Hello guys, I lost a lot of cash trying to battle in D1. I had three schollies open, I battled higher prestige teams to no avail. I am at IUPUI, Indiana, and some teams pulled players easily from me.

First, I spent a lot to get a player considering me, but he ended up on a BIg 10 team. I guess I had no shot, but I did not know it.

Second, I spent a lot on a player, was the only considered, woke this morning and it said : TOO LATE... He went to a Big East team.

Sigh*

Anyways, I could not prevent the second thing, since I did not know the Big East team would push for my player. But for the Big Ten player, is it a waste of time? And how easy is it for a team with higher prestige to get players from my team? I have a D prestige.

It's very, very easy for higher prestige Big 6 schools to take recruits from your team if you're D prestige.  Prestige is HUGELY important in D1, unlike D2 and D3.  For every full letter grade a team has you out-prestiged, you need to put in roughly 40% more effort than they do to win the recruit.  So if distances were the same and the Big 10 school had C prestige and spent $20,000 on the kid, you'd need to spend roughly $28,000+ to win the battle.  And given you aren't in a full conference with $20k+ in post-season cash, beating Big 6 schools is very, very tough.  Also, if you are on the lower end of D prestige (so, close to D-) and the other school had a high C prestige, you'd need to outspend them by closer to 50%.  

The Big East school probably saw you were in a battle with a Big 10 school, realized you were weak, and came in and snatched a recruit you couldn't protect.  This is the norm in D1.  If you battle a school right out of the gates in D1 and have a lower prestige, other teams are going to know you're weak and will look to poach (I don't believe in this term, but it's what gets thrown around all the time, so I'll use it) at signings.

At D prestige your goal should not be to bring in the best recruits that will talk to you....your goal should be to sign lower-rated guys with lots of high/high potential that can develop into good players in 2-3 seasons.  Big 6 schools tend to not go after these types of players.  I don't know which recruits you lost or which Big 6 schools came in on you, but my gut tells me you probably aimed too high at D prestige.  

Find a mentor, I'd be happy to help when I can.... I've had tremendous help learning D1 and played about 20 seasons now (not much under this ID though). 

Site mail is the best option for folks to give you step by step, context related advice as you work thru things.

Do you have any more D1 recruiting coming up?

Different coaches have different advise on how to do a rebuild in a Lower Div-1 school.  First, let me say that I see Div-1 as 3 levels, Big-6 Schools, Mid Majors (like A10, CUSA, and the couple of B baseline schools out there like Gonzaga, Utah, UNLV, New Mexico, Marquette, DePaul), and then Lower (the rest).

The way I recruit for Lower Div-1, is I pick players who are better than I have now, but not nearly good enough to be on a Big-6 ream.  I also tend to send 1 phone call to see if I can recruit guys rated at 40 or higher.  I also tend to wait until several cycles pass before I really decide on recruits based on what others take and who is left.

Once I get my prestige up to the C+/B- level, then I try recruiting much better players (the same way I recruit at the Mid Major level).  When I start going after good players at this level, I have no issues leaving 2 or even 3 spots open (take walkons) to allow me to recruit 3 players with 6 spots until a build a good nucleus of at least 5 players.  In fact, I don't think you can really compete at the mid-major level without taking walkons and using at least 2 spots worth of cash per recruit.  Once I have a good team and a decent nucleus, then I start filling all spots again.

Thanks guys. I spent 15k on that battle and did not get it. Lost 7k on a player ineligible, taken by a Big East team.

Here is my team, I had six recruits last year, three this year, it's all done.

You can comment. Not sure If I did it right.

http://www.whatifsports.com/hd/TeamProfile/Ratings.aspx?tid=11906

Without seeing your potentials, your recruits look really good. Looks like you'll make the postseaon in year 4, or maybe year 3.