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zam

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zam last won the day on May 19 2023

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Pee-Wee (3/11)

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  1. I don't want to make a case for the D2 kids because I haven't seen them in person, but it appears the Stellar 6 Player from the A Blue division also got nearly half of his points against some really awful bottom 5 teams. And quite honestly the other half of his points came against the playoff teams in that blue division. And if the playoffs showed us anything it's that other that CV, the rest of that division was also pretty bad. Is he a good player? Maybe. But he probably only gets a fraction of those stats if he played against the likes of QV, Shaler, Indiana, GB, Meadville, NC all season. Not taking anything away from the young man, he led the team to the Pens Cup, Undefeated Season, Freshman and all that, but it's the same situation.
  2. Oh Man! You aren't disputing this guys legal troubles, just disputing his job title? An ankle bracelet sounds like more than an unpaid parking ticket... Was he even able to travel with the team?
  3. Each birth year is slightly different depending on who is coaching and which organization the strongest players gravitate toward. I'm assuming you are asking about the younger ages based on your question. Generally speaking Pens Elite is always going to field the strongest team in the area. You can look at all the birth years for the last number of years at My Hockey Ratings.com and see they are typically in the top 12 teams in the country. Historically Esmark was their closest rival, and they take most of the Pens cast offs and add some foreigners. They are typically strong only at 16u and 18u. They only started having younger teams a couple years ago, one of them was ridiculously bad last season. A couple years ago Vengeance put together a successful 2008 team that was equal to Pens for a few years, but since then fell apart and most of their best players went to pens or left town. They never really got traction on any other birth year besides that one. Any of the other "AAA" teams your results will vary. This is the first I heard the Aviators fielding a "AAA" team. A couple years ago their organization consistent of like 2 A minor teams and didn't have home ice anywhere. So better watch out, You are definitely playing the role of guinea pig on that one. My suggestion for any team you are considering, find out who the coach is, find out what their reputation is and how long they've been coaching. Look up how successful they were last year. If they have an open skate or a tune-up go to that. If your kid is the best kid there, go somewhere else. If your kid is the worst one there play single A Pahl hockey.
  4. Some may say the life experiences of living with a host family in a new city, and traveling the US and Canada while developing relationships with that family, coaches, and players all while pushing oneself to succeed at the highest level of their sport might be more beneficial than attending a dance at the Burgettstown Days Inn.
  5. What is likely to happen with the 09s is pretty predictable. 1 or 2 Strong pens kids will leave for opportunities elsewhere, 2 or 3 weak players will be cut. They will pick up a couple out of towners, and maybe 1 or 2 local 09s will make the team The Preds, Vengeance, Shaha and Icemen will each swap a couple players amongst themselves. These are players seeking greener pastures or players cut and looking for another option. Esmark will grab some Russians, a couple cut pens, and a dozen local players and end up the 2nd or 3rd best team locally. And before you get all excited about the Iceman, what did they do this season? Beat a few 50, 60,70 ranked teams. Now if they can prove they can do that consistently through the course of next season what does that make them.... Pretty much A 50-70th ranked team. But as JoePa used to say, "if you aren't getting better you're getting worse." And historically the best kids are going to leave Icemen, and they're unlikely to attract any relevant players to the frozen pond. And all the other teams are consolidating talent and getting better, so icemen are more likely to decline next season. Not taking anything away from this past season, but I doubt they can take a step forward. Let's reconnect after tryouts and see if this is what happened.
  6. This whole 15U argument reminds me of Miracle. "If we played 'em ten times, they might win nine. But not this game. Not tonight. Tonight, we skate with them." Except the underdog still lost this game. And you can all thank My Hockey Ratings for this argument. Winning isn't good enough anymore, if you don't exceed the "expected goal differential" Even a 2-0 SHUT OUT in a championship game wasn't good enough because they "should" have won by 5. If you don't key into one single game but look at the course of the season, PPE beat Esmark back to back at MidAms 9-4, and 2-0. Beat them In two regular season games, 7-0, 8-0. That's a 26-4 aggregate score, +22 spread over those 4 games. Almost exactly the " average expected goal differential" Plus, that expected spread is based on an entire season of data. Knowing Esmark, their roster for the first month of the season probably differed from their roster the last month of the season. It doesn't take that into account. It doesn't take into account injured players in the game, or long term injuries, doesn't take into account starting goalies. It's simply a number that compares past results and theoretically tells you what to expect a match up to look like. And over the course of the season it does a pretty remarkable job. One nice thing about PIHL games is nobody talks about these theoretical spreads. "Sure you beat BP, but you should have done it by 3 more goals." Sounds laughable right??? And going back to what I said about At large bids to nationals being good for instances where a deserving team is upset in a playoff game. Look at PIHL AA we could have a PT 7-9 team going to the state final, instead of a 17-1 SF team. And I'm not knocking PT, awesome for them, I'm rooting for them! But which team would likely give us a better chance against Philly? At the end of the day Kansas City is the super bowl champion. Nobody cares that they needed overtime to do it or if they beat the spread or not. They won, the other team lost.
  7. Sorry, I wasn't suggesting PPE was the team deserving of an at large bid. I was just saying it makes sense to have the at large bid option for exceptional teams that are upset. Or two elite teams in the same district. The 18u AAA division was very balanced. Atleast half the teams had a legitimate chance to win it. But perhaps it was just balanced mediocrity compared to the rest of the country.
  8. The 6th seeds at the 15u and 16u divisions both made it to the finals on the backs of heroic goaltending. Both of these teams faced 50 shots against per game but their goalies were nearly perfect and they mustered up enough offense to get to the final. It's nearly impossible to rely on that over the course of a season especially with a 2 goalie rotation, but in a 3 game round robin, an elite goaltender can make all the difference. It's only fair that USA hockey awards a few at large bids to account for these sorts of situations. You could have a wagon of a team get knocked off in a district playoff game and miss out on nationals and a 50 or 60th ranked team be the lone representative of the district. The 18u division was won by a goalie that only gave up a total of 3 goals over the course of 4 games. Several teams had legitimate chances to win that division but were on the wrong side of close 1 goal games. 13u and 14u were each won by the superior team and faced very little adversity.
  9. I heard your number 1 ranked Mars team fell to an underwhelming, unranked Moon team from a lesser division last night. Can anybody confirm?
  10. I'd imagine the "negotiated merger" between "Alpha/Vengeance" and Steel City Renegades went something like this.... Hey we have been paying SCIR to roster our teams for several years now, we tried to get the Aviators to do it but they wouldn't. And you might notice they are no longer here. So we can either rename your organization Vengeance, allow your board to "run things" and renew your ice contract OR you can go over to SSA and see if they will sell you a few hours of ice. If you don't like that deal I'm sure one of the other displaced organizations like the North Hills Vipers would.
  11. Vengeance isn't really a legit organization it's just a team name. They don't have the ability to submit USA Hockey rosters on their own so they paid renegades to roster their teams. Rumour is renegades are rebranding as vengeance for all their teams A, AA,AAA.
  12. I got the feeling that PIHL is making the transition to 4 divisions. This Blue A division being the bottom. AAA, AA, A Gold will compete for penguins cup, A Blue will just have a year end tournament like the (Open division, B, D2, co-op) West Virginia teams are in that division, so that solves that problem. Last year A Gold played A Blue in the All Star game, this year they are separate games, so there must be a reason for that. The movement between divisions will continue the same. Win enough games at A minor, you move up to A major the next year. It's an attempt to keep regular season games more competitive the #1 Single A team doesn't have to play the #24 Single A team. I don't follow the Philly side, maybe they will follow suit. Just a hunch, I don't have any inside info FYI.
  13. What you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. And if by chance you were having a stroke while typing that post then I apologize for my insensitivity.
  14. Well I think you got your answers there. You can figure out who your first line center is going to be. Not a bad idea, throw some shady business money into buying a team. Suddenly you go from beer league hero to team owner and professional player. A modern day Mario. That's one way to impress the ladies and lil Johnny wildcat.
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