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What's up y'all, stats are in the title. I'm a HYP football player applying K-JD. I've pretty much leaned on my experience as a D1 football player in my apps/personal statements, as it really has been a formative and character-defining experience for me. I'm pretty confident that this is a relatively strong soft factor, but I also don't know just how strong of a soft it is (If anyone has thoughts/experience on that, please let me know).

Anyways, I blanket-applied to most of the T-14, along with UT and SMU. I'm from Texas and my goal is Texas (preferably Dallas) biglaw litigation, ideally with a clerkship if possible.

I sent it on the T5 schools in spite of my chances, because why not shoot your shot? Realistically though, UT is obviously a good option with in-state tuition (and maybe some money??), and I will also be pursuing the Sumners route at SMU (no debt with a stipend sounds great, and I could live at home). Aside from these, I'm very attracted to UVA and Duke. For one thing, I would love to get out of New England and head back south. Also, it seems to me that the prestige bump of these two (particularly UVA) would give me a much better shot at the clerkship route, and also a higher chance of securing the cream of Texas biglaw.

So to get to the point: I like UVA/Duke a lot, but to justify either of them I would probably need at least some amount of money. Putting aside the fact that I have to get in first (which is of course far from guaranteed), can anyone comment on my odds of getting any sort of merit aid with these scores/softs? Either up front or through a negotiation process, I really just want to know if this is something I can realistically hope for and factor into my calculus. Thanks y'all

It looks like you have a very good chance of both admission and $ at Michigan and down (I'd attribute the lower admission % at Berkeley and Cornell to YP, so would recommend writing Why X's for at least those two schools). You also have a decent chance of getting into Columbia/NYU/Penn (though probably without $). Overall, I'd recommend applying to all of the T13 from Columbia and down to maximize your options. If there are any you haven't applied to, I'd strongly urge you to do so - it's not worth trying to save on application fees.

I urge you to return to TLS when you actually have offers in hand. Speaking broadly, for your goals you should ideally attend a T13 with $, which seems like a realistic outcome for you. If you don't get substantial $ at any T13, which seems unlikely (but not impossible), then a T20 with $ (esp. Texas or Vandy) might be the best outcome for you. If you don't get substantial $ at any T13/T20, which seems extremely unlikely, you should probably bite the bullet and attend a T13 anyway. Given your goals and numbers, you should not attend SMU. SMU is a good school, but it's too far below the T13/T20 to justify choosing it in your case.