My son went through this last year in track and field.
Pomona was mentioned above; the coach was clear he had two slots but they went to the athletes that could score the most points. The rest were tips that didn’t provide the admissions certainly of fit example NESCAC support, at least of an Amherst, Williams, etc. The Claremont’s, etc are different schools and different recruiting coaches so I wouldn’t mix them.
The key in getting interest is whether the athlete no matter the event can or will score points in the conference championship. Doesn’t matter if there are two hurdlers. Multi event scorers would get preference I’m sure.
My son emailed coaches of schools he was interested in and filled out questionnaires - and at least in the case of Williams, those are reviewed as the coach contacted him based on that not the email (could be timing but they still went through it apparently).