Reebok High Performance 14/15's

[Hockeyisking]

I am new to this but I have read posts a long time. Has anyone heard what district 6 is doing? I overheard two louder gentlemen talking at the rink and what I thought I heard was that they are making multiple teams from the district. I think the said very few kids would be let go. Anyone else hear anything?

[scoreandscoreoften]

Any reports from last nights tryouts!

[MrBoDangles]

I'd hate to think that anyone thinks they're going to get a leg up for the HP 15/16/17 teams by having their 12-13 year old participate. Most of these kids haven't gone through puberty. Many haven't even started. The changes that occur among players over the next few years will cause some pretty wide swings in how they "rank" against one another in a couple more years.

Don't get me wrong, there's no harm in the kids getting some more ice time, coaching, etc... There's nothing wrong with using this as an opportunity to gauge where players need to work on their skills/game relative to their peers. But leave it at that. Kids aren't going to get left behind come the 15/16/17 selection process because they didn't participate as a 2000 this year.

This goes back to:

Why have the 00's with the 99's?

Why, in a birthyear program, were they only planning on letting some of the 00's try out?

I don't think this is a conspiracy issue. I think it just wasn't well executed, and I agree with your question.

99s would have made sense this year.

00s next year.

Doesn't count for much in the end how they structured it this year though. The kids will be where ever they end up when they hit the HP selection process.

The execution makes everybody think that there must be an issue.

Just like it wouldn't make sense for the 15's to only be for Jan-June kids and then have the next year (16's) open for all born that year..

Would make it all the tougher.

[Lace'emUp]

Bo - to expand on the splitting of age groups, USA/MN Youth Soccer does this for younger age groups, and it works well in their "HP" program which is called ODP (Olympic Development Program). More kids play soccer than hockey, so it might not work so well for our hockey model. In any case, here's how it works for tryouts this spring. The 2001 age group (yes, they reach even younger than hockey) is kept together. The whole birth year is in one pool. For the 2000's & 1999's, they split them into "younger" (Jan-June) and "older" (July-Dec) pools. Then they bring the whole group back together for the 1998's, 1997's, and 1996's. This is the same for both the boys program, and the girls. It has worked very well over the years.

IMO, I have no idea why MNH is putting two age groups together for this miss-named 14/15 program (should be 13/14). It makes little sense to me. This new program should strictly be 1999's and be called HP 14's, which would follow the same lead as the 15's, 16's, and 17's. If people think that's unfair, then simply keep the same school year together. Call it 7th grade (young 99's/old 00's), 8th grade (young 98's/old 99's), and so on through 10th grade. That would make too much sense, and USA Hockey would never approve, so I know it will never happen.

[helightsthelamp]

Why did mn hockey schedule the scrimmages at end of September? This weekend conflicts with our association Tryouts... Is this the case for others, or are ours just earlier then others? At this time our association is not willing to budge on tryout dates to eliminate the conflict, others facing the same issue?

[snowpuck]

What association and IMO 14's don't mean a thing.....

[helightsthelamp]

What association and IMO 14's don't mean a thing.....

Does not matter which association, not trying to start controversy about association. Trying to gather factual information about conflict with the date. Glad it means nothing to you and really does not mean much to me either, but it does to my 14 year old son as such that is what is important not what either you or I think of it....