Jkersman01

Ahh, got it. Again, pardon my ignorance but what other top programs do something like this? Non prep schools. I’m just not hearing of any situations like what PPE does. My understanding is many other top programs cut down on the large group lesson/development approach and there is more time allotted for private skating and one on one work.

Do they? I might have a blind spot here but if you’re doing pens, north Catholic and excel, you have 4 on ice and 4 off ice sessions a week for excel. Then 2+ on ice and 2+ off ice sessions a week for the team. 2 days a week you’ll have 2 on ice and 2 off ice sessions. I don’t know of any prep schools that do that.

Agree 100%. They’ve created this hybrid model- prep school but for predominantly local kids to change schools to an inferior one. It makes no sense other than, like you said, to fill the ice from 1:30-4:30 every day. They need to decide- is this geared towards local kids? If so drop the north Catholic thing. Is it geared towards our of towners? If so build dorms. It was sloppily implemented but as long as they keep filling the spots and bringing in the revenue the new owners won’t care- just mitigate the cost of the facilities for the NHLers/ that’s the real goal peeps. And the cherry on top- those ‘top’ couple recruits they bring in each year aren’t paying anything for school, excel or pens fees. The local kids that pay full rate are essentially subsidizing them.

If your PAHL??? Simple. Numbers. You don’t have the numbers to field a competitive division. PAHL is ecstatic if they get 4 girls teams in a division that are somewhat competitive. 16u was decent this year, right? Oh wait they folded the entire age group. So let’s block out anyone who wants to play PAHL 16u girls but maybe wants to get a few extra games in. So if you’re a decent minor birth year 16u girl, what do you do? You don’t restrict eligibility if you’re trying to grow a demographic of a sport. You expand it. PAHL can’t see it because none of the board members have girls that play, right? I think I’m right but I may be off. If they do, they don’t understand it at the older levels (past 12u). If you’re a decent player after 12u??? Simple- PAHL has such a huge disparity of girls on each team. Some can barely skate. It’s like forcing all the boys to play local in house. You’re severely restricting the ability to play with parity due to small numbers. You almost need to change on the horn with line parity. It sucks. if you’re Steel City??? Well you’re providing an alternative now. Here’s an organization that understands girls hockey. For the record I have no affiliation there. But mid to high level PAHL girls that don’t want to be part of a league that can’t put together a decent league season and has clearly shown they have no interest in understanding or expanding girls hockey- here ya go. Now big question is how would this team schedule a competitive season- but I can’t blame the families for looking elsewhere. If PAHL isn’t going to look to grow girls hockey, freaking kudos for another origination to at least superficially look like they want to do it.

This is 100% on PAHL. This gained traction when they tried to push through the anti-girls hockey rules. Soured some families and now they are looking for any alternative they can find. Ironically, even under those proposed rules these girls could have played both Selects and PAHL. I know a few of the families that expressed this sentiment.

I don’t have a dog in this fight but come on…. These are 13 and 14 year old kids. They’re vulnerable for goodness sake and not perfect for sure. But don’t act like this result wouldn’t happen at least 80% of the time. That’s about as much of a guarantee as you’ll find. You must not have watched the ‘games’ this year but only watched the ‘game’ in question.

Actually this isn’t accurate. They have a good bit to do with them. They own them and run them. They generally just hire ‘jr team’ staff so the big boys don’t have to deal with any of it. They only deal with what they want, or need, to deal with.

Nothing I said was personal to you at all. I’m just trying to engage in discussion to understand things better and understand perspectives. Sorry you got offended. Sometimes it is hard to really understand tone and viewpoint on message boards. Congrats on all your accomplishments and laying out why you’re way more qualified than me to have an opinion on this. I guess I’m just a concerned father, team manager, and friend to many families that are heartbroken by this and promised them I’d do what I could to understand perspectives and viewpoints better. No D1 athlete here… you got me… overworked dad bod going on🤷😉 So are you saying we should essentially make all sports co-ed then? Come on, I’m not recommending segregation in hockey. Unreal. USA hockey has separate girls hockey rules and divisions for crying out loud. Were your D1 and all American accolades co-ed too? If not, why did you play girls sports and not instead try to play high level boys sports? I’m getting off topic and don’t want this thread shut down in case there is other info anyone has on this that could help the debate before the vote occurs in a few weeks. Private message me if you still wish to engage, sorry you are bowing out. You might have a helpful perspective. In have a feeling this is fizzling out. Great context on Facebook if anyone is interested in learning more and helping to support local girls hockey development. https://www.facebook.com/story.php/?id=841603716173422&story_fbid=2161727097494404 These are some of the families I’m supporting. 3 of these mothers are D1 athletes who helped me understand the inequities here. Maybe that will resonate with some of you since if my hot air will not.

I disagree vehemently with this logic but let’s say you’re exactly right. Make PAHL and PIHL the options for girls. Now it’s equal. How many PAHL girls have a legitimate shot at making a high school team? Remember the top girls aren’t playing PAHL now. I’d say very few especially at decent sized schools. Now girls make up less than 1% of the PIHL players- is that really a second option? You’re making the second option an option the girls are by and large not going to be able to actually have practically speaking. Under this rule, like Bender said, a PAHL girl is now playing a 12 game PAHL season if she’s lucky (assuming PAHL girls teams don’t crumble under this rule which some certainly will) and can’t crack a high school team. Practice once a week if she’s lucky on Saturday night. A boy is playing 25ish games for PAHL, regular practices, plus a full PIHL schedule, regular practices. Rules are now equal. Are they equitable?

This is important and being ignored here by many. The 10U PPE black team this year was essentially playing an A minor gold schedule. The 3rd to bottom division in PAHL. Under this rule, those girls are considered Tier 1 and "too good" to play PAHL. My daughter played on the 'gold' PPE girls team for 5 years. Our most competitive games were A major black (2nd highest). We'd play some AA games here and there but I'd say we won 1 out of 4 of those. Fairly competitive. I'm guessing here, but probably 20% of the girls playing PAHL girls at the 10U level (maybe a bit less at 12U) also play on a PPE team. Many girls double roster in PAHL (10u and 12u, as has been said) to fill out teams. I wouldn't be surprised if this rule ended up causing PAHL to consider, if not go to, a model where 10/12u merge, and 14/16/19u merge. There already is one 16U team playing 19U. The skill discrepancy would be so bad it would make many girls frustrated and likely want to quit. My guess is the organizations that field girls teams don't like this proposed rule because it will destroy their girls programs. The orgs that don't probably either are (i) indifferent, (ii) against it, if one of these girls took a roster spot from one of their boys who is only a couple good bounces away from making the NHL, or (iii) against it because they're upset that they have a kid that plays on a legitimate Tier I boys team and can't play PAHL, but girls can so they're getting an unfair advantage and more ice time. If you think the third is ridiculous, it is not. I didn't make that up and I fear one organization is going to vote for the adoption of this rule based on that logic.

I see your point. Let me throw this back out there then. Boys have a legitimate option to play on two teams. PIHL and amateur. Let’s make the rules ‘equal’ and say girls have those same options. Is playing PIHL for girls a legitimate option when compared to the non-PIHL girls teams? I can tell you absolute horror stories of girls playing on PIHL teams with the boys. One of which made the news 2 years ago with the Mars goalie. It might look ‘equal’ on paper, but PIHL isn’t a legitimate option for girls unfortunately. So this rule leaves boys with two options and girls with one. Everyone seems to think it’s completely fine for boys to prioritize PIHL over PAHL, but girls can’t prioritize their non-PAHL girls team over PAHL? I should note, she only missed 1 period of 1 PAHL game when she played both because of conflicts with PPE. And I should note this doesn’t apply to us now so I have no horse in this race.

I'm just curious as to the rationale here. Not trying to be confrontational, just understand. Why is it acceptable for a player to miss a PAHL game/practice for PIHL, but not acceptable for a girl to miss a game for a girls team for example? I know you didn't say "girl" to be clear, but I think that's the root of the issue here with this rule that's causing some concern. The big argument against this from the girls side is that it is OK for boys to play on a PIHL team (non-PAHL) as their second team, but not OK for a girl to play on a girls team (non-PAHL) as her second team.

What’s wrong with the 10u and 12u black team families at PPE doing what they’re doing? 4 years playing a combo of local games that they pick against generally similar competition and adding to it about 6 regional tournaments against other girls teams? Would you rather put these girls in the girls ‘PAHL pen’ where there are 4 teams in a division and 2 of them can barely skate? And play each other like 4 times and call it a season…?

Interesting. I fear sometimes when we oversimplify things we miss a legitimate rooted difference. Being the same isn’t being equitable in many cases. The state of girls hockey and boys hockey is different. I wish they’d acknowledge that.

I get that was the stated rationale. My question was a little deeper than that. Maybe phrased this way - were there really rumblings that some 9,10, 11 year old boy families were so irate that they couldn't play both PPE/Vengeance and PAHL, saw that girls could do it, and were threatening to sue over it essentially claiming girls get preferential treatment? On top of it all, I believe PPE prohibits boys from playing on another team anyway, so not sure that would be contributing to this. Just seeing if anyone knows if there is more to it than what is stated as the rationale. In some ways, perhaps this could open them up at the minimum for bad press (i.e. news story that local hockey organization restricting eligibility of girls), but potentially to litigation the other way. To be clear, I don't think the latter would happen. Just seems strange to me at a time when PAHL probably has the most "competition" it has ever had, a topic of discussion is apparently focused on prohibiting a good bit of girls from being eligible to play.