One of the issues I've seen over the years (applied 3 cycles straight, took this year off reapplying next cycle) is as followed. So SDN numbers are really high. Like 21+ AA for acceptances. That seems unreasonable but then you figure there are schools that are accepting a 15 AA (see the ADEA book and look at the range of accepted students for the less talked about schools). Then there are schools that you can't even apply to like South Carolina or Georgia where they only take in state students.
There's this number of 4800 students start as D1s each year. Let's say the top 800 have those 21+AA. There has to be like 400 students where getting a <17AA still gets them into school for whatever reason. Then you have to take out a bunch of spots to schools you have no shot of getting into (Harvard, out of state at all the southern schools, not WICHE, etc.). There's reasonably a lot less spots out there than you think.
So moral of the story, get that high score.
