High school athletes across Dallas-Fort Worth sign collegiate Letters of Intent on Wednesday

by Erin Rice

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Starting as early as 7 a.m. North Texas universities will announce their 2009-2010 football, soccer, track and field, and cross country recruiting classes.

Across North Texas and the rest of the U.S. on Wednesday, thousands of high school senior student-athletes will be putting pen to paper to pledge what universities they'll attend in the Fall.

February 4 is National Letter of Intent (NLI) Signing Day for student-athletes who participate in football, soccer, field hockey, track and field, cross country, and men's water polo. The NLI certifies that the student will attend a certain school for at least one academic year and that the school will provide financial aid for the same amount of time. Once the student has signed the letter, no other schools are allowed to recruit him/her. Though most athletes have already likely made oral commitments to attend specific schools, there are no binding agreements until the NLI is signed.

Several public and private high schools and ISDs across Dallas-Fort Worth will be holding signing ceremonies on Wednesday. Dallas ISD's “Meet the Signees” event in the Ellis Davis Field House on South Polk Street at noon is open to the public. They'll be honoring athletes in the sports above, as well as those who signed early for basketball and volleyball. Carroll Senior High School will hold their own signing ceremony at the crack of dawn, er, 9 a.m. where they'll introduce their own 16 senior athletes. Fort Worth Country Day School already has an announcement posted congratulating two of its women's soccer players impending signatures.*

Though none of the area universities are (technically) revealing their respective recruits until the letter of intent is signed, the buzz is front and center on their websites. UNT will blog their signees starting at 7 a.m. as the letters are faxed over. The athletic department will announce the 2009 women's soccer recruiting class at 11 a.m., then head football coach Todd Dodge is expected to give a press conference at 1 p.m. aired live on MeanGreenSports.com.

TCU has a page dedicated to all their incoming freshman signed thus far and will update with football, soccer, and so on in the afternoon. A football-only list and other hooplah will be released at 4 p.m. following a press conference with head coach Gary Patterson.

While SMU hasn't extolled any events online, no doubt they'll release lists of their signees throughout the day, as well.

*Countless schools have released similar announcements. These are simply a few examples.

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