one thought. you have to understand that recruiting is PURELY considering credit drivne. so if a home visit is worth 100 points for you, and 100 points for someone else, if you only give 200 points, and they give 500, the other team will win. every time. and in many cases, a home visit might give you 100 points, and give them 150, or 200, or 50.
in d2, you have more money than d3, and higher prestige. the on probation probably knocked that schools credit down somewhat, but WIS hits those programs hard when they get put on probation. however, they don't give them huge penalties on top of that (an a- prestige school might drop to d-, but then, they are probably on even footing as other d- schools). and thats just how divisions work in WIS - worst d2 school is basically as prestigeous as the best d3 school. in real life, maybe the best d3 teams would wreck bottom end d2 teams. actually, they would here, too. but they don't have an advantage in recruiting (not artificially - smarter coaches garner many major advantages).
so basically, the other coach jumped on, spent a bunch of money, and took the player from you. doing *1 eval* is like doing nothing, thats not going to keep the kid coming. the other coach probably out spend you 20 times in that cycle alone, and had out spent you by double or more overall, so the player signed with him. if you want someone in this game, you have to spend a bunch on them, or risk the other school wants him more, spends more, and you lose him.