All the teams should be put into flight 1 and let them fight it out. As we have all stated many times this whole flighting system SUCKS!!
One of the biggest problems with this fighting system is that it benefits teams that have had a core group together for 2-3 years. Newly formed teams simply do not have enough time to get any kind of cohesion or plays in place.
Not trying to play devil's advocate, but as much as we dislike the flight system, I thought for the most part CAHA got it right last year...
Last year, WW and Saints were the two top teams in Flight 2, with Saints being the official champion and WW with the second best record in Flight 2 (yes they did lose to Mariners in the 'Flight 2 Playoff')... However, as decent as these two teams were, they were unable to beat any Flight 1 teams. So in a way, CAHA did get it right by grouping the perhaps more 03 heavy teams in Flight 1 and the younger teams in Flight 2...
Regarding the flight system benefiting teams with a core group together for 2-3 yrs, well in theory it should be true, but which team(s) in Flight 1 has a core group with a 2-3 yrs history?
Bears1 - Pretty much a brand new group with 5 or 6 AAA kids + AA kids from elsewhere + a few kids from A moving up
OC1 - more than half are either new to this group or did not play with OC last yr + a new coach
Saints1 - Not too familiar with this group but I didn't recognize more than half of them
GSE2 - can't say I know too much about their roster, but perhaps they've been together awhile? Idk...
WW - core has been together for many yrs but have at least 6 new players this season
All I'm saying is that there are so much off-season movement that it's rare to see a group hanging on to their true core for more than a few yrs...
Guess we could go back to how things were, or follow 16AA, and go with a no-flight system, but I'm sure we will bitch about teams losing/winning by 10+ goals and how it's a waste of time for the so-called better teams to sandbag and for the lesser teams, not being able to play competitive games...