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Midstate Youth Hockey and the Syracuse Blackhawks program strongly support the calendar year format (for all our AAA Boys and Girsls teams)and feel it is important from an association and individual player perspective to play by this format, for a number of reasons:
Our age groupings will be aligned with USA Hockey and the Empire West Amateur Hockey League.
Having players play at their respective age designations will make each team that much more competitive with similarly aged teams, especially when competing in Toronto, Boston, Detroit, The Atlantic, Ottawa, etc.
It will lend consistency to each team, with the same nucleus of players playing together from year to year.
The USA Hockey "Select Team" festivals are all based on calendar year teams.
In order for calendar year teams to be effective, we feel that the vast majority of players must play at their age appropriate levels. This being said, we also recognize that there is a very small group of players who, by playing at their age level, may help the team, but will not have the bility to develop individually, because of their exceptional talents. Coaches and parents have asked us to consider these special cases, for the benefit of the individual players and ultimately for the benefit of the Syracuse Stars as a whole. In addition, because there are two birth years at each age level (i.e., Bantam, Peewees, Squirts), we should provide the opportunity for exceptional "minor team" players to play for the tournament-bound, or
"major teams".
Based on this, we are willing to allow certain "ELITE" players to try out for a team above their calendar year age designation, under the following criteria:
The player seeking to "Play Up" must contact the Competitive Committee members(Steve Cibelli & Terry Kirwan) in writing, requesting that he/she be allowed to try out at a higher level. The player or player's parents must make
the request - a coach's request will not be accepted. Addresses for the Competitive Committee are:
Steve Cibelli - Competitive VP
8212 Perch Drive
Liverpool, NY 13090
315/622-1450
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Terry Kirwan - Asst. Competitive VP
315/452-2443
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Once the Competitive Committee has received the request, they will contact the family by phone, email or in person to discuss the reasons for wanting to play up. Discussion with the Competitive Committee is mandatory prior to tryouts. The ability to try out for an older team will be extremely
selective. This to maintain some sense of order to the tryout procedure.
The player must be willing to try out for both his age appropriate team and the team on which he wishes to play.
The player will be evaluated by an independent group of individuals, made up of Competitive Committee members and selected Travel Team Coaches (total panel to be no more than 5). The coaches of the affected teams will not have any say in the decision.
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