2014-15 Week #5 Rankings Released
It was another exciting week of youth hockey around North America. While most of the top ranked teams only further strengthened their top billing, a few rankings saw changes with the Chicago Mission 00 AAA team taking the top spot from Honeybaked and Belle Tire taking the top spot from CYA at the Peewee Minor level. At the USA Squirt Major level is a change at the top and it deserves a few words.
The Florida Alliance Squirt Major team played in Detroit this past weekend and had a successful weekend. This will upset some of you. I will get the same emails I receive almost every year and they will have two flavors. One is that this is an "All-Star" team. And so is just about every good team in the country. The difference is that a Florida-based "All-Star" team has to fly out of state to play competitive games, whereas these same types of teams in most other parts of the country teams consisting of the top talent can drive to play other similar competition. I watched first hand a decade ago as the Florida Jr Panthers Squirt Major team joined the Mid-America Hockey League to play teams like the Chicago Mission, Chicago Chill (now Fury), St Louis Blues, Wisconsin Fire, Indianapolis Checkers and others. It was extremely expensive and in the end, while there were a number of very good players on that Jr Panthers team, it wasn't a sustainable way to develop Florida hockey talent. It didn't last, the Jr Panthers dropped out of the league and eventually dropped their AAA program. Whether you believe in the methodology of the Florida Alliance program or not could fill an exhausting debate. But it's really not relevant from a MYHockey perspective. They field a team, they play games and they do it well. The math is run and like the other 17k teams in the system, they get ranked when they meet the minimum game requirement. From a MYHockey perspective, end of story. They are treated like everyone else.
The second flavor of email I get is about teams that only play occasionally or play fewer games than the top teams from the Midwest and Northeast. This is true, they play fewer games. This is neither inherently advantageous nor detrimental to their ranking. One bad game has a bigger impact when you have played only six games versus if you've played twenty. On the other hand, if you have avoided having a bad game and have been able to sustain it, maybe you have an advantage over teams that have played more games and eventually had a drop off. There is no advantage either way, it depends upon the team and it comes down to the basics. MYHockey measures a team's average performance level for all recorded games. While the number of games is not really considered a factor, the fact that most highly competitive teams from Florida, Texas or the West have to fly to the Midwest or New England to play the best teams in the country. Florida Alliance will play all or nearly all of their games on the road. MYHockey does not factor this into the rankings, but they are at a clear disadvantage.
Just want to provide some background for those questions that will arise this week.
There is a big OHL game tonight in Buffalo featuring Connor McDavid and his Erie Otters. The hype is only just beginning...
The Florida Alliance Squirt Major team played in Detroit this past weekend and had a successful weekend. This will upset some of you. I will get the same emails I receive almost every year and they will have two flavors. One is that this is an "All-Star" team. And so is just about every good team in the country. The difference is that a Florida-based "All-Star" team has to fly out of state to play competitive games, whereas these same types of teams in most other parts of the country teams consisting of the top talent can drive to play other similar competition. I watched first hand a decade ago as the Florida Jr Panthers Squirt Major team joined the Mid-America Hockey League to play teams like the Chicago Mission, Chicago Chill (now Fury), St Louis Blues, Wisconsin Fire, Indianapolis Checkers and others. It was extremely expensive and in the end, while there were a number of very good players on that Jr Panthers team, it wasn't a sustainable way to develop Florida hockey talent. It didn't last, the Jr Panthers dropped out of the league and eventually dropped their AAA program. Whether you believe in the methodology of the Florida Alliance program or not could fill an exhausting debate. But it's really not relevant from a MYHockey perspective. They field a team, they play games and they do it well. The math is run and like the other 17k teams in the system, they get ranked when they meet the minimum game requirement. From a MYHockey perspective, end of story. They are treated like everyone else.
The second flavor of email I get is about teams that only play occasionally or play fewer games than the top teams from the Midwest and Northeast. This is true, they play fewer games. This is neither inherently advantageous nor detrimental to their ranking. One bad game has a bigger impact when you have played only six games versus if you've played twenty. On the other hand, if you have avoided having a bad game and have been able to sustain it, maybe you have an advantage over teams that have played more games and eventually had a drop off. There is no advantage either way, it depends upon the team and it comes down to the basics. MYHockey measures a team's average performance level for all recorded games. While the number of games is not really considered a factor, the fact that most highly competitive teams from Florida, Texas or the West have to fly to the Midwest or New England to play the best teams in the country. Florida Alliance will play all or nearly all of their games on the road. MYHockey does not factor this into the rankings, but they are at a clear disadvantage.
Just want to provide some background for those questions that will arise this week.
There is a big OHL game tonight in Buffalo featuring Connor McDavid and his Erie Otters. The hype is only just beginning...
