I just took over my first team at the DI level (Ohio U, D prestige) and was looking for some advice/tips from any experienced coaches at that level.

Recruiting starts in a few days and I am hoping not to screw up too had as I have heard recruiting at DI is an entirely different animal. What caliber of players will I be able to get? Which will send me a backup message? At DI what are the best qualities to recruit for in your players or is that similar to the lower divisions? Will I be able to battle higher prestige schools, especially some from the Big 6 conferences, or should I just give up on a guy if one of those schools shows up on him?

Any advice for outside of recruiting would be very helpful as well. Thanks in advance for any input.

From someone who has done this recently (UT Chattanooga in Knight), you are looking at nothing higher than 1 or 2 star guys in your first year or two. You can certainly send some phone calls out to guys ranked higher, but in all likelihood they will reject you. The prestige difference in DI plays a much greater role than in the lower divisions. I'm not saying you can't beat someone a grade higher, but it will cost a lot of money. Competing with big 6 teams at this point is pretty much off the table because they will have a huge money advantage on you.

You've made it this far so you must have some semblance of knowing what you're doing. Don't try to reinvent the wheel. Recruit for potential, and in 3 or 4 seasons you will get that prestige up into the C/C+ range, and then you can start getting some real recruits.

I'm making my first attempt at D1 in a long time and last time I gave up after 2 seasons because I missed my D2 conference and went back. Would you say it is smarter to go after some in range D1 recruits early and try to wrap them up early, or to wait for a few cycles, spend no money and see who comes back not on any bigger teams lists in order to not risk being poached by higher teams?

At a very low prestige DI school I would tend to treat it almost like being at a DII, wait a few cycles to figure out if the big boys are going after any of your targets before you dump any big time money. That's only my philosophy though. I'm sure there are other coaches that would do it different.