Peewee AA 2017-2018

[MO-ICETIME]

So will only 8 teams make AA and the rest dropped to A? Or is it 8 and 8 in each Division?

Doesn't sound like they are putting a number to it. Could be 10 in top and 6 in bottom; I would guess (not assume) it depends on the number of teams declaring. if they can't make bottom, then they could get dropped to A.

Interesting! I think the top team getting a free ride to States is dumb however.

It puts alot of emphasis on the CAHA weekends for sure!!!

[b77]

So will only 8 teams make AA and the rest dropped to A? Or is it 8 and 8 in each Division?

Doesn't sound like they are putting a number to it. Could be 10 in top and 6 in bottom; I would guess (not assume) it depends on the number of teams declaring. if they can't make bottom, then they could get dropped to A.

Interesting! I think the top team getting a free ride to States is dumb however.

It puts alot of emphasis on the CAHA weekends for sure!!!

Wait so all the 07 teams playing up into AA this year are going to take spots from legitimate AA teams and players and then not have to play them when the little Gretzkys can't hang with the kids 3 years older than them. [size=78%]This just gets better and better.[/size]


 If a team that declares AA and then gets bumped down to A does the club get to field another AA team or is that bid just lost?

[MO-ICETIME]

So will only 8 teams make AA and the rest dropped to A? Or is it 8 and 8 in each Division?

Doesn't sound like they are putting a number to it. Could be 10 in top and 6 in bottom; I would guess (not assume) it depends on the number of teams declaring. if they can't make bottom, then they could get dropped to A.

Interesting! I think the top team getting a free ride to States is dumb however.

It puts alot of emphasis on the CAHA weekends for sure!!!

Wait so all the 07 teams playing up into AA this year are going to take spots from legitimate AA teams and players and then not have to play them when the little Gretzkys can't hang with the kids 3 years older than them. [size=78%]This just gets better and better.[/size]


 If a team that declares AA and then gets bumped down to A does the club get to field another AA team or is that bid just lost?

And there it is.. those 07 teams! Humm??

[Hockey05]

Thank you for posting this Mo-Icetime. 
So as I read this, the two divisions will not play each other and we just lost another 8 games after getting back the SCAHA league games.  Or, will the divisions play each other and have the games count?  I see the divisions being 8 teams each.   

If you are going for a coach and growth at a lower level club does this mean that you lose out on a faster pace because your stuck in a lower division? 

Does the season just end for the lower division teams with no playoffs? 

The way this is written, it does not count on coaching or player development over the course of a year.  Sure some teams just do not belong, but other clubs very much approach the off season differently.  Some of this is by choice and in other cases by no choice.  At PWAA, often outside of big clubs you don't really look at a spring practice and say "There is the PWAA team.  They are all pretty much out there or it sure looks like they are out there." 

Yes, IMO this does create a bias for a '07 team playing up.

Lastly, kids are forced to go play each other Labor Day and all of us travel to San Jose.  Instead of saving money to play local or spend money and have a choice to go play wherever we damn well please. 

It's my bet we won't have an answer to any of it before tryouts. 

[6607]

If its 8 and 8 in each flight, CAHA will have guaranteed all flight 1 teams a spot in the playdowns or a bye on the basis of Labor Day and two exhibition games.  What's the point of the season?  There will be 1 spot in playdowns up for grabs.  So much for on ice competition.  Teams and families relegated to the second flight get screwed - if your team is relegated to pee wee a you get your release, but presumably flight 2 teams know their season is over before the regular season even starts and are locked into that team??? 

[Rats13]

It seems like if CAHA is truly going to evaluate teams then the arbitrary 2 teams per club limit could be changed?

[6607]

"At the conclusion of the regular season, the 1st place team in the top flight will automatically advance to State Championships.  Playdowns will include the 2nd – 8th place teams in the top flight.  The top team in the bottom flight will have a chance to compete for the final playdown spot."

* * *

This makes me think that there will be more than 8 teams per flight and that the reward for finishing first in the second division is a chance to compete with the bottom of flight 1 in a play-in series of games for the last playdown spot.  Confusing, not sure what we are buying if we go AA.

[Hockey05]

"At the conclusion of the regular season, the 1st place team in the top flight will automatically advance to State Championships.  Playdowns will include the 2nd – 8th place teams in the top flight.  The top team in the bottom flight will have a chance to compete for the final playdown spot."

* * *

This makes me think that there will be more than 8 teams per flight and that the reward for finishing first in the second division is a chance to compete with the bottom of flight 1 in a play-in series of games for the last playdown spot.  Confusing, not sure what we are buying if we go AA.

Which then means there is an extra game to determine 3rd and 4th place with the top 3 teams advancing to the state championships to play agains the regular season champ. 
I guess I'll give CAHA the benefit of the doubt for trying something new, but I hate losing hockey games.  You can make the argument to me that we lose traveling for two CAHA weekends, but we all gained an extra trip to San Jose that few of us would have ever taken. 


I guess it will be fun, sort of a European soccer league with a playoff that the top team from the lower tier makes.  But how do you determine the top half teams at PWAA? There is no way you could do that at PWA last year and be correct.  Practically all of the teams belonged at that top level.  Who would be the judge of this or would it be entirely statistical driven? 


But it sounds different, I guess fun, I hope we know more details soon. 

[Icelife]

In all seriousness, can someone please explain what they are trying to do in layman's terms? I'm so confused about "flight" and "play down". Is the assumption there will be the same amount of AA teams there were A teams last season? They will all be on the same level during Labor Day Tournament, then divide the teams into 2 groups, a top (X) number of teams and (y) group who didn't play as well in the first few games? Then the kids play for several months but doesn't really matter because playoffs are set in the first few games of the season? Doesn't make much sense...teams get better through the season because they work hard and learn to work together. Sounds to me if I am interpreting this correct, those teams that are created with same birth year since Mites, will always take the top spot since they don't have to work out the kinks in the beginning of the season... I'm lost!

[6607]

It IS confusing.  Can't tell if the idea is for there to be 8 upper division and 8 lower division teams (although I heard a rumor from a usually well informed source several weeks ago that there would be only 16 teams in PWAA this season).  This format seems to put the cart before the horse: Labor Day and pre season become more important than the regular season. 

I don't see the value in having the lower flight as part of AA.  They are effectively creating a new tier of hockey that appears not to have a true playoff at the end of the regular season.  That sucks.  1 playdown spot(or the opportunity for 1 team from the lower flight to compete for 1 playdown spot ) is not much to play for.  It would have made more sense just to create a tier 3 with its own playdowns and state championship.

Worse yet, will this process be fair?  Will CAHA really relegate the Ducks, Kings, Sharks and Gulls teams if warranted?  Will they relegate Ducks, Kings and Sharks 07 teams to a lower division when they are predestined to play AAA in 18/19?   If there are 20 some teams vying for AA, the match ups will be extremely important. 

[Nowhearthis]

I applaud the effort to get more parity of competition during the season.  The selection process described however is very flawed.
If there are 18-19 teams (as usual) then the selection can only be based on 4 single weekend travel games and 3 preseason games
so you see only 7 of your opponents out of 18.   That mathematically is not statistically enough a sample for any precision (need 9-10 games for strength of schedule to work).  So it makes the schedule and short benching of too much importance too early.


Sadly, I can hear now all the messages on this board about this after the first weekend from half of the teams.


Solution: If we have more games (and make them local since we have majority of the teams and sheets here), it could work.


Caha?

[MO-ICETIME]

I don't take it as 8/8 per division. just using last season as an example:Their were 18 teams and for arguments sake top flight can be 12 and bottom 4 and last 2 teams get dropped to A. With 12 teams only 7 make it to play downs from Top Flight and 1 of 4 makes it from Bottom flight.


Random thoughts:
I think I read a few weeks ago that CAHA was going back to the old format, so i don't see their being a reduction in potential games, it should be more than last season. 


So it looks like Play-Downs will be the same with the exception of the #1 seed getting the bye.


I really want to see if those 07 teams get pushed down to PeeWee A. Hey, if they deserve Top or Bottom.. It is what it is and congrats.. BUT if not??


Feels like it's still a work in process but could be a move in the right direction at keeping clubs from moving teams up too fast.


Nowhearthis GREAT POINT! I did notice that it said some teams may be required to participate in a few local preseason games.. Guess this will be for the teams on the fence.

[#4BobbyOrr]

The geniuses at CAHA strike again. I can't imagine a more convoluted and stupid system. Now we have AA and Aa.

[MO-ICETIME]

The geniuses at CAHA strike again. I can't imagine a more convoluted and stupid system. Now we have AA and Aa.

HAHAHA!! Needed that laugh this early in the morning!

[#4BobbyOrr]

The geniuses at CAHA strike again. I can't imagine a more convoluted and stupid system. Now we have AA and Aa.

HAHAHA!! Needed that laugh this early in the morning!

This make 7 (SEVEN!) levels of Peewee in California.  AAA major, AAA minor, AA, Aa, A, BB, and B.  Do we really need the seven levels of peewee?  Dante's hell only had 9 levels.