Re the Claremonts, I know a few recruits that got in and a few recruits that were crushed when they didn’t. The coach we met with stated that he didn’t have much pull with admissions, and his solution was to encourage recruits to apply to Pitzer. That’s my problem with the Claremonts (all great schools), but coaches may not be able to give the same level of assurance of admission that other schools can. It goes without saying that you need top notch scores and grades, but you also need to ask specific questions about the likelihood of admission. Recruits should have a fairly good idea of their chances for admission by the time they apply, and the Claremonts tend to be more murky.