18U Shell Game

[Guest]

That's a shame that clubs would rather kids get embarrassed on the ice rather than be competitive in the name of money. Would the club still not make money if they did the 18B Independent thing as suggested? maybe, not as much but still making money.

[Guest]

VFC has been fielding garbage teams for years to make money. Especially at the 08 age group. In general, the rink has been on the decline for years. Minutemen teams are embarrassingly bad. Colonials AA teams are bad. It's turned into a B level rink.

[Guest]

I could never understand clubs that do this at 18u. Instead of having 2 unbalanced A teams put the weaker team as a B Independent team at a lesser price. Give them one practice a week and 6 game slots and let them make their own schedule and go in 18B tournaments. I helped coach my friend's son team that did this a couple yrs ago. They played 14 games and went in 4 18B tournaments coming in 2nd once. The team manager did a great job getting fair competition to play. She found bottom to mid 18A teams and a couple mid 16A teams to play. We were 1-11-2 that year but all games were close, and kids loved that season.

Its a great idea, but I don't think that's an option for VFC since they are AHF members.  The AHF only has two levels at 18U - AA and High A.  There is no low A or B option with the AHF.

I think they realize there is no low A or B in the AHF at 18u, that's probably why they said independent. What would being in the AHF matter? They are not BB rink. How many clubs are in the AHF but not the THF but some other AAA league, I know of some including the Minute Men. The 1st yr of the AHF the Vipers did it, they had a mixed 16/18 team that played in 18B tournaments and as many scrimmages they could get.

Because VFC has a contract with AHF to place their teams in their league.  I obviously don't know the agreements in place, but I'd assume AHF/Black Bear would not allow a VFC team to not be in their league.

I'm sure you could be 100% independent but then you are likely paying a lot more for ice

[Guest]

I could never understand clubs that do this at 18u. Instead of having 2 unbalanced A teams put the weaker team as a B Independent team at a lesser price. Give them one practice a week and 6 game slots and let them make their own schedule and go in 18B tournaments. I helped coach my friend's son team that did this a couple yrs ago. They played 14 games and went in 4 18B tournaments coming in 2nd once. The team manager did a great job getting fair competition to play. She found bottom to mid 18A teams and a couple mid 16A teams to play. We were 1-11-2 that year but all games were close, and kids loved that season.

Its a great idea, but I don't think that's an option for VFC since they are AHF members.  The AHF only has two levels at 18U - AA and High A.  There is no low A or B option with the AHF.

I think they realize there is no low A or B in the AHF at 18u, that's probably why they said independent. What would being in the AHF matter? They are not BB rink. How many clubs are in the AHF but not the THF but some other AAA league, I know of some including the Minute Men. The 1st yr of the AHF the Vipers did it, they had a mixed 16/18 team that played in 18B tournaments and as many scrimmages they could get.

Because VFC has a contract with AHF to place their teams in their league.  I obviously don't know the agreements in place, but I'd assume AHF/Black Bear would not allow a VFC team to not be in their league.

I'm sure you could be 100% independent but then you are likely paying a lot more for ice

Other non-BB AHF clubs have looked into other options instead of putting 2 teams in the same division knowing damn well that one team has zero chance of winning. The price of ice is determined by the rink so why would being independent cost more? That's like saying if you are in the AHF but have a nonleague game the rink will charge double for that game slot, which isn't true, they charge the same. Our club a couple yrs back had 2A (1 high, 1 low) and 2AA teams in the same division and the team they felt was the lesser was given the option of staying in the AHF, joining the EJ for a season(which we often did when in the DVHL) or go Independent. The team opted to stay in the AHF and finished in the bottom 3rd of the division while the other AA team was in the PA playoffs. Like someone else said, why would BB allow clubs in the AHF to put their AAA teams in the other leagues and not the THF if they had that much control over non-BB rinks