I know everyone is not jumping to give away secrets, but I am asking anyway.

dont settle, use fss and stay close to home 360 miles and under

If you are in Div-2 or Div-3, you should try to fill your entire class with dropdowns/pulldowns (At least that is the case for B level prestige).  All the better teams seem to have all their players coming from the higher division.

know your limitations, don't over-extend, but keep your eyes on good prospects that you can reasonably aquire. Know your opponents when concidering battles. Do they have more scholarships (and thus more money) and how much prestige advantage do they have. One or two battles are ok, but don't try to battle for all of your recruits unless you have a significant prestige advantage and equal or more money than your opponents.

honestly, dont let  a high overall fool you. some of my best players have been 390-410 as freshman but have points in all the right places.

look at any players within 100 miles, uncheck the d3 search so you can see everyone. any player not ranked, under 480 or so that you like, send a phone call or 2. This gets you on their radar and one may contact you the 2nd or 3rd day and say  ex ' i'm not getting the attention i was hoping for, lets talk. that is a drop down you can grab and since he is really close, you can keep higher prestige players away because you have a money advantage if they try to fight you.

if you send me a sitemail i'll give you some pointers, but i'm not gonna put it out in the public for eveyone.

Posted by matt58vt on 7/17/2010 7:34:00 AM (view original):
honestly, dont let  a high overall fool you. some of my best players have been 390-410 as freshman but have points in all the right places.

I agree with this at DIII. At DII, it's usually better to recruit higher overalls.

Posted by car_crazy_v2 on 7/18/2010 6:28:00 PM (view original):

Posted by matt58vt on 7/17/2010 7:34:00 AM (view original):
honestly, dont let  a high overall fool you. some of my best players have been 390-410 as freshman but have points in all the right places.

I agree with this at DIII. At DII, it's usually better to recruit higher overalls.

Why are higher overalls better in DII?

Posted by car_crazy_v2 on 7/18/2010 6:28:00 PM (view original):

Posted by matt58vt on 7/17/2010 7:34:00 AM (view original):
honestly, dont let  a high overall fool you. some of my best players have been 390-410 as freshman but have points in all the right places.

I agree with this at DIII. At DII, it's usually better to recruit higher overalls.

I'm assuming you mean higher than 390-410, not that one should place more emphasis on overall rating.

Posted by usc4life on 7/19/2010 12:28:00 AM (view original):

Posted by car_crazy_v2 on 7/18/2010 6:28:00 PM (view original):

Posted by matt58vt on 7/17/2010 7:34:00 AM (view original):
honestly, dont let  a high overall fool you. some of my best players have been 390-410 as freshman but have points in all the right places.

I agree with this at DIII. At DII, it's usually better to recruit higher overalls.

Why are higher overalls better in DII?

I'm not sure why, but they just typically are. Usually higher ratings at DII and DI mean better core ratings. I would say at DI that this is very very very true. 

I have never looked at an overall rating and you really shouldnt you should look at core areas that you value for your need.

If you're a newer coach in D3, I would basically ignore anybody outside of 360 miles for the first few recruiting seasons. Your biggest limitation is your budget. If you stay inside 360, you can take on a risk (getting into a tough recruiting battle, chasing a tough pulldown) and if need be, still recover to have a solid recruiting class. When you try for someone 700 miles away, and on your fourth cycle someone 100 miles away starts battling you, you're in serious trouble.

Also, if I have 4 open spots, which usually means about $13K, I usually budget it this way:
1 high-quality pulldown - may cost me $4-7K, depending on the number of evals needed to get him to consider me
1 lower-cost pulldown or dropdown - hopefully for under $3K
1 local D3 guy with OK cores and good-to-great potential - under $1500
1 walk-on - by giving up one spot almost every year, I get to spend the recruiting money of 4 spots on only 3 spots.
FSS - usually just the 2 closest states (since I'm staying within 360 miles), so I can do this for under $1500

it doesn't always work out perfectly - 2 recruiting cycles ago, I blew $9K on a pulldown and a battle, and lost both guys. But most of the time, this strategy gets me a good mix of D2-caliber guys and D3 guys with some upside.