 Lurker |
December 05th, 2008 17:12 GMT |
 
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Topics: 12
Replies: 1272
Post: #29473
PT: #1/24
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There has been an interesting development this year in the CYSA State Cup that has pretty much been under everybody's radar. Over all team numbers for the younger age groups are down compared to last year. For U12 and U13 age groups (boys and girls) there isn't a big difference. For the U11 age group, the decrease in the number of teams is significant. Here is how this year's and last year's numbers look
GU11
2008 - 56
2009 - 16
BU11
2008 - 63
2009 - 32
GU12
2008 - 62
2009 - 55
BU12
2008 - 59
2009 - 56
GU13
2008 - 71
2009 - 60
BU13
2008 - 64
2009 - 60
Overall, 96 fewer teams are playing State Cup this year in the younger age groups. The cost to register for the State Cup tournament went up this year, but not enough to offset this loss in revenue to CYSA. More important than that, however, is the HUGE reduction in teams in the U11 age category. In particular, notice the absence of some of the bigger names in youth soccer in NorCal (e.g., Mustang). Is this the start of a new trend? Is it a logical extension of the creation of a viable NorCal Premier Fall League? Inquiring minds want to know...
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Global Moderator
Topics: 9
Replies: 611
Post: #29474
PT: #2/24
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Nice work with the stats Lurker. I wonder if the proliferation of B teams that occured in the last few years is a factor. When this first started the B sides went to state cup. They seemed to trail off after a couple of first round exits.
Is it a trend? Only if others follow. I think SJSC and BOCA would love to move away and bet they are in good company.
It might be as simple the clubs realize u11 cups mean little and there are better thing to do..
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| Lurker |
December 05th, 2008 18:57 GMT |
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Topics: 12
Replies: 1272
Post: #29475
PT: #3/24
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From U12 and up, B teams might be a factor. The fact that every age/gender is down at least a little indicates something...
For U11, there are some major A teams that are not playing. Teams for this age from the same club last year did play. If you take a look at the NorCal Premier Fall league, this might explain things. Teams that do not play in a CYSA fall league cannot sign up to play in State Cup. There were 53 teams playing in the NorCall boys U11 division (Premier or Gold). There were 46 U11 girls teams playing in NorCal. Most of these teams, I would think, are not even registered under CYSA.
It's hard to take away something that somebody has experienced and is used to. It may be hard to sell the idea of not playing State Cup to teams that played previously. For the older aged teams (at least from the comments on this forum), State Cup is the ONLY thing teams consider important. New teams that have never been there and done that won't know what they are missing (or at least the parents wont).
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| Threads |
December 05th, 2008 21:00 GMT |
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Topics: 6
Replies: 329
Post: #29476
PT: #4/24
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My daughter's U12 team is staying home from State Cup this year. Our feeling is that they might go back as a U13 or U14, but at this age the girls are better served with a break for other sports or playing small-sided winter league. I guess we fit into the "B" team agenda.
With respect to Norcal - many of our parents believe that Norcal is strictly for top 20 elite teams and wouldn't offer good playing opportunity for a mid-tier Abronzino team. If Norcal wants to expand they might consider some PR to encourage teams like our to try their spring league - maybe reaching out to coaches.
Doing away with the spring league double header games would help their cause, too. That alone would be reason for us to stay with the spring CYSA league.
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| Lurker |
December 05th, 2008 21:12 GMT |
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Topics: 12
Replies: 1272
Post: #29477
PT: #5/24
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Quoted from: Threads, December 05th, 2008 21:00 GMTMy daughter's U12 team is staying home from State Cup this year. Our feeling is that they might go back as a U13 or U14, but at this age the girls are better served with a break for other sports or playing small-sided winter league. I guess we fit into the "B" team agenda.
With respect to Norcal - many of our parents believe that Norcal is strictly for top 20 elite teams and wouldn't offer good playing opportunity for a mid-tier Abronzino team. If Norcal wants to expand they might consider some PR to encourage teams like our to try their spring league - maybe reaching out to coaches.
For the U11 age groups, there were Premier and Gold divisions for the NorCal Fall league. For the U12 age groups, there were not enough teams for this (boy's and girls only had a Gold division). For anything older than U12, there aren't that many teams participating. My impression is that NorCal is focused on Clubs rather than Teams. Since the bigger clubs usually have an A and B team (sometimes more), they need to provide options for both levels of play. For smaller (less organized) clubs and independent teams, it may be harder to fit.
Quote Message
Doing away with the spring league double header games would help their cause, too. That alone would be reason for us to stay with the spring CYSA league.
Absolutely the double header format has to go... To a certain degree, they have this due to the limited number of teams from the same geography (a team traveling 2+ hours may want two games instead of one). Hopefully someone from NorCal reads this forum so that they can gain from the feedback...
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| Threads |
December 05th, 2008 21:37 GMT |
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Topics: 6
Replies: 329
Post: #29478
PT: #6/24
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Our club is MVLA - so we have lots of teams, although they are not as tightly organized as the A and B teams in some other clubs.
My daughter previously played Norcal spring league with another team and it seemed like an interesting option, but other parents have had experiences with mid-level teams being badly outclassed in Norcal and they are not inclined to go back.
Although certainly many teams that shy away from Norcal leagues still like the option of playing in US Club tournaments.
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Topics: 2
Replies: 666
Post: #29479
PT: #7/24
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Mustang has made a concious decision NOT to register any of this year's younger class 1 teams (U9-U11) with CYSA at all. They have played their league seasons with US Club Soccer and are therefore ineligible to participate in State Cup.
By all accounts, the teams, parents, coaches and club leadership are universally very satisfied with how this has worked out. Even with all its troubles and growing pains, competitively the NorCal leagues have been a much better experience.
It will be interesting to see if they extend this for next year's U12s. At U12 and above the state cup winners are eligible to participate in Regionals. Don't know if this will be enough of a reason to go back to CYSA. It would also be interesting to see if they make a distinction with the A/B teams (as in only register the teams with a legit shot at Regionals in CYSA). I certainly don't know, am not enough of an insider to influence, but it is interesting.
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Topics: 5
Replies: 86
Post: #29485
PT: #8/24
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This message was edited by soccer4kids on December 06th, 2008 08:08 GMT
There is a very simple explanation for what happened to the U11s and State Cup. NorCal decided this year to go "toe to toe" with CYSA and scheduled an obligatory two weekends of NorCal State Cup for the last 2 weekends of January and quarter-finals (in which all teams participate) for Feb 7th. This directly conflicted with the preliminaries of CYSA State Cup. This was done on purpose (admitted by NorCal) to get teams and clubs to make a choice. Most decided to go with NorCal and therefore had to decline to do State Cup -- and as a result, most registered for NorCal fall league rather than CYSA. There was a lot of discussion within and among clubs regarding this decision, with many waiting to see who would "jump ship" next before making the decision. Ironically, NorCal has now told the U11s they can play these 3 second round games "any time" between Dec. 5th and Jan. 25th -- now that it is too late to do CYSA fall league and sign up for State Cup. Very strategic way to help clubs move away from CYSA. Some clubs kept a toe in both, however, with "A" teams playing in NorCal and "B" teams in CYSA...
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Topics: 2
Replies: 666
Post: #29487
PT: #9/24
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I know with confidence that Mustang's decision was made LONG before Herb published his schedules for NorCal Cup... But I also believe that NorCal probably used the 'but Mustang's doing it' argument to press back when people complained about the NorCal Cup scheduling.
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Topics: 5
Replies: 86
Post: #29488
PT: #10/24
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This message was edited by soccer4kids on December 06th, 2008 17:27 GMT
Quoted from: Mustang Dad, December 06th, 2008 16:40 GMTI know with confidence that Mustang's decision was made LONG before Herb published his schedules for NorCal Cup... But I also believe that NorCal probably used the 'but Mustang's doing it' argument to press back when people complained about the NorCal Cup scheduling.
Absolutely right re NorCal. Not only that, but "they wanted us to do it this way...."
One very positive aspect for our "mid-level" U11 team is that with NorCal there are 2 rounds of "reseeding" and therefore a lot more games than CYSA state cup, where most teams are out after 3. With NorCal you play 3, perhaps are "outclassed" significantly in 1 or 2 games, then are reseeded, get more competitive, and by the time quarter finals roll around (in which all teams participate) each team should be extremely competitive with the quarterfinal opponent. Better for development, it seems, rather than a "winner take all" in the first bracket of play.
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