Predictions for AA?

[Hockey05]

Is this the NCAA? The CAHA board should be ashamed of themselves. The mandated all teams to San Jose to be "evaluated". That was a sham and a disgusting money grab. Most people knew how this was gonna shake out. What a joke. As someone stated earlier "it's good to be the king"

Sharks 12UAA team got sent down to A, so even they didn't get everything they hoped for.


Who do you figure made money from the tournament?  The Shark's rinks are booked solid about 18 hours/day, so they probably had to displace other customers to accommodate the jamboree.  I guess the refs made money they weren't expecting.


I take the jamboree as a reaction to weak teams playing last year.  How would you keep clubs from submitting weak teams?

 
You can't honestly say all of this was worth our time and money.  They could have come darn close to figuring out the exact same thing with regular scrimmages. 
And it isn't just the lower level teams that took it on the chin.  So too all the best teams that had to subject themselves to that garbage when they could have gone to a real tournaments and played run time games over a big holiday weekend. 
Now we have split divisions which in some cases have all So Cal teams.  So all those teams have to go up North again to not play one team from up North???  Some teams will be in Vacaville to play So Cal teams they will be playing 2-3 times in CAHA and also in a SCAHA exhibition.  That is nothing short of ridiculous.  I'd rather donate my money to all those suffering from the natural disasters and have a kids charity game.  More than hockey is being played, people are wastefully playing with our time and money. 

[KickSave]

Ha ha ha can you imagine the freak outs that would accompany decisions made without the jamboree?


You play in a statewide league. That means you travel statewide. Norcal teams have traveled to KHS to play other Norcal teams, CAHA tried giving SoCal teams local games last season... no matter what they do, people complain.

[NorcalDad]

You can't honestly say all of this was worth our time and money.  They could have come darn close to figuring out the exact same thing with regular scrimmages. 
And it isn't just the lower level teams that took it on the chin.  So too all the best teams that had to subject themselves to that garbage when they could have gone to a real tournaments and played run time games over a big holiday weekend. 
Now we have split divisions which in some cases have all So Cal teams.  So all those teams have to go up North again to not play one team from up North???  Some teams will be in Vacaville to play So Cal teams they will be playing 2-3 times in CAHA and also in a SCAHA exhibition.  That is nothing short of ridiculous.  I'd rather donate my money in a kids charity game to all the people suffering from natural disasters.  More than hockey is being played, people are wastefully playing with our time and money.

I was more curious about the previous "money grab" comment, like CAHA did it in order to profit in some way.  California is a goofy state for hockey - all the Norcal tier teams spend a lot of time and money to play Socal teams on CAHA weekends, but have few teams to play locally.  Since we only have a few teams up here, it makes it a necessary evil if we're going to play as a state.  It used to be that teams would travel and end up playing local teams, but I think that was mostly fixed last year.  Now that the flights are set, maybe they'll be smart enough (or hear from enough affected teams) that they'll double-check the schedules.


Jamboree aside, I wouldn't say that CAHA Tier is worth the time or money for Norcal families at all.  The cost of all that would buy almost unlimited local ice or trips to some nice tournaments farther east.

[Voice in ur head]

Well then why didn't the few teams travel to play the majority of the teams? Cuz it makes more sense to have more teams travel than just the few you are talking about.

[WCHP]

Well then why didn't the few teams travel to play the majority of the teams? Cuz it makes more sense to have more teams travel than just the few you are talking about.

i really think it was about ice availability, once the Ducks build their facility, i can see them alternating year to year. One year in NorCal one year in SoCal.

[Avcadet]

Well then why didn't the few teams travel to play the majority of the teams? Cuz it makes more sense to have more teams travel than just the few you are talking about.

i really think it was about ice availability, once the Ducks build their facility, i can see them alternating year to year. One year in NorCal on year is SoCal.

I asked a CAHA Director at the State Championship games about everything being up north. He told me it had to do with one location having 4 rinks vs. multiple locations down here. He remarked that once the new Irvine Ducks facility was built there would be rotations.

[dreal]

Initially, I was disappointed in the "Two Tier" system.  It was my belief that the travel to San Jose was pointless and that a subjective evaluation would be biased, with the Coaches conducting their evals.  As I watched at the Bantam and Midget level (I have kids at each level) and when it all played out, the teams were (IMO) placed at the appropriate level.  Two years ago, when my older son played Bantam AA and his Ducks team went to Nationals.  During that season, a Kings2 AA team played a horrible SCAHA pre-season, did not win a game, and was badly outscored.  The Coach and the Club recommended that the team drop to Bantam A.  The PARENTS were furious and demanded they remain at the AA level.  The Club, who did not want to lose a group of families, relented and allowed them to play at the AA level.  As expected, their team went 0-15, scored 4 goals and gave up 129!!  We played them and they did not have a shot on goal and we stopped shooting on net halfway through the 2nd period.  I didn't think that anyone "won" in that scenario.


I'm not sure if this new process is perfect and most likely needs some "fine tuning".  But it does put teams at a level where parity exists.  The lower flight will play games that should be competitive as will the upper tier.  This is just my opinion, and no I am not affiliated with CAHA.  Just my humble opinion...

[Voice in ur head]

The placement of the teams was fairly accurate, I agree. I believe that there will always be errors in placement due to a team missing players that weekend or having a bad showing. There is not a perfect solution. There will always be someone who is unhappy. The issue, for me, is that most people already knew where the teams were gonna end up with or without the jubilee. With that being said, now flight 2 is comprised of all SoCal teams, is there any reason that these teams need to go to NoCal to play teams already in their backyard? There is plenty of ice for those teams to play on.

[dreal]

I agree with Voice in ur head, the lower Tier teams should not travel to Northern California to play Southern California teams.  Hockey is a huge financial commitment and hopefully CAHA will utilize good judgement and common sense...

[Fowlmood]

I hope so, we already gave San Jose some tax money.  They're good.

[lcadad]

Two years ago, when my older son played Bantam AA and his Ducks team went to Nationals.  During that season, a Kings2 AA team played a horrible SCAHA pre-season, did not win a game, and was badly outscored.  The Coach and the Club recommended that the team drop to Bantam A.  The PARENTS were furious and demanded they remain at the AA level.  The Club, who did not want to lose a group of families, relented and allowed them to play at the AA level.  As expected, their team went 0-15, scored 4 goals and gave up 129!!  We played them and they did not have a shot on goal and we stopped shooting on net halfway through the 2nd period.  I didn't think that anyone "won" in that scenario.

That was the old days.  The last few seasons, teams that are far below the average have been dropping or getting forced to drop from every level from Tier2 to BB.  There was no need for this Flight system.  It may be clearcut for Bantams this season, but I can tell you that U16 people seem to take issue with the assignments. 


In PW my kid's team played a tough schedule, had all close games and got dropped into the 2nd flight where we get to play 5 other teams, one of which we have already beaten 2x by 5 goal margins each time.  If we had simply tied a game 3-3 that we lost 3-2 (and outshot the opponent by 5 shots as well) we would probably be in the top flight.  This happened for one reason and one reason only -- politics.  Our record was 1-3.  Another top flight team was 1-3.  "That's a strong team and should be in the topflight!"  Ok.  And that team we are talking about, lost to the same team we lost to 3-2, 3-0.  The team we beat 10-5 this weekend, played another team placed in the top flight over us, by 5-3 the weekend before.  We were told that flighting was to insure competition.  When you are losing to top flight teams by 2 goals in games where the shots are roughly even, and you could have won with a bit of puck luck, your team shouldn't be put in the lower flight and ours was. 


This is a solution nobody needed to a problem that doesn't exist.  It was tried roughly 10 years ago, but nobody at CAHA has any institutional knowledge.  I'm a bit tired of people talking about these extreme situations (OMG a team beat another team by 8 goals!).  I predict there will be any number of lopsided victories in the upper flight this year.  Will they double down to 4 flights next year?  It's kids hockey, these are games, it's a team game, there are geographical issues and size issues that benefit some clubs and handicap others, but at the end of the day, every single player in the NHL can tell you about games they played as a kid where the team they played on got spanked, or conversely beat another team badly.  It is not an important issue, it is part of life.  If this system was such a great idea, how come we don't see it anyplace else? 

[Into the Boards]

Sorry, but there is simply no other youth league I have ever heard of that evaluates teams and then categorizes them BEFORE they've even played a game.  This completely favors teams that move up together or that have been playing together for years over teams that are just coming together. 

What if 3 teams from Flight 2 all drastically improve and repeatedly beat top 8 teams from Flight 1?  Only that first place team in Flight 2 has the chance to go to the playoffs.  The other two Flight 2 teams are just screwed...all because someone judged them BEFORE the season had even begun!

This is exactly why no other leagues do it this way.

[skates]

This all could be solved if each club was only allowed one AA for each division. Then the best of the best kids would truly be picked. When clubs have 2 AA teams one is allways trying to play above their level.

[WCHP]

did we ever get the criteria on how each team was evaluated?

[fistocuffs]

This all could be solved if each club was only allowed one AA for each division. Then the best of the best kids would truly be picked. When clubs have 2 AA teams one is allways trying to play above their level.

How true.  One AAA, One AA, One A, One BB, and as many B's as you want.  Thats approx 90-100 kids in one level for one club.   Quite a bit for any club