Lifelongbender

Ain't that the truth? My kids have gone to many tournaments, in one case as far as Annapolis, only to face three PAHL teams in a tournament more than once.

There is a committee that meets, but maybe not today, exactly. They look at the results of the games. Most teams will remain where they are, but some teams will be moved either because of the outcomes of their games, or because they appealed and demonstrated through extra games that they do not belong where they were placed. Initial placements are based on a combination of proposed placement (from the organization) and a database of players they keep for reference. Then discussion occurs at the meetings about teams that had unexpected placement game outcomes. To be honest, I agree with those who have said on this discussion board elsewhere that PAHL generally does a good job on placements. There are always teams that either don't get placed right, or for whom there really wasn't a good place to put them, but by and large the system works as well as it can given the huge number of moving parts.

Both begin and end in October and, say, late February or early March. Many, if not most, players do both school and amateur. Amateur games are on weekends, and PIHL games are on weekdays, so it's generally manageable.

sigh. No desire to bury the truth at all. If you look back to the discussion we had about this topic when it happened, I'm sure you can discern my opinion on it. My desire was to avoid this silly discussion, which literally has nothing to do with the St. Margaret Tournament.

Right. That has been discussed elsewhere.

Sort of. Mort, the longtime BP coach, left the organization. He was replaced by a longtime BP assistant coach.

Yeah, what the heck is going on?

The Quest battle camps are a great investment. Both of my kids loved them.

I don't remember a second collapse in the 2010s, no. But stranger things have happened.

Well, that is hilarious on so many levels. You do have to appreciate their sweaters, though. Always been a fan of their uniforms.

I have a friend who does some teaching out there who has had issues with both the rising cost of ice and the ice schedule issue. I think this is entirely correct.

I'm just riffing here, but Black Bear could be the best thing that ever happened to Rostraver. I'm not saying anyone is talking about that. I am saying they should be.

You know, this all sounds dangerously like USA Hockey moving in the right direction for once. I'm not sure how to process this.

Yes, @carroll81 and @Not Gam, that's exactly how they were calling it back a few years ago. I wasn't very precise with my language.

Are you saying that they're having people sign waivers at the door? But no masking or other measures? Ah, yes, I see on their website that they are requiring an online waiver before entering the facility.

A couple years ago some officials were enforcing this, at least in the preseason. They were penalizing the third man into a battle. It will be interesting to see if this gets widespread enforcement this season.

Everyone's a comedian!

Well, I was just wondering if we could get updates about the current policies at rinks around the region. I'm not interested in anyone's opinions about masking or vaccines here, or political views. Just wanting to understand the policies of rinks in the area. It's my thinking that we are going to be in the same boat as last season - coaches wearing masks on benches, players not required to wear them on the ice, and possibly restrictions on parents in rinks. I don't see this season evolving any differently than last season. I thought that starting a conversation would give us all a place to note rink restrictions and policies as they are revised and released.

I heard yesterday that Mount Lebanon is requiring masking inside the rink building for everyone starting today. Masks are not required on the ice. They are required in lobby, stands, locker rooms, and bathrooms. I figured this would happen again as the season started up, and it's worth noting that Lebo is a municipality-owned rink, and was probably the most restrictive of all rinks last season. Has anyone heard of similar requirements at other rinks? I'm betting YMCA won't be far behind on this. The Y just released a policy for their summer campers at the Y building requiring masking.

I just went to MHR's 2020-2021 rankings and selected a random team in PAHL for this example. I am not affiliated with the Badgers. In the listing Allegheny Badgers (#757) 16U AA (PA) the three digit number 757 is the team number assigned by PAHL to that team. If that is the question you are asking the answer is yes.

All, if we take a look at the top of the page ay MHR, it includes this note: Lord knows where the data that's up there actually came from, but I'm guessing that it's legacy data for the most part.

@Saucey is right on this. The divisions haven't been set yet at PAHL. That data is, as far as I can tell, entered by volunteers. I do not believe that PAHL does anything with MHR.

Yeah, these two questions are why I think you'd have to be nuts to play there at this point.

All of which is why it seems so likely that closing the D1 hockey program has been on their minds - or officially part of their plan - since the arena was in the planning stage. I still believe that they probably already had an interested buyer for the ice center when they broke ground on the basketball arena.

Will the team they do end up fielding even really be D1? In the end, no matter what happens with the program, there's no real sense in which whatever team takes the ice for them this season will really be a D1 RMU hockey team.