Coaches:
Welcome to week 1 of our soccer season. I won't repeat everything from the schedule distribution email, but as we head into week 1, here are a few friendly reminders:
1. Communication – For all teams, Developmental and JV – Home teams, if you haven't already, reach out to your away teams to coordinate details. This is always a good idea, but even more so in the first few weeks of our season where weather can be a gating issue on whether or not games are played. I've attached the most current coach's contact list (only change from the previous list distributed is to the email address of Carlow's 1/2 grade team). As a reminder, we can and do play in the rain. We do not play during an active lightning storm and we do not play on fields that present a substantial health risk. Generally speaking, mud is fine, standing water is not. But I have seen standing water on playable fields and I've seen fields with mud bogs that were shin deep (and not safely playable). Prior to the game starting the home team determines if the game and field are playable and they should make that determination no fewer than three hours in advance (so for those 9 am games, someone should make the call by 6am if a game is going to be cancelled). During the game only a referee can call it due to rain. Also, once a determination is made the visiting team and referees should be notified immediately. See attached contact list for that information. For games utilizing PIAA referees, any decisions to cancel that are made within 48 hours of game time need to call/text Chuck as well. Failure to do so can result in the referees showing up for a cancelled game and the home team will be responsible to pay those refs for the games if they are not notified in a timely manner (generally speaking, notice to chuck via text/cell phone three hours or more prior to the start of the game should be sufficient).
2. Rosters – I am missing rosters for all teams other than Sts. Peter and Paul and Blessed Trinity. Those should be completed, signed by your principal and emailed to me by Friday. Failure to do so could result in your teams not being eligible for postseason play at the developmental tournament and JV/V playoffs.
3. DSL Registration fees. I have followed up with a few of you. At this point the fees should have been received almost a month ago. Please submit those to me ASAP and no later than Monday of this week. Tournament and Playoff eligibility may be impacted for teams that are not current on their registration fees.
4. Game Cards – For our JV/V teams, please use the attached game card form for your games. Players names and numbers should be written legibly (I've attached the form in word format if you want to type players and names into it and save it for future use.). Two copies of a roster need to be in hand for your games, one of which is given to the referees and one of which is given to the opposing coach. The winner of the game (or home team if there is a tie) is responsible for uploading the game results via the QR code immediately following the game. Game cards that are lost or not submitted within 24 hours of the game may not be counted for standing purposes and you could put your team at a competitive disadvantage for postseason play qualification. When uploading the game card please make sure you are clicking on the correct league (Girls/MLS/Premier), division (JV/V) and correct home team and away team as listed on the schedule. This is particularly relevant for schools that have multiple teams such as AMA where there is a blue team, a white team and a girls team. If you select the wrong team when uploading the results it wont register correctly. Don't hesitate to reach out to me if you have questions on this as the system works pretty good when the data is inputted correctly, but if you enter it wrong, the computer won't try to figure out what you really meant. It'll just reject the game card or overwrite or steal a spot for the teams that you indicated.
5. Referees. Home teams are responsible for paying the refs. The JV/V games typically have two refs (although the girls games could be one ref). The PIAA refs for most JV/V games are paid $50 per ref, per game so the home team needs to have $100 cash available to pay the refs for each game. Developmental games and girls games that are not using PIAA refs are responsible to pay their refs at the agreed upon rate that the home team sets. Also, while we are on the topic of referees please note that referee abuse will not be tolerated. At the JV/V level most referees will give a a verbal caution, then a yellow and then a red