I was contacted by a recruiter through email a couple weeks after applying to schedule a first interview with the hiring manager. I never spoke to a recruiter about the position first, I just went straight into a first interview. I felt really confident I would get a second interview after speaking with the hiring manager for 30 minutes over Zoom. After all of my behavioral question answers he kept saying "wow, that's a really good answer". He did not point out any deficiencies in my skills or experience. Since I had not spoken to a recruiter initially I reached out to the one(s) that scheduled my interview after my first interview to express my thanks to the hiring manager and ask the expected pay range for the position (and since there is now a law in my state that says pay ranges have to be disclosed). The one recruiter said the other could answer that question and then I was ghosted for two weeks until I received an automated email at 2am on a Sunday that said I was rejected for the position. I had absolutely no indicators from my first interview that I wouldn't be getting a second panel interview. I reached back out to the same recruiters asking for some interview critique and (of course) have not heard back.