How was your AHF Playoff Experience?

[Guest]

Now that the AHF has wrapped up its playoffs....what did you think of the playoff format?

Lots of chatter about tie breakers, I don't see the controversy - but I do see how it stinks for the odd team out.

[Guest]

Didn't they use the same point system and tiebreakers as the District uses for their round robin playoffs?  As long as they are stated upfront prior to games starting and they follow them, then there is nothing to complain about.  Its impossible for everyone to be happy. 

Just like the KRACH... if its good enough for College Hockey, its good enough for youth hockey!

I, for one, thought the AHF was WAY better than the DVHL.  Better competition, more teams got to experience playoffs, fun add-ons (Player of the week, All Stars, Honor Roll, etc) and although some parents still complained - we had our schedules much earlier!

Enjoy the ride of watching your kid(s) and their teammates/friends play and the new friendships you've made.  Soon enough they'll be in college (99% of them not playing hockey) and we'll all be missing our time watching and cheering on our kids and the joy it brought us.

[Guest]

I thought the weekend went very well. The refs were easily the best of the year. The games were very even and exciting. Our division went to tie breakers for the Championship game and it worked out in our favor.

[Guest]

The AHF playoffs were very well done. The divisions I saw were competitive, with several overtime and one-goal games. The fact that ~50% of teams got to a 3-game playoff round is a major bonus, when compared to our experience with the DVHL's small field one-and-done playoffs.

I would prefer the AHF not use shootouts to break ties, especially in the championship game. I did not see any deciding games get to shootouts, but if they did it is an unfortunate way to end a season. Since most of the games ended well ahead of their scheduled time slots, maybe extend the overtime session to a ten-minute period to avoid shootouts?

[Guest]

The tiebreakers are USA Hockey rules.  There was one situation where the rules just didn’t seem right, but that’s one rare circumstance that happened in one of probably 60 or so brackets.  With only 3 round robin games, tiebreakers will often be needed.

[Guest]

My thoughts on the AHF Playoffs:

The brackets are by design going to be very competitive.  Seeds 1-4 play each other,  Seeds 5-8 play each other, and Seeds 9-12 play each other.  So these games will very likely be close and the records will be similar.  This is a good thing.

Tie-breakers will almost certainly be used. This stinks for the team on the outside looking in.  Hard to lose like that. 

One point of contention is that many parents don't understand how a three way tie breaker works.  They think that their team beat on the other teams and that is that (they are in).  They conveniently forget that they lost to the 3rd team.

Also, they think a 3 way tie breaker determines the first team and then two way tie breakers kick in.  It doesn't.
The 3 way tie breaker determines the top 2 teams.

Maybe AHF should add points for periods won and that would separate the teams a bit more.

I would much rather lose due to period points rather than the "differential".

*** All in all, it was great tournament.  And one of the good selling points of the AHF. ***

[Guest]

Is the "differential" part of USAH rules?