NJGS (the average rank for D1)?” At the end of the signing period, this player was Ms. Madison Walker of LaQuinta, California. Ms. Walker signed to play golf for University of Albany, a top-tier academic school that is part of the State University of New York. According to NJGS, Ms. Walker played eight events with one top-5 finish, an overall rank of 514 and a scoring differential of 2.03.

In women’s golf this year, only one of the top-40 ranked players in the country signed with a non-power five school; Shiao-Yun Liu of China who signed with Pepperdine. Pepperdine, although not a part of a major conference, has a strong academic reputation (No. 46 according to U.S. News) and has a breathtaking campus located in Malibu, California. Of the other 14 signees with major conference schools, with six signing within the Big Ten (3 at Northwestern, 2 at Illinois and 1 at Michigan State) while Duke, North Carolina, Southern Cal, Stanford, Baylor, Oregon, Clemson and Mississippi State each got one player. The average scoring differential of the players within the top 40 of the class was a shocking -4.01, which is 9.26 shots better than the average (5.25).

Upon first glance at the list, one cannot help but see a strong preference for the top players to also pick strong academic schools. According to U.S. News Reports the schools chosen by top 40 players have the following academic rankings: Stanford (No. 5), Duke (No. 9), Northwestern (No. 11), Southern Cal (No. 21), UNC (No. 30), Pepperdine (No. 46), Clemson (No. 67) Baylor (No. 75), Michigan State (No. 81), Oregon (No. 103) Illinois (No. 138), Mississippi State (No. 173) with an average academic rank of No. 63.

Examining the rest of the class, the average rank of elite schools was 107.9, with Georgetown signing two players ranked 58 and 134, while Columbia signed players ranked 121 and 135. Another sign of the strength of the classes academic and athletic abilities.

Among the most interesting trends in recruiting is the lack of preference for college coaches to recruit “in-state” players. Over the past two years, the number of “in-state” signees have remained about 50 percent in both men’s and women’s recruiting, however in this data the numbers are much closer to 33 percent.

Of the 181 players who signed early only 40, or 22 percent of them, were international. Of these 23 where not ranked by NJGS, 11 were ranked by World Amateur Golf. They are Arafi (Coastal Carolina) 461, Earl (Wofford) 2348, Fanali (Arizona State) 108, Foochareon (Virginia Tech) 1339, Forsterling (Arizona State) 265, Hutchinson-Kay (Mississippi) 889, Neilson (Texas Tech) 805, Nordfors (Campbell) 810, Rossi (Rutgers) 750, Sundberg (Campbell) 949 and Traustadottir (Colorado State) 941. The average of these 11 players is 878.6.

It is also interesting to note that the highest ranked player signed to play Division 2 was 167, while the highest NAIA player was 198. Both demonstrate that players of all skills levels are spending time to consider different options beyond just going Division I.