My son is a Junior rated as an all state 1st/2nd teams defensive player of a large NE state. He has established good relationship with 2 of the top ivy football coaches. Each coach as “offered him” a spot…pending academic review. These have been made in person and via formal looking letters from the coach (not a likely letter). They continue to communicate with him frequently via twitter and discussions with his coach . They have each been provided grades and scores before they made this “offer”. His GPA is 4.0 with all AP/Honors classes. His SAT were at 1750 so far. We are heading into spring with much interest from many other schools including 1 big 10 school and 2 other ivys.
My question is how much stock should he place in these offers of support from the ivy coaches. I know about AI and I know he is on the lower side. If he was not going to make it I would hope they would tell him up front.
Also how have others managed the Ivy process vs non-ivy recruiting at the same time. Ivys appear to want commitments earlier than non-ivys. How do you keep your options open. Especially if you dont know true commitments from Ivys until near the end of the process.
The following information is based on general Ivy recruiting experience, it is not football specific.
Your son has received a conditional offer, which is different from an unconditional offer. There are surely some bad people out there, but from what you have disclosed, and subject to your personal judgment, there is no reason to believe that if all applicable conditions were met and the offer became unconditional, that the offer would be dishonored.
AI has a floor, as you are aware, so you can see if that might come into play. Otherwise, AI is dynamic, based on the AI of teammates and in fact the whole school. In general, athletic ability and the chance of being admitted with a lower AI are positively correlated.
From what you have posted, the conditional offer your son received was not a quid pro quo for any type of firm commitment from him. So you are not constrained or hampered in any way in your other recruiting efforts. In fact, the Ivy Manual would prohibit a request for a matriculation commitment:
The “devil is in the details” - of exactly what they have said verbally and in their letters. But based on what you’ve said, I’d place a fairly decent amount of weight in their offers.
As far as if he’ll make it past admissions, why not ask the coaches what they think? You don’t mention that in your post. What have they said about his current SAT? They’ll usually give an opinion on it and a goal for a higher score. (Also, has he tried the ACT?)
Keeping options open is easy. It’s basically automatic, everything is verbal and nonbinding.
The letters said the coach will support your application with the addmission office (with a big caveat stating admissions makes decision not the coach). We have asked about what he needs and they stated it would be good if he could improve 50pts.
In respect to leaving options open it appears that most Ivys want you to apply ED which is basically hard committing in October. That is smack in the middle of season. This implies if you are committing to Ivy you have to decide before your season starts. That closes out interest from other schools as your season progresses.
Yea, I assume most ivy will want you to apply ED, so your options for them will close on Nov 1 generally.
But they can get pre reads starting July 1. A positive pre read and full support from the coach is pretty much golden. So you’ll have all summer and fall to decide.
A couple things off the top. First, I wouldn’t consider any communications with the coach to be an offer until and unless your son hits the SAT target and gets an unconditionally positive pre read (after July 1 as mentioned up the thread). Second, I assume one of the schools you are talking about is Yale, since Coach Reno has been sending out those “you are in a select group of athletes that we will support to the admissions office” letters for at least the last couple years. I would caution you that HYP can at times have quirky admissions relationships. There is a thread here where a poster shared her son’s trials with both Harvard and Yale admissions this last December. In addition, two of the very early commits in my son’s class at Princeton never matriculated there because they could not get through admissions. While academics are hugely important at all the Ivys, they are just a bit bigger deal at HYP. Especially if your son is a one or two band kid, I personally would want to have contingencies in place until admissions comes through with a likely letter. Third, in my experience watching my son and others, it is a bit of a juggling exercise to proceed on both the Ivy and regular D1 track. My experience is a bit different than what you have observed though. From what I have seen, regular D1 recruiting moves much more quickly than Ivy, largely because of the necessity of pre reads and waiting until July. Which brings me to point four, don’t get caught up on all the ED required stuff on this website. Football doesn’t work that way. All of the Ivys recruit into the RD round. While the recruiting calendar is accelerating in the Ivy, it is still no where near as accelerated as regular D1. Every situation is different, but over the last half dozen years I am pretty confident I know kids who have been offered at every Ivy. I have never heard of one requiring an ED app to secure support for a likely letter.
Overall, I would say that all of the coaches my son dealt with were honest with him through the process. Some of them are fast talkers, no doubt. But all were frank with him (and me) when asked specific questions. Enjoy this process with your son. It is at times annoying, but it’s also pretty cool. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, and feel free to pm me if you want more specifics. Good luck.
Update. It has been an interesting month. Another ivy “offer” (now at 3), 1 small loccal FCS offer, strong interest from a high academic FCS, and interest from 1 big 10 and 1 ACC. We got a better read on AI and he moved up 30 points on the SAT so he is right at 200.
@Ohiodad51 you were right FBS move faster from the recruiting/Offer POV. I guess I was saying “offers may come earlier but commitment for non-ivys can be later” Good to know the RD is an option so that if he does not ED he can focus on his last season rather than deciding if it goes that far out. Hopefully he decides in the summer.