Rain, Rain, Go Away

A huge storm came through the Chicago area in the early morning hours on Friday.  It had been a wet week, but the clouds were breaking as I headed to the complex to take in a number of the U14 games at 11AM.  I had the day all mapped out.  Which games to see and for how long in order to make sure that I could watch all the U14 teams in attendance.  I was very interested in watching the Mustang Rampage team from California, as well as the Real Colorado team and the PDA Charge (NJ).  I also wanted to see the St Louis SC girls and the Michigan Hawks team as I know they are both top teams in Region II.

As I drove up to the complex, I didn’t see anyone at the entrance.  Sweet!  I can save the $5 weekend parking payment because I’m here so early.  But as I made my way into the 20 field complex, something obviously wasn’t right.  Where were all the cars?  I can’t be that early.  Halfway along the one way circle drive through the complex, I was stopped my a tournament volunteer.  All morning games had been cancelled due to the wet field conditions.  Field changes and future updates would be posted on their website, but the U13 games were likely going to be moved to fields in Geneva, about an hour away.  Perfect.

We had at least half the U13 team driving in that morning from Minnesota and on the road.  If we were going to play in Geneva (western suburb of Chicago), families driving in should alter their route and come through Rockford.  If people stayed on their current route through Milwaukee, they would have another hour of driving to get to Geneva.  A few frantic phone calls and word began to get out to the team.  Most coming in that morning had got an early start and were already past Milwaukee.  The team manger was just passing Madison and turned around, planning on taking I90 through Rockford and meeting the team in Geneva.

An hour later, we got word that all Friday games were cancelled and to keep an eye on the website for tomorrow’s schedules.  By that time it was too late to re-re-route the manager, so they had a nice 8 hour drive into the hotel.  Fun.

A little bowling, a team dinner, and a Rubik’s Cube (one of the girl's younger brother was toting around a cube and I asked to borrow it) saw the rest of the day fly by, still with no word about Saturday’s games.  The girls went to bed planning on getting up for a 9AM game as was on the website’s schedule.

I remember when the Rubik’s cube first came out when I was in 5th grade.  I was immediately hooked by the movable cube and spent many and hour twisting and turning the colored faces trying to hone my technique.  Me and my nerdy friends in junior high school used to take the cube apart and Vaseline the pieces in order to reduce the friction and thus improve on our already stellar sub-one-minute times to complete the puzzle.

Unlike riding a bike however, solving the puzzle in 2007 did not come easily.  I could finish one side, no problem, but I had forgotten the pattern algorithms for aligning the layer 2 edge pieces, permutating and rotating the bottom layer’s corner pieces, etc. that I had spent hours memorizing 25 years ago. 

When I first got the bube from TJ at the team dinner, I was confident I could solve it.  I ended up returning it to TJ with only one side completed.  Stupid puzzle.  I’ll get you tomorrow!

Looking at the website that night, I was still excited about the prospects for the weekend.  The U14 line up for Saturday looked good, and I would be able to catch a number of the U14 games I wanted to see in between the two U13 games scheduled.  I hit the hay still with a positive attitude about the weekend, trying to quiet my mind and meditate the Rubik’s Cube solutions back to the forefront of my consciousness.  Tomorrow would be a fun day of soccer and cube solving!

Driving, Driving, Driving...

Much to my wife's chagrin, I headed to Libertyville on Thursday afternoon.  Why do you have to go?  You're team's not even playing in the tournament! 

The issue was that the newly formed U13 Blue team's coach, Ben Gaddis, had fall colligate coaching commitments with UW River Falls and was unable to fully jump in to partially start with this team until at least September.  Our Girls Coaching Director (Mark Cook) was out of town, so it fell to Andy Kaasa (who coached a number of these girls last year in the East Academy) and myself to take the reigns.  It was disorganized at best with this age group due their coach and coaching director not around, and Andy and I felt a need to try and make this first experience a good one for the families. 

However, Andy, with HS commitments, could not get to Libertyville until close to midnight on Friday, so the plan was for me to cover the U13s on Friday afternoon as, as was initially no problem as until this past Monday,  I was going to be there anyway with the U14s.  Even though the U14s pulled out, I still needed to cover the U13s.  I tried to explain this to my wife, but it wasn't easy :)

Happy to help out the U13s, I was just as interested in seeing the U14 age group play.  What was so great about this event is that all the games were played at one complex and we had worked hard to secure a hotel within a few miles of the facility.  I planned on watching a number of the U14 games on Friday, take the U13s for their 2:30PM game, watch more soccer, have Andy arrive on Friday night, co-coach the U13s for two games on Saturday while watching more U14 action, then driving home Saturday night to leave Andy with the U13s on Sunday.  Alas, all great plans are thrown to the wind once the battle begins.

* * * * *

I love the 3 - 6 hour drives to near-by regional events.  It's all me time as I stuff my face with coffee, sun flower seeds, SoBe, and fast food.  I had a great Book on CD, as well as a shoe box full of cassette tapes.  Yes, I said cassette tapes.  Man, those are almost in the same Jurassic park category as 8-tracks now.   

Back in the early 2000's after retiring from the professional playing ranks, I didn't have much to do.  Without soccer to occupy my everyday, I looked to pursue my other dream - to become a rock superstar!

My ascent to music stardom had an auspicious start at best.  In third grade, I was forced into violin by my parents (and later into piano).  I absolutely hated the stringed instrument.  I couldn't make the stupid thing even come remotely close to sounding in tune no matter how hard I tried.  I liken the sounds I produced to those of a mating (or dying) domestic feline.  I dreaded going to our neighbors for private Suzuki Method lessons (titty titty ta ta, titty titty ta ta), and more than once thought about smashing the expensive piece of polished woodwork into a thousand pieces.  I “accidentally” dropped it once in 5th grade, but then experienced first-hand the “benefits” of musical instrument insurance and was utterly disappointed on how quickly the violin was replaced. 

In 7th grade, I joined (well, I was forcefully enlisted into) the junior high school orchestra and was surrounded by 30 others nerds who, like me, couldn’t make the stupid string instruments make music.  There were 12 of us in the violin section, and only one knew how to play.  She obviously sat First Chair (the place of honor for the most proficient musician) and her name was Becky DeBuss.  Becky is surly a violin virtuoso somewhere today.  I wonder if she still wears those Coke-bottle thick eyeglasses?

Though the rest of us in the violin section despised our instruments, we were all fully aware when we listened to Becky that we were in the presence of greatness.  Our orchestra teacher, Ms Danielson bless her heart, tried her best to work with us, but it was difficult to control the cacophony of sound (save from Becky's instrument) as the rest of our violin and viola bows kept glancing off our head gear or pocket protectors and hitting incorrect strings. 

On top of this all, my violin case became a badge of my nerdism in the junior high hallways and a magnet for all the 9th grade bullies.  It was like there was a Sim's arrow hovering over me constantly that said "Kick me".  Actually, it would have said “Check Me Hard Into the Lockers!”  Moreover, the stupid instrument hampered my usual cat-like agility, so though I would dance out of hip checks into lockers more often than not, the bullies knew that if I was carrying my violin case I was easy prey.  Man, I felt sorry for the cellists.   

Our first concert my 7th grade year for the parents in the auditorium was comical at best.  I knew I couldn't play a lick so most of the concert was spent with me feigning the bowing and the fingering with my rosened up bow moving back and forth a hair's breath above the strings without ever touching them.  It was sheer brilliance!  Even Ms Danielson, who clearly knew what I was doing, smiled at me.  Thank you, you nerd, for not completely ruining our performance! 

Wonder if the parents could tell that out of the 12 violinists, only one or two were actually producing any sound, as being very intellectual nerds as they were, most of the violin section quickly picked up on my geniusness and feigned playing.  Actually, the parents must have figured it out because every time Becky stood for her violin solo, it sounded exactly the same as when the full section was supposedly playing. 

Now if I was a band geek, I think I could have pulled this off without a hitch.  It would have been easy to fake fingering when playing a saxophone or trumpet.  However, when the video of the orchestra concert was transmitted to all the home room classes the next day, it was obvious that something was not right with the violin section.  When Becky's bow was at the bottom of her down stroke, mine looked to be projecting 2 stories into the air.  When Becky would hold a long, drawn out note with a slow, fluid bow stroke, mine would be changing direction like I was playing triplets. 

I'm sure you can guess what happened next.  Yep!  Me and my nerd air-violin virtuosos still never played a note, but we all focused on Becky to make sure our bows were doing what her bow did.  Up when hers was up, down when hers was down.  We were a bit slow to pick up on the changes at first, but we honed our skill so that the delay between Becky's changes and ours would never have been picked out by the untrained eye.  It was hard work, but we did it!  Looking back at it now, if we put that much effort into actually learning the stupid instrument, we might have actually been decent.

Where was I going with all this???  Oh yeah, rock stardom. 

At the first party of my high school years (10th grade) I had an epiphany.  I noticed a bunch of people crowded around the bonfire.  To be more specific, I noticed Gaye Sterrioff, the mintest girl in school, and her entourage of other smoking hot babes there.  I sauntered in that direction, proudly displaying my Bartles and James Wild Berry wine cooler, to see what they were all goggling at. 

There on a couple of tree stumps sat Jamie Gathje and Scott Nargan strumming away on acoustic guitars. The girls gazed at them in complete adoration and that was that.  From that point on, I knew the guitar was the instrument for me and the way I was going to score all the babes.

OK, I know I’ve gone off on a little tangent here.  I’ll try to find my way back to the drive to Chicago. 

After I retired from the Thunder and didn’t have much else going on, it provided an opportune time to pursue my rock star dream.  My problem was that my buddies that I hung out with had no clue about music.  I had collected a ton of music gear over the last decade; a full drum kit, 5 or 6 guitars, a bass, electronic key board, PA system and mics, amplifiers, and more.  I moved into a cool place in uptown (Minneapolis) and set everything up in my basement.  It wasn’t long before I convinced my long time teammate Amos Magee (now current MN Thunder coach) and another buddy of ours, Ross Hoaglund, to try and pick up and learn the different instruments.  Ross and Amos both showed tremendous musical ability and fairly soon our band was up and running.

For a good three years we were together and produced many a top 10 hit that unfortunately will never be aired on mainstream radio… though they were for sure good enough to be.  A year into it, we began looking to record our sessions.  Not one of us had much cash, so our initial investment into high tech recording came in the form of a $12.99 purchase of a walkman-type recorder from Walgreen’s Drug Store.  We had some great times, playing and recording music into the wee hours of the morning, then heading upstairs to play cards and huddle around the tiny recorder to listen to our sessions played back.  Ah, the good old days. 

Anyway, life happened and we all moved on to different things.  I still have crates of our recorded jamming sessions, and road trips allow me time to reminisce.  Believe it or not, I still have the same recorder.  The absolute best investment I’ve ever made.  I plug my $200 Bose headphones into the $12.99 device and I’m off!  A 6 or 7 full cassette tapes later, I’m passing 6 Flags and looking for the hotel exit in Illinois. 

Road Bumps, Not Goose Bumps

OK, I admit I was looking forward to additional goose bumps (see Of Goose Bumps and Finger Tips - recap of 2007 region final game) in Libertyville.  A big part of me wanted to relive the regional success we found last summer and this event would provide a prime opportunity to try and do just that.  This would also be a fantastic early season test for the team to see how the group continues to measure up to other top regional and national competition.  However, it was not meant to be.

When all was said and done we just could not get enough numbers to make it work.  Only one of our HS players was able to get the OK from their HS coach to join us for the event.  I’m pretty confident I could have convinced many of the other HS coaches to release our players for the event if I spoke with them directly, but I wanted the OK from the parents of the HS players before approaching the coaches and most of them, considering that their girls were some of the youngest and newest to the HS scene, didn’t feel comfortable in having me rock the boat.  I don’t know this for sure but it’s my pretty good guess. Understandable.

We had a number of guest players lined up. Sting and Brownie, much to my delight, were ready to come with the team when asked, Chilly was in, and a few other White teams players who were asked to come were also initially set to join up.

As I mentioned, I had called Rory Dames (Eclipse Select Coaching Director) last week when I began to get the sense that our HS players were out and told him about the trouble I was having putting a team together for the event.  I wanted to honor the commitment we made to the tournament and knew how pulling out at this time would cause a major headache for their organization.  He told me that we could come as a US Club Soccer team and use guest players (though the tournament said no guest players could be used) and I was confident that I could get something together.  I emailed him yesterday (Sunday) and let him know that I had managed to form a team of 14, but then had to call him today (Monday) and let him know that 2 players had had conflicts come up and now could not go, so we had to bail on him.  I’m sure he wasn’t happy but he was understanding of the situation.  Looking at the adjusted schedule now posted online, looks like things worked out OK.

Real bummer for us though as, as I mentioned already, the event would have been a great gauge for us (if we had buy in from the entire Blue team) to see where we were at.

I’ll still be heading to the event with our U13s and plan on catching a bunch of the U14 games down there to scope out the other top teams at our age group.

I'll be out of town on Labor Day weekend as well with the U11s at the NSR Gold Cup in Naperville, so our non-HS U14 girls will mix in with the White/Green team training next weekend, and I'll see them the week after. 

* * * * *

Though I'm disappointed that we had to forego this event, I'm excited for our girls who will get the chance to experience HS soccer at a young age.  And this has absolutely nothing to do with the soccer.  The soccer will be decent for some of the girls involved, but the training we can offer in our club team setting surpasses the majority of HS programs out there.  Not because of the coaching, but because of the level of play at our sessions as there is little doubt that we try and play better soccer than most HS programs. 

The benefit the girls will see is the respect that they will receive from most of their older HS teammates.  Young HS players are usually taken under the wing of older players, and this goes a long way towards increased self confidence and self esteem in the HS setting when upperclassmen acknowledge the younger players in school hallways, HS football games, etc.  This was a GREAT experience for me in my HS years and one that I would want all the girls to experience at some point.  This is one example of how the hard work the kids put in at the younger age groups pays off in soccer life and non-soccer life down the road. 

High school soccer as an underclassman s one of the encouragements I use all the time with the kids and the parent group at the younger girls Academy ages.  They may not see tangible development results now (though they are clearly there to the trained eye).  But down the road when their daughter plays varsity soccer as an 8th, 9th, or 10th grader, when the girls at a delicate time in their social lives get boosted by involvement with varsity sports, this is a great result of the work that is put in now (at the Academy age levels). 

The weight that parents place on HS sports was made evident to me a few years back.  When I was with the Woodbury Inferno (currently U16), we had a fantastic defensive-minded player named "Mouse".  Mouse was a tough, tenacious, and aggressive player who would tackle a fire hydrant without fear if it had the ball.  I know, I know.  Not a very intimidating name for a tough defender, but she squeaked every time she made a mistake on the field, thus the nickname.  I know many an opposing attacker back in the day who left with bruises with Mouse's name on them. 

Mouse's parents, especially Mama Mouse, were not extremely supportive of the year-round training that I had implemented with the U11 team back in 2003.  No matter what I did to try and sell them on building a solid foundation and skill set at the early ages and how this would benefit the girls in the long run, no matter what reasons I gave for regional/national tournament travel and exposure/experience, there was always hesitation on Mama Mouse's part as to why the kids needed to be in such a structured environment.  Luckily, we had success on the field back then and Mama Mouse was hesitant to have her daughter leave the team. 

Then, Mouse made the varsity team at Cretin-Derham Hall HS as an eighth grader.  I ran into Mama Mouse that November and she saw me, ran over and gave me a big hug, and told me that NOW she understood what I was talking about.  Her daughter was a starter in a varsity program and the technical skills and sense of the game that Mouse possessed put heron par (if not above) those of her HS peers.  Mouse then transferred the next year to Woodbury HS (her community school) and played an important part of their Minnesota High School championship season. 

To me, this exemplified the typical Minnesota soccer parent.  For all I know, this is a good representation of the majority of soccer parents in the US.  With the importance of HS in our society, parents are proud to say that their little one made varsity as a 8th grader.  I'm sure this is the same in all other HS sports.

I also don't take issue with HS soccer for one other very important soccer development reason.  Kids on teams like ours will undoubtedly settle into specific roles on the field.  The pressure to perform at the level of tournaments we attend is high, and it becomes increasingly more and more difficult to give players additional experience in game situations in different playing positions. 

High school soccer provides an excellent opportunity for players who may be more role-type players in our environment to play more of an impact-role in their respective HS program.  For example, a girl who may help our club team best as an outside defender may be the go-to central midfielder in her HS program, our star center back might be the leading goal scoring forward for her HS program, and so on.  I've seen it happed on plenty of occasions and this is a good thing for player development. 

I'm in the process of tracking down all our HS players' schedules and am looking forward to watching them all in action this fall. 

New Territory, New Issues

I have never before taken a team of girls for their U14 year.  Though I feel that I’m extremely qualified to take any youth age group, my passion has always been in working with the younger players so I’ve recycled myself back to the U10 or U11 age group and looked to pass teams on to other coaches at the U13 age group.

As I mentioned previously, things didn’t work out to pass the group on as there was no one to take them come the end of last season, so I decided to stay on for one more year.  I don’t want people to think that I’m not excited about this prospect as I most definitely am.  It will just make for a busy year as I will also be heading up the new batch of 28 U11s in the East Academy, assisting with our East Academy U12s, managing all 4 (North, South, East, and West) Academy programs, webmastering the increasingly more and more complex Bangu website, working with the Minnesota Thunder in their youth development programs, volunteering at Macalester College (my alma mater) to help Coach Leaney with the Women's program, attempting to keep my eyes on an 11 month old baby girl who can somehow manage to crawl around at nearly the speed of sound, studying to pass my real estate broker's license exam (I'm a licensed realtor, mainly to develop a piece of property my family owns in the Kenwood of Minneapolis, and now looking to get my broker's license and start up a company), bringing to market a handful of soccer training devices, and last but by far not least, trying to see my wife every once in a while.  Too much on my plate?  We’ll see.

Anyway, not being used to the U14 age group, I am definitely running into some unforeseen issues, namely conflicts with high school programs.

I contacts Craig Perry, the head honcho at the Minnesota State High School League (MSHSL) to verify the exact policy governing club play during the HS season.  Though there are a lot of rumors going around, no one seemed to know the exact restrictions placed on these players.  Last year, people didn’t think HS players could even attend August tryouts once they began their HS training year.  We found out that this was not correct as players just couldn’t participate in 11v11 organized play outside of their HS programs beginning in September.  They could come to tryouts and play 10v10, or even 10v11, but not full 11v11.

I just wanted to be sure I knew the facts, so it made sense to approach the people who knew them. Here's the email chain.

Hi Craig,

I have a U14 girls team with players trying to make varsity programs this fall.  I’m looking for clarification on exactly what these high school players can or can’t do with our club when in HS season.

If you can call me, that would be great.  Cell phone is best and the number is below.  I will also try to track you down next week.

If it is easier to email, here are my questions:

I believe that the only restriction in place prohibits high school varsity soccer players from 11v11 play with their club teams.  Please confirm this is correct, and that 8v8 play would be OK.  Also, please clarify if this restriction is only applicable to varsity athletes or if this includes ANY high school player (JV, 10^th grade team, 9^th grade team).

If we have athletes that fall under these restrictions but we have an event the weekend of Aug 24 in Illinois, is it possible (assuming that it is OK with the parents and the HS coaches) if players are not names to high school programs until after this event?  I realize this will mean missing 1 or 2 early season games, but our team plays at such a high level that my guess is these young players would prefer to travel to Illinois and compete even if this means starting their HS seasons late.  Or, once teams start practicing in mid-August does this constitute a commitment to the HS and thus no 11v11 play with club.

Thanks in advance for your help here.  I know you’re probably busy, but the input would be appreciated as we are holding tryouts this week.

Mark,

The summer season for high school athletes extends through Labor Day.  Even though many of the MSHSL fall sports start in August, students are allowed to participate with non-school/summer programs until Labor Day.  After Labor Day, members of a high school soccer program are not allowed to participate with a non-school soccer program during the high school season.  Participation is defined as but not limited to: practice, scrimmage, competition, training, and tryouts.

Individual schools do have the prerogative to not allow non-school competition during the extension of the summer season through Labor Day.

Craig Perry
Associate Director
MSHSL

Craig,

Thanks for getting back to me, I appreciate the information.  Is this rule written in any policy that you can forward to me or that I can access online somewhere?

Mark,

This information can be found in MSHSL Bylaw 208—Non-School Competition and Training.

Go to the League website then: Resources, Publications then Eligibility.  The bylaws are in the 2007-2008 Official Handbook.

Craig Perry
Associate Director
MSHSL

Perfect, thanks!

Last question, I promise. :)

Do these rules only apply to Varsity athletes? Or do they hold for JV, 10^th Grade, and 9^th Grade?

Mark,

The rules apply to all students grades 7-12 who participate in high school programs—varsity, JV and sophomore.

Craig Perry
Associate Director
MSHSL

So, under this policy, our HS players could in fact join us for any event prior to the Labor Day Weekend without jeopardizing their HS eligibility.  Nice.  The Eclipse event in late August would now be a great opportunity for me to gauge where we are at with the new group relative to some of the strongest teams in the country.  The individual and team strengths and weaknesses highlighted by this level competition would serve as a great resource when looking to design training sessions for this group this coming winter.

Last year we traveled to the same event and had a less than stellar showing, tying the Chicago Magic (IL), beating Ohio Elite (OH), losing to the PDA Charge (NJ), and tying MTSC Blaze (OH).  However, results aside, the knowledge and experiences gained from observing the team in action allowed me to organize specific training sessions in the following months that helped elevate the team to the next level, as I feel was evident by our summer successes at Regionals.  I’m looking for the exact same thing this year and am excited to see the team in action.

However, even with the current MSHSL policy out in the light, I'm still feeling a hesitation by most HS players' parents in confronting the coach to see if their daughter can make this event.  It is obvious that parents are putting a lot of stock on their daughter playing HS soccer at this young age and they do not appear ready in the slightest to ruffle any feathers in the HS scene.  I can understand this to some extent.  We'll see what transpires in the next few days.

I did place a call into Rory Dames, Coaching Director with the Eclipse club and gave him a heads up as to our developing player situation.  Obviously, at this point he's kinda screwed if we drop out, so I'm going to do what I need to do to try and honor our commitment to the event.

0708 Yearly Development Plan

Our development plan for the year is as follows.

Fall Season (Aug - Oct)

We will look to take part in the Eclipse Challenge Cup the weekend of Aug 25 in Libertyville, Illinois.  This will be an extremely competitive event for the girls and will feature some of the best competition the Region II has to offer, as well as will draw in other top talent from across the country.  It will be a challenge for us to participate as we will have a number of players vying for high school varsity positions this fall as underclassmen.

Becs (9^th grader as Centennial HS)

Hannah (9^th grader at Bloomington Jefferson HS)

Scratch (8^th grader at Eagan HS)

Bidi (9^th grader at Woodbury HS)

Tori (9^th grader at Edina HS)

Ripper (8^th grader at Hastings HS)

Millie (7^th grader at St Louis Park HS)

Moreover, Clare (from Texas) won’t be in town until Aug 24^th and will be unable to make the trip to Illinois with us.

I will be checking with the Minnesota State High School League to find our the exact policy regarding players playing with club teams during the high school season and hope that we can make things work out in order to field a team for the event.

Our U13 Blue team will also be participating in the same event, and it will be good for these younger girls to interact at the tournament with the older U14 girls.

Other than this event, we will look to train 2x per week with an optional third session for those interested.  We'll have to see what numbers we have available due to HS conflicts, but with 36 girls in our White/Green pool, we should be able to mix the small number of Blue players in if/when needed.  Else, the girls will receive a bunch of small-group lessons through the fall if we train with 7 or 8.  I could think of worse things for these girls to be involved with, that's for sure.  We will also look to schedule some friendlies with other regional teams who I know are also looking for something for their U14s.

Winter I Season (Nov – Dec)

We will follow the same development scheme we used last year, with Field Training 2x per week, Futsal/Street Soccer, FIT Training, and Video Analysis.  We have some friendlies scheduled for mid November and will head to the The IV '07 in College Station, TX. in early December.  This is a top level girl’s showcase sponsored by adidas and run in conjunction with the NCAA Div I Women’s College Cup being hosted by Texas A&M University.  Teams participating in this event receive tickets to the Women’s matches, so I expect this to be a fantastic experience for the girls.

Winter II Season (Jan – Mar)

Same training as Winter I, with friendlies thrown in in Omaha in January and hosted in Minnesota in Feb.  We’ll head to the Las Vegas College Showcase event in mid-March, another one of the premier soccer tournaments in the US.  We were contemplating heading to Vegas last spring, but many parents were hesitant to drop their kids into the Vegas environment.  So instead, we headed to the Jefferson Cup in Virginia.  This year, I'm looking forward to better weather, better fields, and a look at some very strong west-coast competition. 

Spring/Summer Season (Apr – Jul)

We will hopefully apply and get accepted into the Midwest Regional League (MRL) Premier Division.  I feel we missed the boat a bit by not competing in MRL this fall, but we might have been extremely short-handed missing our HS players.  In looking at the teams who will be taking part in the fall season, either they don’t have the same HS conflicts we do here in Minnesota or they are going to make due with the players they have.  I’m assuming that many of the top Region II teams have a number of players at this age who could compete for spots in their respective HS programs.

For the U14 fall MRL season, there is only one playing division.  Success this fall earns teams the right to play in the spring/summer MRL Premier Division.  I’m banking on the fact that we, as 2007 Region II Champions, will not have an issue in securing a place in the top division of MRL play next spring.  I hope that I’m correct in this.

We will opt out of the U15G MYSA Premier League next summer in favor of MRL play, assuming we are accepted into the Premier Division.  If by some chance we are not accepted into the top MRL division, the local play at an age group older will likely be better competition for us than the MRL First Division, with a lot less time and monetary expenditure.  I don’t know the exact timing of MRL acceptance and foregoing the MYSA Premier spot, and I need to look into this quickly.

Our three weekends of MRL play should carry us through into the Minnesota State Cup where once again as the clear favorites to win the event we will try and secure our place in the 2008 Region II Championships in Rockford, Illinois.

We will then look to add in potentially a US Club Soccer Regional and USA Cup in July.

There you have it.  Similar to last year, a year that we saw tremendous improvement in the girls' individual abilities as well as a year that helped continue to challenge and test the players, helping to fuel the passion for the game.  We are not much different from other teams in Minnesota with regard to the quantity of sessions we offer.  We do differ in the variety of programming that we offer our players, in our ability to enter and compete in the highest level events across the country throughout the year, and in the overall level of the training environment we showcase, thanks in large part to the talent level and commitment the girls on this team demonstrate. 

Will all this guarantee us another regional title?   Not by a long shot.  Will all this help best position the team to contend again in Rockford next year.  You bet.