<p>Two young men in our area went to the same Ivy to play football this fall. Believe me it was "in the paper" news. Their recruitment was announced in a joint article in ?Jan, ?Feb, close to, but not right at the uniform signing day for DI football, and at a time totally unrelated to ED, RD, etc. They even published the class standing and ACT of the young man from a local public. The other boy went to our big rival private school, so I know from football parents at the school that he was courted ?to what extent? by at least 3 Ivies, and got offers from at least 2 - offers that he was considering right now, before and after Christmas.
Obviously, for football at least, the process doesn't work exactly like either arm of regular admissions, but based on their experience, most likely letters from Ivies are out, probably with FA awards. The public school kid was being recruited by some non-Ivies (do they still have D2 or D1-AA?), so he had to wait to hear from those schools as well.</p>