BACKCHECKING

Youth Hockey Site Rethinks Ranking Teams of Children MYHockey Rankings will no longer rate 11-and-under teams in the United States and Canada, its founder said, describing the practice as potentially harmful. Give this article Goalie Chase Crawford of the Allegheny Badgers 10-and-under hockey team in a 2021 tournament against the Altoona Trackers in Cranberry, Pa.Credit...Jared Wickerham for The New York Times By David Andreatta Published May 13, 2022Updated May 15, 2022 A website that has shaped youth hockey in the United States and Canada in part by ranking thousands of teams across both countries on a weekly basis has announced that it will stop the practice at the youngest levels of competition. Neil Lodin, the founder of MYHockey Rankings, said on its website on Wednesday that the platform would no longer assign a numerical rank to teams of children under 11, explaining that rankings contributed to an unhealthy approach to the game by adults. “Youth sports have become a rat race to the top amongst parents, coaches and clubs,” Lodin wrote. “There is this ‘If you aren’t keeping up with the Joneses, do you even love your kid?’ mentality out there. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story “The youth hockey community isn’t immune from these issues,” his message stated. “And let’s be honest, rankings are a contributing factor when they’re used in a negative and exclusionary manner instead of as a coaching tool and scheduling resource.” In December 2021, MYHockey Rankings and its influence were the subject of an article in The New York Times. Ken Martel, the director of player development for U.S.A. Hockey, the sport’s governing body, said in the article that he feared the weight given to rankings by some parents, coaches and youth hockey associations had a harmful effect on player development and the cost of playing the game. The website’s ability to cull and crunch an array of statistical data on thousands of teams spanning age groups 9 to 18 has made it an indispensable resource for many in the youth hockey community. At its core is a sophisticated algorithm that predicts a team’s “performance rating” and the goal differential of any game it might play against any opponent in the database. Coaches and tournament directors routinely use the website to identify teams that are projected to be evenly matched, and schedule games accordingly. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story But critics have contended that the website’s ancillary practice of assigning a numerical rank to teams has fueled a primal instinct among too many youth hockey stakeholders to climb the rankings ladder in a never-ending game of one-upmanship. In an interview, Lodin said the website would continue to provide the core data that helped inform scheduling decisions — like win-loss records, game results and other statistics — while eliminating the rankings for its youngest teams. The site ranked roughly 3,000 teams of children under 11 years old during the most recent hockey season. “We’re taking action that we think makes users more likely to use the site as intended, as a tool to help teams schedule appropriate levels of competition, as opposed to the detriment of hockey,” Lodin said. Tom Farrey, the executive director of the Aspen Institute’s Sports and Society Program, whom Lodin credited with posing the idea of getting rid of rankings while retaining the data that helps teams find well-matched competition, called the move “a step in the right direction.” “It sends the message that development is more important than comparing kids and teams who are still in the early stages of growth,” Farrey said. Martel, of U.S.A. Hockey, applauded the development. “This will hopefully relieve some of the pressure a bit,” he said. “We’re a late-developing sport. The best young kids aren’t the best kids later on. Nobody knows who’s really good until after puberty.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/13/sports/hockey/myhockey-youth-rankings.html How long will it take PPE mite parents to start a new ranking site so they can tell everyone that their 8 year old is on a top 10 team.

You do have a point about the 12u players, but at least they are playing up and not down.

Its not that big of an issue. the games i watched were competitive. I am just wondering why would Franklin want to play A and not AA. If its not to chase a banner why not have the lower kids play up instead of the better kids play down?

BTW...muckerandgrinder... Sorry your team didn’t run away with the summer sizzler banner. ?haha made me laugh also..

You are correct my opinion that Bantam and above, AAA should not play down in an A division is set in stone. They obviously cared more about winning the great sizzler than development, if they cared about development than they would have entered the AA division so that they got to play against better players. Do you agree that it would have been better for the A kids to play up in the AA division rather than the AAA to play down 2 divisions?

Appreciate everyone’s feedback and now I see the point of spring and summer hockey. At the time it was hard to watch my nephews team take some dirty hits from players that are obviously more skilled. Most of the AA players cannot keep up with players on the “Faux AAA” teams and I had a hard time understanding why they would want to play in the A division. I figured that mommy and daddy wanted to show off Johnny’s AAA talent to their A league family, friends, and coworkers or since Johnny is a bottom player on his “Faux AAA” team he wanted to feel like a superstar. I thought why they wouldn’t rather be with the top players from the “Faux AAA” and PPE teams in skating and skills lessons to get better for next year instead of checking a kid in the back half their size and getting kicked out of a summer hockey tournament. Now i understand that they just wanted to have fun and play with their friends. Pittsburgh’s hockey motto should be “I GOT MINE”

If this tournament would have been nonchecking i would have no issue.

I see your point and I would not have an issue with it if they played in the AA division, the skill level is not that big of a difference. I agree that summer hockey gives a chance for kids to have fun but how much fun do you think 1st year Bantams, who have only played A division are getting smashed into the boards and watching the AAA kids skate end to end and score are having.

I watched a couple of A division summer hockey tournament games in Pittsburgh this past weekend. Most of the players looked like they are in the right division but some of the teams had players who play AAA in the fall. I feel that if you play AAA, you should not be able to play in any AA/A tournaments, especially A division. Not sure why they would want too anyway. The team that won the championship looked like they had 3 or 4 AAA players.

Your right nemesis, if they don’t get drafted #1 overall, they should just go play PAHL and avoid the money grab.

I asked the same question yesterday and was told he decided to go the the Barons. Congratulation's to all of the Pittsburgh kids who did get drafted. Good luck and keep up the hard work.

Crazy that some of these kids got cut from PPE.

I heard the 06 team has 8 kids from Pittsburgh now. Not sure how many at the other age groups.

The U15 Barons and 08 Vengeance have several players that came from PPE. The Barons are ranked higher and have beaten PPE 2 times this year. The 08 Vengeance are ranked higher than PPE, and I understand that PPE declined to play. Hockey2020 if you are correct and only those who got cut or couldn’t make PPE would choose to leave, why do you think that they are playing so well on a different team? Could it be that the Barons and Vengeance have a better development program, the PPE coaching staff can’t recognize talent, PPEP (Pittsburgh Penguins Elite Politics), or did they just get lucky this year.