User manual

VarsityReach helps high-school and club athletes build a recruiting profile, find college programs, and email coaching staff. Parents follow along. High-school and select coaches publish a roster and schedule. College coaches do not need an account — athletes email them, and the thread stays logged here.

In the app: Help · Production: https://varsityreach.com

This manual covers every function in the product as it works today. Ask answers and school data are research aids, not official NCAA advice.

1. Who uses VarsityReach

College coaching staffs are recipients, not sign-in users. You send them email from your own Gmail (or another mail app). Replies file back into VarsityReach when they keep the CC or the RB-XXXXXXXX code.

One login can be team coach and parent. An athlete login stays an athlete login.

Sports

You pick a sport at signup. Directory matches, NCAA headlines, contact windows, scholarships, and Ask all follow that sport.

Softball, baseball, football, basketball, soccer, volleyball, lacrosse, tennis, golf, swimming, track, cross-country, gymnastics, field hockey, ice hockey, wrestling, rowing, beach volleyball, water polo, bowling, fencing, rifle, rugby, skiing, and STUNT.

Softball and baseball have a full diamond stat sheet (AVG, ERA, and so on). Other sports lean on film, schedule, and bio.

2. The public website

Anyone can use these pages without signing in.

Browse colleges

On Colleges, search by school name, conference, or city. Filter by sport, division, state, and major. Cards show nickname, logo (when the crawl has them), and a short athletic-aid note (D1 roster / scholarship limits, D2 equivalency, D3 academic aid only).

This directory is built from NCAA.com school pages and athletics-site crawls. Rosters lag the transfer portal. A missing name is a *possible* opening, not a confirmed vacancy.

Contact the team

On Contact, enter your name, email, optional role, and a message (10–1000 characters). Complete the human check (Turnstile) and send. Mail goes to hello@varsityreach.com. Public forms are rate-limited (about 8 submissions per minute).

3. Accounts

Create an account

1. Open Sign in and choose Sign up.
2. Enter your name, email, and a password (at least 8 characters).
3. Choose Athlete, Team coach, or Parent.
4. Complete the human check and submit.

You can also use Google or Apple.

If you opened a parent invite link (/auth?invite=…), the form already treats you as a parent.

Finish setup (onboarding)

New accounts go through a short guided setup. Incomplete athlete or coach profiles return here until the required fields are saved.

Everyone

1. Confirm athlete, team coach, or parent.

Athletes (required: name and graduation year)

1. Who you are — name, sport, class year, positions, bats/throws when it applies.
2. School and academics — high school, club, city, state, GPA, majors, optional team join code.
3. Contact — email for coaches, optional phone, coach-visibility toggle.
4. What's next — film, one email a week, invite a parent, Ask.

Team coaches (required: first and last name)

1. Name and title.
2. Public email, optional phone, website, and bio.
3. Create a first team (or skip and do it later on My Teams).
4. What's next — join code, calendar import, public coach card.

Parents

1. Paste the invite link or code from the athlete's Family tab, or continue and link later.
2. What's next — read-only profile, schedule, conversations, and Ask.

If you used a parent invite link (/auth?invite=…), the invite is accepted first and you land on the parent wrap-up step.

Sign in

1. Open /auth.
2. Enter email and password, or use Google / Apple.
3. You return to your last dashboard area when possible.

My dashboard in the site header also takes you there.

Forgot password

1. On /auth, type your account email.
2. Complete the human check.
3. Use Forgot password.
4. Open the email and set a new password on /reset-password.

Sign out

Use Sign out in the header (public site or dashboard).

Who can open which page

Dashboards require a signed-in session and the matching role. The wrong role sees “You don’t have access to this area.” Admin pages require the admin role.

4. Athlete hub

Open My dashboard after signing in as an athlete, or go to /athlete.

The left table of contents jumps to each section. Tabs across the top are Overview, Edit, Schedule, Stats, Film, Schools, Messages, and Family.

The header always says VarsityReach plus a breadcrumb for the page you are on.

Overview

#### NCAA digest

Headlines for your sport from NCAA.com (last 7 days when available). Links open the original story. This is news, not a recruiting list.

#### This week

A two-item recruiting checklist:

1. Add one new film clip this week.
2. Send one coach email this week.

If either item is still open, VarsityReach sends a transactional reminder to your contact email on Mondays at 2:00 PM Central. You do not get it when both items are done.

Buttons jump to Film and Schools. A note appears when D1 coaches in your sport still cannot call or DM you — you can still introduce yourself.

#### Recruiting card

A preview of what coaches see: photo, name, academics, film tiles, school list, upcoming events. Click the circle to add or change your photo.

• Copy share link copies https://varsityreach.com/p/{your-id}.
• The public page only works if coach visibility is on (Edit tab). Phone is never shown on the public card.

#### Coach contact

A table of when coaches in your sport may call/DM, take official visits, and do off-campus contact, by division. Athlete-initiated email is allowed earlier than coach-initiated contact. Graduation year drives the class status (sophomore, junior, and so on).

These are compiled Bylaw 13 age gates. Sport calendars still add contact, evaluation, quiet, dead, and shutdown periods on top.

#### School news

Stories from programs on your school list. Bookmark an article to reuse it in a later coach email.

#### Scholarships

Outside awards and free eligibility tools filtered to your sport. Categories: any sport, your sport, campus aid, free tool. Division III is labeled as academic / need-based only — no athletic scholarships.

Edit profile

Save after each group of changes.

Basics

• First and last name
• Sport
• Graduation year
• Height
• Positions (sport-specific)
• Bats / throws (softball and baseball)
• Contact email and phone
• Recruiting bio
• Profile photo — click the circle on your recruiting card, or use Edit → Photo (JPG, PNG, or WebP, 2 MB). Google/Apple sign-in photos are used until you replace them.
• Coach visibility — on = public /p/{id} card; off = profile unavailable to people with the link

Academics and teams

• GPA, SAT, ACT
• High school, club team, city, state
• Intended majors (comma-separated) — used for school matching

Find your fit (Recruit)

Preferences that rank schools: location (in-state / out-of-state), campus type (public / private), faith affiliation, preferred divisions.

Theme (Recruit)

Accent (clay, navy, teal, magenta, gold), surface (clean, clay, bold), and layout (classic, stacked, split) for your recruiting card.

AI bio writer (Recruit)

Builds a recruiting bio from your profile facts plus a short Q&A. Review it before you save.

Team activity

Anonymous counts for your club: teammates on the app, talking to coaches, messages sent, replies.

Schedule

1. Join a team with a coach’s join code, or leave a team you already joined. Team events appear on your schedule.
2. Add a personal event: title, type (tournament, showcase, camp, game, practice, visit), date, time, location, notes.
3. Delete events you no longer need.

Upcoming events can be attached automatically when you email a coach.

Stats

Add a season row (season name and team). Softball and baseball include GP, AVG, OBP, SLG, HR, RBI, SB, ERA, IP, K, WHIP, FLD%. Other sports can still store a season row; film and schedule carry more of the story.

Film

1. Enter a title, category (hitting, pitching, fielding, catching, speed, full game, skills), and a YouTube link (youtube.com/watch, /embed/, /shorts/, or youtu.be).
2. Add the clip. It embeds on your card.
3. Delete clips that are outdated.

One new clip per week completes the This week film habit.

Schools

Browse the same college directory from inside the hub.

• Search by name.
• Filter by division.
• Save a school as saved, interested, contacted, or offered.
• Find your fit ranks programs from your majors, preferences, and roster movement.
• Similar schools appear under that list.
• Start a coach conversation from a school — that opens Messages with a draft.

School cards show D1 House roster caps, D1 legacy / opt-out scholarship limits, D2 equivalency, or a D3 “academic aid only” note.

Messages

See Emailing college coaches.

Family

Invite a parent:

1. Enter their email.
2. Send. VarsityReach emails them a link and copies it to your clipboard (/auth?invite=…).
3. They sign in (or sign up) with that link.

Status is pending, accepted, or revoked. Revoke a pending invite if you sent it to the wrong address.

Parents can see profile, schedule, stats, and coach threads. They cannot edit your data.

5. Emailing college coaches

VarsityReach drafts the letter. You send it from Gmail (or another mail app). The app does not send the email for you.

Start a draft

1. Open Schools.
2. Pick a program and start a conversation (or open Messages and continue a thread).
3. A large compose window opens (about 80% of the browser).

Write the letter

Choose a starter:

• Intro — first contact from your profile
• Quick update — short progress note
• New film — new clip announcement

Then:

• Confirm the To address. If the crawl does not have a staff email, add a name, email, and role.
• Edit the body. Make it concise shortens the draft (Recruit).
• Optionally include film links and upcoming schedule dates (MM/DD/YYYY and HH:MM).
• Optionally attach a saved school-news article.

Preview, then Open in Gmail. If Gmail is not available, a mailto: window is the fallback.

What every send includes

The app always adds:

• A CC to hello@varsityreach.com
• RB-XXXXXXXX in the subject (your thread code)
• Your public profile link (/p/{id})
• Your HS / club coach card when you are on a team (/c/{id})
• A note asking the coach to keep the code if they reply

A copy of the outbound letter is stored in Messages.

How replies come back

When the coach replies:

• If they reply-all (keeping hello@varsityreach.com), or
• If they keep RB-XXXXXXXX in the subject,

the Worker files the reply on that thread. You see it in Messages. The bubble is labeled with the sender’s email first, then their name.

A copy of *your* send that Gmail CCs back to VarsityReach is not stored as a coach reply.

If the coach drops the CC and the code, the reply will not file. Ask them to include RB-XXXXXXXX next time, or paste the reply into the thread yourself if you need a record.

Follow-up on an existing thread

Open the conversation, write a follow-up, and Open in Gmail again. The same subject code is reused so new replies stay on that thread.

Dates and times in messages

Schedule lines and similar timestamps display as MM/DD/YYYY and HH:MM.

6. Ask

On the athlete and parent hubs, a Ask button sits at the bottom right.

• Drag the header to move the panel. Drag the corner to resize. Position is remembered.
• Click a suggested prompt or type your own question.
• Citations appear under the answer. Links open in a new tab and do not close Ask.
• Escape closes the panel. Your last question and answer stay until you ask again.

Suggested prompts:

• When can D1 coaches contact me?
• Can I email a coach before they can text me?
• Does Division III offer athletic scholarships?
• What is the roster cap for my sport?
• Which outside scholarships fit my sport?
• What is the 10/7 rule?

Ask answers only from:

• Contact-window matrix (by sport, division, and your graduation year)
• Roster and athletic-aid tables
• Scholarship directory
• Eligibility Center facts (core courses, 10/7 rule, NLI ended October 2024, visit rules)

It does not send email and is not official NCAA advice. If the AI is slow or down, you still get the underlying tables.

7. Parent dashboard

Open /parent after accepting an invite.

If you are not linked yet, the page tells you to ask the athlete to send an invite from their Family tab.

If you follow more than one athlete, buttons at the top switch whose data you see.

What you can see

Ask is available here too, using that athlete’s sport and graduation year.

You cannot edit profile, stats, film, or send coach email.

Family plan

1. Create a family plan (staging currently comps testers — no live charge).
2. Assign a seat to each linked athlete. Each athlete must have a unique email on their account.
3. Up to three athlete seats.
4. Subscribe $19/mo (test) opens Stripe Checkout. Test card: 4242 4242 4242 4242, any future expiry, any 3-digit CVC.
5. Manage billing opens the Stripe customer portal.

Early access still unlocks Recruit features even without a paid seat. Live billing is not turned on.

8. Team coach dashboard

This hub is for high-school and select/club coaches, not college staff. Open /coach.

Schedule, Roster, and Athlete outreach stay locked until you create or join a team.

My teams

• Create a team: name, level (high school, select, middle school), season, city, state, description.
• Join a team: search or use a join code. Owners can approve pending coaches.
• Per-team public email (often a school domain) and optional parent-facing email.
• Share the join code so athletes can attach themselves from their Schedule tab.

Team schedule

Add games, tournaments, showcases, practices, camps, or scrimmages (title, dates, time, location, opponent, notes).

Import calendar

1. Paste a public iCal (.ics) feed URL (Google, Apple, Outlook, or another calendar). The feed must be reachable without signing in.
2. Preview events and import the ones you want.
3. With a feed URL saved, VarsityReach re-syncs about every 6 hours. You can also refresh now.

Team events show up on athletes who joined the roster.

Roster

Add or remove athletes on your team. Athletes can also join themselves with the code.

Athlete outreach

Read-only view of college emails sent by athletes on your roster. You cannot send those emails for them.

My profile

Name, title, public email and phone, program URL, bio, and a profile photo. Copy your public coach card at /c/{id} so athletes can include it in outreach.

9. Admin

Requires the admin role. Open /admin.

Snapshot

Counts for athletes, coaches, conversations, and listed programs.

Job runs

History of scheduled data and email jobs (name, status, start time, records, cost, message).

NCAA knowledge

Keeps Ask, contact windows, and scholarship/roster tables current without a code deploy.

Upload one of:

Each upload replaces that matrix in the database. Counters and an upload history (filename, row count, notes) update after a successful parse.

Files must be under 2 MB. The catalog includes bowling, fencing, rifle, rugby, skiing, and STUNT. Anything else is skipped and listed as notes. Live tables currently hold the August 2026 research files (35 contact windows, 77 roster/aid rows, 14 scholarships). Empty tables fall back to the bundled defaults.

Only admins can upload.

School crawl

Queue or run the background directory crawl:

• Queue NCAA.com school index
• Queue D1 athletics-site discovery
• Queue program rosters / coaches / news (all enabled sports)
• Run the next batch now

Status: NCAA schools, programs found, sports covered, softball programs, current roster athletes, current college coaches, pending jobs, and recent events (arrivals, departures, coach moves, roster shrink).

The crawler identifies as VarsityReach, honors robots.txt, and waits between requests. Cron processes a batch about every 15 minutes. Catalog sports refresh daily; other discovered sports weekly.

College directory

Table of programs: name, division, state, roster openings, recruiting flag.

10. Plans and Recruit features

Listed on /pricing. Early access unlocks every Recruit feature for testers.

Starter (free)

• Recruiting profile, bio, and photo
• Season stats and event schedule
• Up to 3 YouTube videos
• Full college directory
• Invite one parent (read-only)

Recruit ($19 / month when live billing is on)

Everything in Starter, plus:

• AI bio and Make it concise on drafts
• Ranked Find your fit / similar schools
• Unlimited video and schedule entries (as implemented)
• Message preview and outreach tools
• School-list news and saved articles
• Recruiting hub stats
• Custom profile colors and layout
• Family seats (parent is the payer; up to 3 athletes)

Team coaches

High-school and select coach accounts are free. College coaches do not sign up — athletes email them, and the thread stays in VarsityReach.

Stripe on the parent dashboard is test mode. Do not use a real card unless you are told live billing is on.

11. Notifications and switching roles

Notification bar

While signed in you may see:

• New unread messages in a coach thread (Respond opens Messages)
• Parent invites still pending
• Program alerts: a tracked school’s roster shrank, or a coach you contacted moved to a school that still looks like an academic fit

Dismiss items you have handled.

Role switcher

If your login is both team coach and parent, use the profile menu in the header to switch dashboards. From a single coach or parent login you can add the other profile. Athletes cannot add coach or parent on the same login.

Admins who also have another role land on /admin first and can still open the other hubs they have access to.

12. What VarsityReach does not do

• Send coach email on your behalf (you send from Gmail)
• Create college-coach logins or a college recruiting board
• Guarantee roster openings or scholarships
• Replace the NCAA Eligibility Center
• Give official NCAA interpretations
• Host film (YouTube links only)
• Send weekly newsletters (the sport digest is in-app; Monday 2:00 PM Central mail is only a checklist reminder if an item is still open)

13. Troubleshooting

I signed up but I am not in a hub.

Finish /onboarding and pick a role.

The public profile says unavailable.

Turn coach visibility on in Edit profile.

A coach replied and I do not see it.

Check that they kept hello@varsityreach.com on the CC or RB-XXXXXXXX in the subject. Two people with the same display name are still different if the emails differ — Messages labels by email.

Ask is taking a long time.

Wait for the table fallback, or try a suggested prompt. The answer is grounded in the knowledge files, not a live NCAA search.

Upload on Admin failed.

Use the expected .md or .xlsx layout. Check the notes under the history line (unmapped sports are skipped). File must be under 2 MB.

Parent cannot see the athlete.

The athlete must send an invite from Family. Open that link while signed in as the parent.

Calendar import is empty.

The iCal feed must be publicly reachable. Private calendars will not import.

I need help.

Use /contact, or email hello@varsityreach.com.

Quick start (athlete)

1. Sign up as an athlete and pick your sport.
2. Finish onboarding (name, class year, school, visibility on) and add a photo.
3. Add one YouTube clip on Film.
4. Add your next showcase or game on Schedule.
5. On Schools, save a few programs and start one intro.
6. Open in Gmail, send, and keep the CC / RB- code.
7. Invite a parent from Family.
8. Use Ask if you are unsure when a D1 coach can contact you.

That is the core loop: keep the card current, send one real email a week, and let replies file back into Messages.