Rising high school junior Jolee Liles, who hails from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, has announced that she has made a verbal commitment to the Louisiana State University class of 2023.
“I’m very excited to announce my verbal commitment to swim for Louisiana State University for the 2019-20 season. I would like to thank everyone who has helped me progress in swimming, especially my coach, Jayme Cramer. I am blessed to be a part of an awesome program such as LSU. Thanks so much to the LSU coaches for making me feel like part of the family already! Geaux Tigers!!!!! ???”
In four seasons of high school swimming at Parkview Baptist School (Louisiana high school swimming begins with middle school), Liles has already made her mark in a big way. In 8th grade she won the 200 IM and 500 free at the LHSAA Division III state meet (as a 7th-grader she had been runner-up in both events). During her freshman season, she repeated her titles in the 200 IM (2:06.93) and 500 free (5:01.09), knocking 13 seconds off the LHSAA Division III record in the latter. And this past year, as a sophomore, Liles lowered her own DIII record in the 500 (4:57.12) and broke the composite LHSAA record in the 200 IM with 2:02.96; she was named Outstanding Swimmer of the Meet.
Liles does her year-round swimming with Crawfish Aquatics. She wrapped up this year’s short course season with state titles in the girls’ 15-16 1000 free, 200 fly, and 200/400 IM. She was also runner-up in the 200/500 free.
Top SCY times:
- 200 IM – 2:02.96
- 400 IM – 4:22.36
- 200 back – 2:01.97
- 200 fly – 2:03.35
- 200 free – 1:52.69
- 500 free – 4:53.27
- 1000 free – 10:11.78
I'm very excited to announce my verbal commitment to swim for Louisiana State University for the 2019-20 season!! Geaux Tigers!!??? pic.twitter.com/2bc4FvbKvx
— Jolee Liles (@joleeliles) July 31, 2017
If you have a commitment to report, please send an email with a photo (landscape, or horizontal, looks best) and a quote to [email protected].
these early commits are getting ridiculous. I don’t think its any fault of the athlete, but something needs to change.
Frank – I tend to agree, though I’ll point out that it’s a slightly different scenario in this specific case. Local swimmer…she’s probably known from a very young age where she was going to go to college, and has probably spent plenty of time in the general vicinity of the team and coaches and has basically unlimited unofficial visits that she can make to campus.
I understand the early commits for swimmers where it is fairly safe to say they have multiple schools beating down their doors and the kids are trying to make a decision to get back to training. Swimmers with multiple OT, National, US Open and even multiple Jr National cuts. While I appreciate this gal’s potential she doesn’t seem to meet this criteria. I am confused by a coach’s willingness to make offers to kids so early when they really don’t have a proven track record of success. Yes, the kids are being the proactive ones in this process (due to NCAA rules) by getting out there early but it takes two to tango and they would not be verbally committing… Read more »
Based on her times, versatility, and rate of improvement she seems like a good recruit for LSU! When you’re looking to move up (as LSU is in the SEC) then taking a few more chances is necessary. A year from now if she were to go 1:59 in i.m. and 4:45 in 500 they might have trouble keeping her away from some of the higher-profile SEC teams. So it is a calculated risk on both sides. Plus she’s in-state which is always nice for recruiting. Seems reasonable enough to me. Good luck to her.
Just wait…she’s going to be terrific – a star.
Gal? How about athlete.