Thanks. So, would one hope to get a likely letter before making the decision to apply SCEA?
Yes, and hopefully the coach will be very clear that s/he will support the LL.
I do not believe this to be true based on my own experience over a number of years although it certainly is holy writ on this board. Whether a early application will be “required” by the coach in exchange for likely letter support (something which is at least technically a violation of the Ivy Common Agreement) will depend on the sport, school and the recruit’s desirability to a particular program. You will have certainly have a serious discussion about timing with the coach before a decision to seek a likely letter is made.
A likely letter can not be issued at any Ivy school without a complete application being submitted absent “extraordinary circumstances”. I have never heard of a letter being issued that way, fwiw. In my son’s cycle at his school, the coach wanted applications submitted RD and then the intent was to “switch” the applications to SCEA once the likely letter was issued. I do not believe his coach is doing that anymore though. But you are going to have to submit the entire application, including transcripts, test scores, recommendations, etc before the request for a likely letter will be reviewed.
This year for Harvard, the admissions committee had the likely letter decision meetings 4 times, starting on Sept 26, and approximately every two weeks until the November. To be considered for the LL, the application had to be complete, including test scores, LORs, etc, all before 1 week prior to the LL meeting. They also required an on-campus interview. Then the LL was sent out 1 week after their meeting.