I’ll explain for this applies to this list of “best players by grade” so here goes...If you had been held back a grade, should you be listed in your current grade (therefore one school class year older than your classmates) or should you be listed in the grade you would be in if you had not been held back.

I still say grade is grade...current grade. What about the kid whose parents kept him back from first grade because they "didn't think he was quite ready"? It gets too wierd !!

So if a kid is held back in fifth grade, and is the best Freshman of his HS class, should he not be considered for Freshman of the Year?

Can you be held back 2 times?, 3 times?. It depends on the award criteria. Best "true" freshman - no. Best freshman - yes.

With 2500 kids playing HS hockey and however many incoming freshman there are, I don't plan to do the research as to how many times each kid was left back.

Carl --- Back to the billeting issue. We are in complete agreement in re what high school hockey, all high school sports, should be all about. To me, here's where it gets complicated...if a kid wants to play his sport in college at any level, he's generally preparing for it in high school. College football players come directly from high school, as do college basketball players. D1, D11, D111. In those sports, high schools are the prime sources, essentially the only sources, of college players. Not so, any longer (unfortunately), with hockey. With extremely rare exceptions, NCAA hockey players at any level of play above club or intramural are products of the Junior hockey "system" or a post-graduate year at a prep school. You can look at any college roster and see that. That being the case, it seems to me that there must be accommodation between high school eligability and Junior Hockey. Because as long as the college programs look first for Junior Hockey experience, high school hockey programs will not fully serve as the player sources that high school football and basketball do.
Deep breath. Therefore, how do we reconcile what high school athletics "should be all about" with the contemporary realities that face student/athletes? To me, that's the nub of the issue and I don't have the answer.

Sorry. The above should be on "A Seedings"' not here!! (and I don't know how to move it).

Good points. Frankly, NCAA college hockey is a bit of a disgrace, trying to be the 3rd "money sport" on the cheap. If they don't want you until you are a 20 year-old freshman, what are you going to do in the meantime? Of course if you've been held back a couple of years, you could be a 22 year-old freshman--somebody's got to buy the beer. Even your PG-prep school player is being told to go play a year of Junior hockey.

At least D-1 football takes its players straight out of HS, red-shirts them, and plays 24 year-old linemen. And NCAA basketball only gets to keep their stars 1 year before they are off the the NBA. Major league baseball doesn't want you playing college (pitchers, anyway) lest some win at all costs college coach burn the young arms out with overwork.

College hockey uses the Jr leagues as an unofficial red-shirt program, but all the risk (of injury) and all the cost is on you. There's plenty of opinions on the side that playing two teams at the same time is too much for the younger athlete. Our local Jr programs need the under-age bodies to pay their bills. I understand our local "JrA" will be something like $9100 next year--could be misinformation. Do we have that many true Jr age players that want to defer college for years? So there needs to be younger players to take up the slack.

Noted hockey icon (the late) Herb Brooks started an elite HS-age split-season Midget league in Minnesota directly to counteract the growth of Jrs. He wanted the players in HS, in their homes, in their communities. This turning HS-age players into hockey gypsies ("to get exposure") is an inheritance from the Canadian hockey world, where players had to be collected from large geographic areas to form competitive teams. We are stuck with that viewpoint for now.

My accommodation between Jr and HS would be this: true Junior hockey is for post-grads. Midget ("elite") hockey would be for HS age players, folded in with a split season so players play 50+ games between Sept and March, instead of 80+ between two teams. Save some money, find some time for cars, girls, jobs, hopefully schoolwork. Cut the cost of travel hockey at that age group, increase the level of participation on elite Midget teams, hopefully improve the quality of both HS and Midget hockey.

Carl --- I agree with everything you have just said. The question I can't answer, the question that remains up in the air in your suggested accommodation (or any facimille) is this: What do we do in the meantime?

Between now and March 22nd, nothing.

Those of us condemned to remain here have this issue and similar ones to confront going into next year. We have the Phila Catholic League schools joining the PIAA--what (if anything) does that change? We are trying to consolidate eastern PA HS hockey into a single organization--how will that work? What's the right divisional, tiered structure for HS hockey schedules? What are the right playoffs? Varsity II's? How do we sustain struggling programs, grow new ones?

The issue of billeted players will get addressed, with a lot of other things, when we have a true body of rules and single organization in place to do it. I don't intend to give up, but I expect to spend a lot of time chasing my tail.

Carl --- I read your last post and let go with a hearty chuckle, not at you, but with you. Because, as you know probably better than I do, the task will be a multi-year, monumental, task. And, regardless of the end-game, Juniors as the primary feeders for the NCAA will have to change in order for the optimum structural reform to take place (ie. for high school athletics to be what they should be, including ALL of their student/ athletes, freshmen (of any age!) through seniors). A huge task.

quote:

Originally posted by Snipe:
Here's a legitimate issue for Congress to get involved with rather than trying to catch baseball players in a lie. Why not make Jr. hockey and college hockey two separate and distinct paths like college baseball and minor league baseball? Players signing a Jr. contract would be ineligible to play NCAA hockey. Hockey players should expect the same transition to college as any other sport.

Because your idea already exists. Once you sign a contract with a CHL team, or even stay at tryouts for more then 48 hours, you are NCAA ineligible.

Or make juniors 17 to 20, keeping young talent in the area and if they decide as seniors to move on let them. Kinda like the NFL rule of playing two years at college.

Exactly, make it the same for all Jr. leagues. Put an end to the nonsense of 22/23 year old freshmen.

Jr. hockey should be a "next level" alternative to college hockey, not an intermediate step.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Snipe,

Pond -- Under your theory, could those seniors that "moved on" also play high school hockey? If not, and they stayed at their high school while playing Junior, think of the peer disapproval they'd have to deal with. It would be pretty unpleasant for them, I'd think.