College FB players: How do you handle schoolwork AND football

[Shogun05]

This is my primary concern going to college. Obviously, I'm a student first, especially because I'm not a high level recruit or anything. But it seems like it will be virtually impossible to juggle schoolwork, social life, sleep and football/training. I'm a computer science major, so that doesn't help the workload situation either...

Any tips on making it a little more bearable (other than switching to an easier major)? Thanks.

[bshappy]

I'm not a football player but a friend of mine that lived down the hall from me was on the football team. It was tough but he was certainly able to handle it. He got all his work done as soon as he could and was diciplined enough not to procrastinate. Some weekends when we would go out he would sometimes have to say sorry I have a workout at 8 am. Can't do it tonight.

There were obviously some sacrifices but he had a really solid freshman year. Im not sure what school you're going to but the university of Michigan football program is pretty demanding. If he could handle it you can too.

[laxer32]

they made me go to mandatory study hall a few times a week (at least the first year)


it time management. you'll need it for the rest of your life. it doesn't get any easier with a family, work, working out, hobbies, etc when you get older.

[jgood]

This is my primary concern going to college. Obviously, I'm a student first, especially because I'm not a high level recruit or anything. But it seems like it will be virtually impossible to juggle schoolwork, social life, sleep and football/training. I'm a computer science major, so that doesn't help the workload situation either...

Any tips on making it a little more bearable (other than switching to an easier major)? Thanks.

Is this serious? You have one game per week .... during baseball we had 4-5 days with two games on each day. It's not very difficult just make sure you get it done .... simple as that. Use a scheduler if you have to.

[Shogun05]

One game per week, very true. practice 5-6 days a week, weight lifting/running 6 days a week. That combined with calc, computer science and physics among my courses, a need for as much sleep as possible to recover from training + practice AND attempting to have a social life strikes me as not exactly simple

Then again, you're a baseball player, you don't even know what difficult is...

[dshorter83]

One game per week, very true. practice 5-6 days a week, weight lifting/running 6 days a week. That combined with calc, computer science and physics among my courses, a need for as much sleep as possible to recover from training + practice AND attempting to have a social life strikes me as not exactly simple

Then again, you're a baseball player, you don't even know what difficult is...

^^^ lol

[NHfootball]

One game per week, very true. practice 5-6 days a week, weight lifting/running 6 days a week. That combined with calc, computer science and physics among my courses, a need for as much sleep as possible to recover from training + practice AND attempting to have a social life strikes me as not exactly simple

Then again, you're a baseball player, you don't even know what difficult is...

I can not even stress how much I agree with this. Secondly: A sport it anything that requires mandatory athletic ability, athletic ability being speed, strenght, agility, etc. Baseball does not, therefore it is not even a sport. Look at babe ruth, or david wells

[andej34]

It's easy. I know people who handle homework with football and 20 hours of work a week. I mean you typically will have 1-4 classes a day. In college you have way more free time than you think! Remember it's not high school where you go from 8 AM- 3 PM. You have a couple of classes a day. I remember my Freshman year of college I got done no later than 1 PM every day and had football from 3-6 and had a LOT of time for homework I also maintained a 3.1 GPA

[embulldogs99]

This is my primary concern going to college. Obviously, I'm a student first, especially because I'm not a high level recruit or anything. But it seems like it will be virtually impossible to juggle schoolwork, social life, sleep and football/training. I'm a computer science major, so that doesn't help the workload situation either...

Any tips on making it a little more bearable (other than switching to an easier major)? Thanks.

im in the same boat. I hope i can handle it too! a friend of mine whos a sophmore and plays LB said that it wasnt too bad. I guess there are a lot of kids who really struggle with school work (not surprising) so the coaches have scheduled study halls for us to get the work done so all the kids at least pass. i think the coaches know that the work is hard and we need to focus on not only football.

this is not how high school was. my coach didnt give a **** about my homework lol. im hoping college is different.

[SDOptimist]

Is this serious? You have one game per week .... during baseball we had 4-5 days with two games on each day. It's not very difficult just make sure you get it done .... simple as that. Use a scheduler if you have to.

You are talking about baseball. I worked college baseball and college football. Its like comparing apples and oranges when talking about free time and practice structure.

Football has practices, workouts, meetings, films and treatments ever single day of the week. The only day they got off of practice was mondays. But they still had to come in for meetings, films, workouts and treatment. They practiced Tues-Thurs, traveled and had walk through on friday. Game on saturday (which involved film and meetings all day prior to the game. On sundays they have a short walk through that had meetings prior to it.

Thats College football. Baseball doesnt even do 1/4 of that. Their practices are most of the time voluntary batting cages. Coaches tell them that they can come in for batting practice if they want. They will have a hour of weight lifting a few times a week. Thats it.

So you being a "college" baseball player acting like you are on top of the world compared to the rest of your student body is not a surprise lol. But trying to tell a football player how to balance time between practice, games, classes, studying and social life is a joke.

But back to the OP (who is talking about college football, not college baseball) lol

College football is the most demanding sport in terms of time and energy/will power.
You really have only two nights where you can potentially go out late. And that is thursdays and Saturdays(if playing at home or depending what time you get back from a road game). But you will still have a social life and make friends outside of football and hang out with them during the days.

You will also have several days of study hall through out the week. take advantage of that time. Also, get your work done before anything else. You have a small window of opportunity in terms of time. Its not super hard to have a good social life and have free time while getting good grades. You just need to prioritize and be responsible.

[Tabarnakz]

One of my friends in law school was in the football team and it took up most of his time considering our university has arguably the best college football team in Canada. I guess the key is time management, he usually had something football-related every single day so most of the time he would do his reading for school during the evening and when he did go out he usually just drank 2-3 beers almost never stayed very late. Get your 7-8 hours of sleep but try to wake up and go to bed at the same time every single day no matter what. Keep your hobbies and your social life for the end of the day when you're satisfied you did everything you needed to do and you're up to date for school.

I'm sure it's worth it. It has to be worth it career-wise considering he got more interviews and more job offers than anyone else I know. He was a clearly above average student but nothing exraordinary as far as grades are concerned. Employers, or at least law firms, admire serious sports players and they admire people with busy schedules/good time management skills even more.

[Spencelynn]

The key words, as previously mentioned, are TIME MANAGEMENT. It's definitely not easy. Spring Ball is the most difficult time. My team also has mandatory study halls, which helped during my first semester. You really just have to prioritize though. It should go school > football > social life, in that order. People get in trouble when they put social life in front of either school or football. Keep your priorities straight and you'll have more free time than you think. Football in itself can be social though; hanging out with the guys in the locker room, at treatment, or goofing off during down time before/after meetings are some of the best memories of football you will have. Be prepared to work harder than you ever have before though.

[sheephead2009]

american football is for pussies!

[jgood]

You are talking about baseball. I worked college baseball and college football. Its like comparing apples and oranges when talking about free time and practice structure.

Football has practices, workouts, meetings, films and treatments ever single day of the week. The only day they got off of practice was mondays. But they still had to come in for meetings, films, workouts and treatment. They practiced Tues-Thurs, traveled and had walk through on friday. Game on saturday (which involved film and meetings all day prior to the game. On sundays they have a short walk through that had meetings prior to it.

Thats College football. Baseball doesnt even do 1/4 of that. Their practices are most of the time voluntary batting cages. Coaches tell them that they can come in for batting practice if they want. They will have a hour of weight lifting a few times a week. Thats it.

So you being a "college" baseball player acting like you are on top of the world compared to the rest of your student body is not a surprise lol. But trying to tell a football player how to balance time between practice, games, classes, studying and social life is a joke.

But back to the OP (who is talking about college football, not college baseball) lol

College football is the most demanding sport in terms of time and energy/will power.
You really have only two nights where you can potentially go out late. And that is thursdays and Saturdays(if playing at home or depending what time you get back from a road game). But you will still have a social life and make friends outside of football and hang out with them during the days.

You will also have several days of study hall through out the week. take advantage of that time. Also, get your work done before anything else. You have a small window of opportunity in terms of time. Its not super hard to have a good social life and have free time while getting good grades. You just need to prioritize and be responsible.

Sure if you are not committed. We either had a double header or practice on all 7 days per week for the season, March into May, practices were 2.5-3 hours, plus an additional hour of tee work for my personal work, and 1 hour of lifting 2-4x per week depending on travel schedule. I would hardly refer to that as a joke. Are you trying to justify having an easy major to allow more social time? More and more people are getting lazy these days .... sure it is not the easiest thing but you are traveling 1 maybe 2 days per week for football but it really should not be an issue.

Then you go on and say it is not that hard just prioritize, which is exactly what I said. Way to make yourself look brilliant.

[Hisairness]

Basketball FTW