James Gatz

I know families that have done both in the same season. Mites is the only level you can do this. 
 

North Pittsburgh’s mite program is a house league. Games are on the weekends. Yetis mites play in the PAHL so you will play jamborees at different rinks. It is possible to do both though there may be some weekends with conflicting schedules. 
 

Levi Rogers runs the Mite program at the Yetis and is very good with the kids and emphasizes skating skills. The teams will have parent coaches for the jamborees. 
 

Looking into the future, beyond the Mites, someone above mentioned that North Pittsburgh’s program is large. They will usually field 4+ mite teams that play in the PAHL. It can be a good long term home. The next step for Yetis, would be either the Icemen birthyear team, which plays an AHF and independent schedule or to continue with the Yetis which fields PAHL teams. There will likely be fewer Yetis teams than North Pittsburgh teams, so there may be a wider range of talent up and down the roster. 
 

Both are good organizations and have supporters. 
 

its easy for me to spend your time and commit your free time, but if you are in a position to do both, consider it. The extra practices are a good thing and you can see which fits the best and have great visibility into each organizations plans for next year come tryout season. 
 

If you are in the North, they still do hands-on sharpening at Lemieux, Baierl, and Frozen Pond.  The guy at the Frozen Pond is good, but it is tough to catch him there.  I'd try to call ahead and schedule if you go that route.  Hours are more steady at Lemieux or Baierl.  

There are 8U and 10U house leagues in the close suburbs. There probably are few options the further you get from Pittsburgh, but it’s not like there are no options.  
 

I don’t understand the comment about watering down the PAHL. They have lots of divisions and if you expelled the bottom half of every roster, the top half would be homeless 

11 minutes ago, SCIR_Coaching said:

Vengeance Tier II (Formerly SCIR) has a group of 14U players that do not have a goalie.  We have not formed a team with them yet for obvious reasons.  We are looking for an A Minor/B goalie at the 14U level to help this team form.  Please submit this form if you are interested: https://www.scirhockey.org/information/player-inquiry/

If another organization in our immediate area has room for 14U skaters, please let me know so we can make sure this group has a team to play for this season.  coaching@scirhockey.org.

Don't see many posts like this on the board, but kudos for working to create opportunities for this group.  

I keep hearing that Covid most impacted the 2012-2015 birth years (with 13/14 the most).  From talking with friends with interest in these age groups at various organizations it does seem like there are fewer athletes in the cohort.  Several have said their organizations are fielding fewer teams than usual.  Is everyone seeing the same thing?  For the good of future 16U hockey, I hope the organizations find a way to keep kids in the sport.  If attrition happens at the same rate, it could be bleak for a couple years as this bubble move through the age groups.  

There are plenty of ways the tryout season could work.  The current model is basically a free agency free for all.  I am not sure that's not the best.  It let's the kids play where they want to play and lets organizations build teams.  Players have to be selective with where they tryout and have commitment fees at stake if they want to play the field.  The system isn't perfect, but it works.

Thinking through potential alternatives each have their own issues.  The independent teams add a layer of complexity, for a league like the PAHL, they could have some league rules tryouts/offers.  (of course those rules would have to approved by organizations, who are not likely to vote against their interest).  

Option 1--An offer clearinghouse.  It could work like residency placements for doctors.  Players tryout at different places.  Players and organizations submit priority list to the clearinghouse and the clearinghouse matches players with teams.  Players have no choice but to play for that team.  Does anyone really want this and trust the clearinghouse?  Talk about taking away a coaches role in building a team.  

Option 2--Impose geographical boundaries on team formations.  Any takers?

Option 3--Schedule tryouts so there are few overlaps and require organizations to keep offers open until league-wide commitment date.  No organization would vote for this and it likely would lead to lots of supplementals.  

I'm sure there are other approaches, but I can't think of any that improve on the current approach.  The current approach maximizes the individual player's freedom of choice.  Some of those choices have consequences...

8 minutes ago, Happy Hockey Fan said:

To anybody that thinks a kid moving up from AA to AAA in the later stages of their youth careen can’t be as good as their little Johnny who has  always played AAA, go pound salt. I know a kid who didn’t play AAA until U18. Was the best Dman on his AAA team. Went on to NAHL, and then Division 1. His teammates have not have the same success. 

Look no further than Michael Bunting as a shining example.  Never played AAA Midget until his final year of eligibility.

@zam hits on an important point, and that's that parents of "tenured" AAA players are not always accepting of new additions if they were historically AA/PAHL players.  An established AAA team loses a couple players for whatever reason.  As they replace them, other returning families assume there will be a drop-off and then one or two more pull out.  At some point there is a run on the bank as more leave what they see as a sinking ship to find a chair somewhere else before the music stops.  

Its not necessarily that there are not customers, it is sometimes that existing/returning customers, don't accept change.

3 hours ago, No Politics said:

A buddy of mine and I laughed last week because we said "wouldn't it be nice if we just had districts like they did in The Mighty Ducks"?  You just play for the team in the district where you live.  Simple.  Ha Ha!

But in the Mighty Ducks TV series, they seemed to do away with districting and went with a tryout model where kids that enrolled in camps and private lessons had a leg up on making the Ducks.  A few of us could benefit from listening to the speech about the "the stakes could not be lower" from the first episode of the TV series.  

1 hour ago, YardSale said:

Bigger question is what does that include?  It is hard to compare apples to apples on a lot of the posted prices 

Paid coaches, skills/goalie training, dryland, 12-15 summer practices, 2-3 weekly practices in season, 50-55 game schedule, 4-6 showcases, HUDL video, nicer locker room for Frozen Pond, THF schedule, feeling of superiority over Tier 2 Icemen and Yetis.  

4 minutes ago, CranjisMcBasketball said:

I’m sure this will be an unpopular opinion but there is too much travel hockey. All these organizations with 4 to 15283847372 sub A major teams would be better suited along with their families having a robust house program and only having 3-4 traveling teams per age group max.  
 

I am having a hard time thinking of any organization around here with more than 3-4 travel teams per age group. The deepest programs can, and should, field multiple 10U teams. The numbers thin as in the upper age groups through attrition.  
 

very few programs are big enough to have a robust house program. I don’t see that many problems with local travel.  The trend towards AHF/non-local travel at the youngest age groups is worth discussing, but even those organizations doing this have no more than one team per birth year. 

1 minute ago, Hockey247 said:

I haven’t found that there is much, for a goalie, at A/AA.  He can definitely compete at that level and would benefit from the added focused coaching.

Goalie development is unique and lonely journey.  I am a big proponent of supplementing with private lessons.  There are a handful of people out there offering private goalie instruction in all four cardinal directions from downtown.  Some of the organizations also offer 2x/month goalie clinics.  They are okay, but not as useful as private lessons from my experience.  

When it comes down to the individual teams, much less the different organizations, your mileage will vary greatly when it comes to what the coaching staff knows and does when it comes to goalie coaching.  Some do provide coaching during practice and others provide virtually zero instruction.  It is a position where the kid has to be a self-motivated, dedicated individual to coach themselves a fair amount.  It can be a struggle to apply what you learn in private lessons/clinics to practice and a battle to reinforce good habits vs. forgetting all they learned in the lessons/clinics.  I don't think there is any one organizatoin that does it best; the individual team/coaching staff matter most.

2 minutes ago, fafa fohi said:

It is typically based on ice time and the amount of tournaments the team plays.  Typically a PAHL team plays in four tournaments - two home and two away but could be more.  Add the amount of practice ice slots and 20 PAHL games along with any independent games scheduled.  Then do the math.  If a PAHL team is playing 55+ games plus 1-2 practice slots a week it is not unreasonable for a $3,500-4K spend.  Also look to see if the practice slots are shared or full ice.

And for most of PAHL organizations I've looked at, their advertised costs disclose that the numbers of tournaments played are decided by the individual teams and the costs for those are extra.  The advertised price generally just covers practice and the PAHL schedule.  

Just now, Hockeydad9130 said:

I'm guessing that was around the time they took the access away from managers.  Probably just input the scores themselves and didn't bother with anything else.

I think you are right.  The main problem with manager input was the FPP screw-ups.  Eliminate that and restore the manager input.  Problem solved.  

2 minutes ago, Hockeydad9130 said:

I actually figured this out last season too.  Was curious how many others found the "loophole".  It still kind of works but only shows the player name and games played.

I don't even know if this is correct this year.  For at least the level I follow, everyone's game count stopped in late December/Early January.  That's not even being input any more.  

The scorekeeping is going to be inconsistent.  It is dependent on largely untrained, parent volunteers serving as the scorekeeper.  It is probably worse at the younger age groups where some of the parents, like the players, are new to the sport and the role.  Everyone should be willing to accept this and know the stats are not the be all end all.  

Not posting the stats, however, does beg the question of why keep them at all?  Why not just report the final scores and penalty minutes and move on?  The answer lies in that the leauge does keep and use the stats.  I suspect they are useful in making placement decisions in subsequent seasons.  If the league is going to keep the stats, and use them internally, what is the real harm in publishing them?  I've seen two theories put forth and address each below:

1.)  Post-game parent complaints.

The PAHL could adopt a rule/policy position along the final lines and post it on their site.  "All scoring is final once signed by the appropriate officials and submitted to the league office.  The PAHL will not hear any appeals regarding scoresheets....."

2.)  Other teams leagues will use public scoring to poach/recruit.

Who cares.  It's a small community here and for the most part people know who is who.  Frankly, the managers, coaches, and member organizations have the scoresheets and could use them for recruiting purposes already.  Not publishing the scores is not the best way to govern recruiting issues.  

2 hours ago, hockeyisgreat said:

Esmark and Icemen play in that league! I am surprised that Black Bear hasn't tried to force all the teams that play in their rinks in SWPA to join the AHF.

The Frozen Pond/Icemen are moving younger age groups towards the AHF as well.  Looks like they intend to field AHF/Icemen teams from first year squirts up.  Time will tell how many PAHL teams the Yetis are able to field.

36 minutes ago, Jkersman01 said:

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?

 

Why should the PAHL care about how the athletes prioritize their time?  I can see why people might care at an organizational or team level, but what concern is it of the league?  If you buy my premise that the league shouldn't care, the next question is why are they trying to legislate this at all?  I get if organizations want to have some internal rules/expectations, they can, but the organizations also have some control over scheduling.  For the double-rostered, we are talking about a handful of players in each organization and the managers of the two effected teams should be able to coordinate scheduling.

For the other rule banning Tier 1 players from playing on PAHL, the devil is in the details of defining a Tier 1 team.  On some level it makes sense for PAHL to define itself as a B-AA league, so excluding true Tier 1 athletes, regardless of gender, makes sense.  Saying that the second 10 girls PPE team is a Tier 1 team, however, is not consistent with everyone's definition of Tier 1.  

On 2/26/2024 at 11:52 PM, Ron Shock said:

I agree with the Teir one rule.

I disagree with the double rostering on two girls teams. Some organizations would not be able to field some teams if they could not have girls on two teams. 

One way to mitigate the double rostering litigation risk without gutting organizations ability to field multiple girls division teams would be to make all players eligible to double-roster under the old rule for girls?  The old rule includes the limitation that "A maximum of five (5) girls may be double rostered between girls’ teams.  Double rostering under this rule must be within a single association and may not cross over to other association girls’ teams."  The old rule says that double rostering within the girls division, the second team must be in a different division.  Remove the gender limits and allow organizations 5 double-roster spots to be use however they want.  

So, if an associated is limited to just 5 double-rosterings, there won't be a deluge of boys doubling up.  The organizations would have to chose how to use those spots.  Most would likely be used by girls in those organizations fielding girls teams.  Under this tweak, girls would lose the ability to roster on both a youth and girls team within an age group, but they could still play up an age group.  

This approach would mitigate the litigation risk, while still allowing 5 girls to double roster.  The expense would be that girls could no longer play co-ed at their age group and on a girls team.  A second cost would be that some organizations might chose to use their 5 spots to allow their favorite boys to double-roster and play up.  

There are two proposed rule changes related to roster limitations girls.  Both cite litigation fears as a rationale for the rule change.  This is the second.

There is a reference in the proposed rules to evaluating the curfew protocol. No real details given. 
 

17 minutes ago, Zarg said:

The girls roster rule preventing girls from playing on 12U and 14U rosters for the same season is a potential huge problem. They even stated in the rational that:  "It is acknowledged that this will likely be a “step backwards” in a few places and therefore could cost us a small number of girls teams.  But the change is deemed necessary and could ultimately lead to long-term improvements."

The PAHL Girls divisions are often only 4/5 teams per division, costing them a "small number of girls teams" may very well make it so they cannot even have a girls division at certain age groups!

This does seem counter-productive.  They say it is to avoid potential litigation.  That fear may be overstated, but wouldn't a better approach be to make all players eligible to double-roster under the old rule for girls?  The old rule includes the limitation that "A maximum of five (5) girls may be double rostered between girls’ teams. Double rostering under this rule must be within a single association and may not cross over to other association girls’ teams."  So, if an associated is limited to just 5 double-rosterings, there won't be a deluge of boys doubling up.  The organizations would have to chose how to use those spots.  Most would likely be used by girls in those organizations fielding girls teams, but if the opportunity were open to all, they could minimize the litigation risk.   

Looks as if PAHL may be re-evaluating the Fair Play Point system.  There is info on some of the new rules proposals on their site.  PAHL Playing Rules Proposals (pahockey.com)

The proposed new rule for goalie rostering seems complicated.  It looks like they are considering limiting a goalie's ability to skate out to 25% of the games.  I suspect this is a non-issue for most of the older age groups.  For Squirts, why 25% and not 50%?  

6 hours ago, hockeyisgreat said:

I see PAHL is having a meeting on February 20th.  They are going over rules for next year.  Maybe this would be a good time to ask why they have no Player Stats!  At least for 14U and above.  They use the same platform as PIHL so I see no reason why they couldn't do the same!  Once again the lack of recognition for players in PAHL is very sad!  I see no excuse as to why it isn't being done already.

Speaking of the next meeting, anyone have any information on the rules changes they will be discussing as related to rostering?  From the Pulse newsletter, "So the Committee has identified a few rules proposals that would need to be discussed prior to tryouts if they are to be implemented for the 2024-25 season, primarily related to eligibility and the composition of team rosters.  Those proposals will be presented at the February 20th membership meeting."  

It is interesting that they are going all-in on a single branded youth amateur hockey organization.  Other programs are creeping in this direction but haven't gone all-in.  The Yetis/Icemen are an example.  PHA/Frozen Pond is expanding the Icemen brand to include Independent birth year Squirt teams.  They will keep the Yetis brand for PAHL teams.  As much as those organizations are linked when convenient, tryouts and registration will stay separate, so presumably you will have to pay two tryout fees if you don't make the Icemen but want to tryout later for the Yetis.