EastCoUnited

Hey Tnac, Thanks for the reply. Looks like you are having a very good pre-season, especially with the training an accomplished club coach can provide. McDonald has trained the Morristown players very well for years as well as a few from other schools like Baxter from Berean, Sherrod from Carter and Ragland from CAK. Good to see the numbers are staying up with Lee leaving for Gibbs. Did he take several players with him when he left? Just curious as how eligible those players would be, since that would be a A/AA transfer directly to another A/AA same district school. I am sure Alcoa has checked the eligibility of the junior player that transferred from Berean. I know he was injured much of last season, did he play or practice at all with the Berean soccer team last year or was his injury from basketball? Transfer rules are pretty clear about player's eligibility, especially when they live in one county and play in another. TSSAA has a recent history with Berean players and Fulton High School and I believe Grace Christian had some transfer issues with TSSAA in basketball. Can be a messy situation if the rules are not followed exactly. Well hopefully Berean can keep their players in the future and continue to build on a successful program that Coach Lee and other started there. Good luck this season.

Hey Tnac, Saw your post on a recent Berean scrimmage. How is the new coach working out? What are your player numbers like this year? Saw that a couple of Berean players are now playing for Alcoa, what is that all about?

I have read with interest for years now the debate on the fairness of the A-AA State Tournament Soccer participation between public and private schools. This debate peaks at this time of year as many very competitive public school soccer teams are beaten by private schools and their season ends without an opportunity to participate in the State tournament, which is the utilmate goal of any High School soccer program. The cause and effect of why this phenomena occurs each year has many reasons and many combinations thereof from: a. Active or passive recruiting by private schools. b. Successful private school programs attract the above average soccer players to these schools that either win or make the State tournament on a regular basis. c. Private schools do not have 8th grader playing restrictions that public schools do. d. Premier club soccer opportunities are unaffordable to most public school parents. Yes, club programs exist that are affordable, but the best D1 and D2 teams cost several thousand dollars per season and these programs are more likely affordable by parents of the more affluent areas of cities or private school parents. e. Private schools can attract players from a very large geographical area where as public schools are resticted by school district boundries or county lines. f. Private schools can pay more for soccer coaches. g. Private schools have invested in "soccer only" fields and have better overall athletic facilities. h. At least in the USA and Tennessee soccer is considered a more affluent type sport, such as tennis and swimming, and the opportunity to play soccer in many rural area schools are limited due to the schools not offering the sport. This is a perception issue, that if more public schools won the State Tournament that other schools may offer the sport. These are just some of the more obvious reasons why there is a problem with A-AA soccer, but what is even more telling is the statistical data for the past 10 years, including this year participants, that backs up the fairness issue. This facts are: 1. Over the last ten years, 1999 to present, 8 of the 10 championships have been won by private schools. (CAK -5 ea. and Knox Catholic, Chattanooga Christian, and Christ Presbyterian Academy - 1 ea.) The two public school championships were won by Ridgeway High School of Memphis in 2000 and 2002 and then this school, due to student population size, moved up to the AAA division. 2. In 2007, 2008 & 2009 there were approximately 120 total schools that offered a soccer program in the A-AA division. Close to 80% of those teams were public schools. 3. Since 1999 and including this year's State Tournament qualifiers, exactly 50% of the qualifying teams are either public or private schools at 44 each. 4. Of the teams advancing to the semi-finals, the percentage of private schools jumps to 68% advancing (27 private schools to 13 public schools). In 2008 all the teams advancing to the semis were private schools. There have been 5 ea. 3 to 1 years, 2 ea. 2 to 2 years and in only 2004 did more public schools advance than privates 1 to 4 and still the lone private school won the State championship. 5. Of teams advancing to the finals over the past 10 years, the percentage stays close to the same at 70% private schools playing for the championship (14 privates to 6 publics). I can not speak for the TSSAA, but I would suspect that if one of the three big other sports that they regulate, i.e. football, basketball or baseball / softball, had such a telling disparity that they would act to remedy the situation, seems like Brentwood Academy football comes to mind. Now based upon these telling statistics what is the solution? 1. Move all private schools, that do not offer scholarships, to a separate A-AA division? Based upon the proposed realignment for A-AA for next year there appears to be approximately 20 private schools (4 in East Tennessee, 6 in the Chattanooga area, 9 in and around Nashville and 1 in Jackson). This may not be enough teams to field a separate division and travel distance may be problimatic. 2. Move all private schools to Division II. This option would provide enough teams in a geographical area so travel expenses would not be prohibitive. but the negative side would be is it fair for private schools that do not award scholarships to compete with private schools that do? 3. Set up a merit system simular to European professional leagues where successful teams are grouped together and less successful together. Even though this option has potential, I believe it would be too cumbersome for TSSAA to organize and administer. Also, if this option was explored would AAA be incoorporated in this system? I do not believe the AAA division has a problem with private schools like the A-AA division does, so they would not support this option. 4. Limit the qualifying places for private schools in the State tournament based upon participation percentage of all High School teams participating in soccer. If you use the last three years statistics of 80% public to 20% private, you would revise the play-off format for A-AA to where only 2 of the 8 slots in the State Tournament would be available to private schools. Next year you would set the qualifing tournament up so that 2 public school teams would qualify from each geographical area of the State and 2 private schools would also make the tournament. This proposal would assure that the best public schools from an area would make the tournament each year as well as allow the best private schools to also participate. There would be two ways to handle the regular season: 1) Set up private school districts as proposed in option 1, or 2) The private schools could play within a geographical frendly district for the regular season, to hold down travel expenses, you could crown a regular season champion, either private or public, and then the private schools would split off into their own State qualifing tournament. I believe that the current districts would have to be reshuffled in order to have at least two private schools in some districts. This would allow head to head play to determine who would advance out of the districts and with seedings. You would have one public school champion and runner up advance and the same for the private schools to their own regional and sectional tournaments and finally public and private schools would compete at the State level for the championship. I believe it is time to quit debating this matter within this forum and for all A-AA public school soccer coaches to lobby their athletic directors, TSSAA or their State legislature representative to fix this situation. There are four options above and maybe some other proposals that should be jointly advanced. I would ask each coach that reads this forum or if you are an interested parent of player to call attention to this post to your school coach and ask them if they feel strongly enough about this matter to begin organizing an approach to action. I believe most if not all public school soccer teams just want a fair way to make it to the State Tournament. Winning it would just be the icing on the cake. The current play-off structure set up by TSSAA will not allow many public schools this opportunity. One of these options would surely accomplish this desire. I would be open to any suggestions on how we should jointly proceed, if enough A-AA schools wish to tackle this problem. I also believe it is a girl's soccer team problem as well. Both programs should advocate that same approach.

The use of home school players will be a very important topic for TSSAA to address if the legislation passes. A good example of the potental issues that home schoolers will create for both public and private schools is to look at how High School Swimming in currently operated. High School Swimming is not regulated by TSSAA and therefore home school students can particiate against all schools. In the East Tennessee area Berean Christian School has an excellent high school swim team and is probably one of the smallest high schools, either public or private in our area (less than 100 students in the entire high school). Their program competes against the Knoxville areas biggest schools, Farragut, Bearden, Webb and scores very well against them. In the State Swim Championships this year, Berean's girls team placed 15th, the boys team 24th and and combined team was 14th out over 200 schools. The only other Knoxville area schools that placed higher at State were Bearden, Farragut and Webb. It is just a guess on my part but probably 80% or more on the swimmers on Berean team do not attend Berean High School but are home school students. Berean, just like CAK and other church sponsored schools, register home school students under their school operating charter so these students can abide by other state regulations. If certain rules by TSSAA are not carefully thought out and enacted, you will either see private schools like Berean Christian become dominate soccer teams or teams like CAK, like they need any help, will get even stronger. This issue will become a major point of controvery not just for soccer but all high school sports. Coaches and Athletic Directors had better follow this legislation carefully.

Carter High in Knoxville had to cancel a scrimmage this week due to weather. We would be available to come to your field on Monday, 2-23 or on Thursday 2-26. We could be at your field ready to play by 6:00. You can call me at 599-4150 if interested.

Carter High School of Knoxville had to cancel a scrimmage last week due to weather, looking for a make-up next week. We can come to your place and have Monday and Thursday open.

Anyone in East Tennessee hosting an end of season JV tournament? Seems like Bearden had one the last couple of years.

After Friday that will make two of us.

Just a note on the AA rankings, Carter did beat Seymour head to head on Friday 2-0. Need to make an adjustment next week.

If I had to guess, it would be either Fulton or Berean at this point. I ultimately believe that Berean will end up forth after they play out the games over the next two weeks. They have games left against Fulton, A-E, Grace and Gibbs. I believe Berean has lost to Carter, Alcoa and Seymour, tied Harriman and have beaten Cosby.

Persistant fouls on Seymour's center mid player earned him a straight red. He was given a stern verbal warning once early in the first half and earned a yellow card later on in the first half. He continued to complain thereafter and after a hard foul in the last 15 minutes of the second half, he was shown the door and rightly so. The other Seymour player earned two yellow cards for persistant fouls, but kept his head so his red was of the "soft" variety. Seymour had to pull this player, but was able to sub in another player. I do not understand the purpose behind a "soft" vs a "straight" red. It was obvious that some of Seymour's players were going after Mark and some of the other Carter players. If that is your defensive tactic then all red card should carry the same penalty. What is going to prevent teams who play in such a manner from injuring players if there is not a substantial penalty?