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ECNL is it delivering on the hype?

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    ECNL is it delivering on the hype?

    There has been a whole lot very very positive information posted about this league since it started a short couple of years ago. Originally it was supposed to be a small national league where only the best of the best belonged. Now it has expanded and morphed into more of an association of regional leagues in a structure similar to DAP. One of the questions now is do all of the original selling points for the league still hold true or have they also changed now that the league structure has changed so dramatically? Originally the primary selling point of the ECNL was it was going to give the players tremendous exposure because all of the best teams and players would be in one place during their showcase events. The claim was that these events were going to change the face of college recruiting because the quality was going to be so high that these events would functionally be the only place coaches would need to go to recruit. As predicted though, the costs of trying to do that proved to be prohibitive and that has forced the whole model to change. Now there is only one ECNL event where you are guaranteed that all of the ECNL teams will be at and since the league has grown so large you now have the inevitable pecking order where teams are grouped differently according to ability. This fact that there would be teams of differing abilities in the league is one big factor that was never really anticipated so what has essentially evolved is the same sort of showcase event that you had in the past. The problem that situation has created is that the original selling point of tremendous exposure cannot possibly be maintained for all of the teams in all of the brackets. So the question is what are the benefits now to participating in this league?

    #2
    Basic math. 1 game per day. 3 day tournament. That usually means 4 team groups 8 team brackets. There are now 66 teams in the ECNL. That means you have 8 sets of brackets. There is now way the quality is going to be as high in the lowest bracket as it is in the highest which means that you are not going to see the same number of college coaches. No way the ECNL can claim that everyone is going to get tremdous exposure. The ones in the top group probably will but the rest probably won't.

    When you think about it, the ECNL may actually limit the amount of exposure the lesser college prospects might get because the college coaches are going to have to go scout the top non ECNL prospects also so they are probably not going to all of the ECNL showcases just the championship and the ones like PDA which both groups are at. When they are at those dual tournaments you can be sure they are not getting to many lower level games. To be fair the lesser college prospects on the R1 track are going to have the same problem. This ended up to be far less than the super league it was originally billed as.

    Comment


      #3
      I'm still on the fence about the ECNL, but I'm not sure any of the things you consider a problem are really a problem. Having the structure moved toward a regional level is a good thing. The regional leagues under USYSA was a good thing but the scheduling was bad. Hopefully the ECNL corrects that problem.

      Comment


        #4
        Think the point is that it is not the home run that a lot of people said it was going to be. From what I can see it really isn't that big of a deal. It simply is an alternative regional league. One of the things that I think hurts it now is that since they are not participating in the state cups their only chance to really win something is through the ECNL championship and that looks pretty tough to get into. I am afraid you could have a pretty good team and still be standing around a BBQ every 4th of July talking about soccer, not playing it.

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          #5
          I'm sorry, but I've never understood the hype other than it's a great way for club coaches (the league was created by club coaches) to provide better salaries and job security by putting themselves in an exclusive league to market. With this regional system, is this any different than USYS Regional and National League? The answer is yes, it is different because not all the best teams are in ECNL. It's a marketing ploy by coaches. Blue Valley lost a game 9-0 the other day! To a team that was in the B bracket last year! It's a farce and has not changed anything about the way colleges recruit. In fact, there are already almost 300 coaches signed up to attend the first weekend of USYS National League and it's not until Dec.

          Maryland men's coach: potomacsoccerwire.com/news/458/17832

          PSW: How has U.S. Soccer’s Development Academy changed the recruiting landscape?

          SC: It’s really no different. It’s nice to see players getting more meaningful games and I think they’re developing. But for us, we’ll go wherever we think there’s players, whether they’re in the academy or not. It hasn’t really changed what we do – we’re still trying to find the players that fit into our program, wherever they may be.

          Comment


            #6
            Only 2 teams per region are going to qualify for the championship but the others have to go also just to be there. I have got to tell you that if my club forced me to travel and there was nothing in it like playing for a title or getting a lot of exposure I wouldn't be terribly pysched.

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
              I'm sorry, but I've never understood the hype other than it's a great way for club coaches (the league was created by club coaches) to provide better salaries and job security by putting themselves in an exclusive league to market. With this regional system, is this any different than USYS Regional and National League? The answer is yes, it is different because not all the best teams are in ECNL. It's a marketing ploy by coaches. Blue Valley lost a game 9-0 the other day! To a team that was in the B bracket last year! It's a farce and has not changed anything about the way colleges recruit. In fact, there are already almost 300 coaches signed up to attend the first weekend of USYS National League and it's not until Dec.

              Maryland men's coach: potomacsoccerwire.com/news/458/17832

              PSW: How has U.S. Soccer’s Development Academy changed the recruiting landscape?

              SC: It’s really no different. It’s nice to see players getting more meaningful games and I think they’re developing. But for us, we’ll go wherever we think there’s players, whether they’re in the academy or not. It hasn’t really changed what we do – we’re still trying to find the players that fit into our program, wherever they may be.
              except now they have to scout twice as many events on the same recruiting budget. something has to give and my bet is that it is the exposure the lesser tier players are able to muster.

              Comment


                #8
                Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
                Only 2 teams per region are going to qualify for the championship but the others have to go also just to be there. I have got to tell you that if my club forced me to travel and there was nothing in it like playing for a title or getting a lot of exposure I wouldn't be terribly pysched.
                Your mindset will (should?) change as your kids get to recruiting age. The tournment wins become much less important, and getting in front of college coaches becomes the main draw.

                Even outside the ECNL, by the time you get to showcasing age there are a number of tournament that do not track wins and losses and teams are playing simply to be seen.

                Comment


                  #9
                  Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
                  Only 2 teams per region are going to qualify for the championship but the others have to go also just to be there. I have got to tell you that if my club forced me to travel and there was nothing in it like playing for a title or getting a lot of exposure I wouldn't be terribly pysched.
                  Not quite accurate.

                  This is true for the u14's only.

                  In u15-17 the top 16 A flight teams qualify for the championship bracket. Everyone else is there for showcasing, and/or relegation/promotion.

                  For u18's only the top 8 teams go to nationals, nobody else. Because they have nothing else to play for (since they are finished with college selections).

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Another thing to consider;

                    UNC-Chapel Hill '11 signing class: 8 recruits, 1 comes from an ECNL team

                    You can find schools exactly opposite, but the fact is that college coaches want the best players, whether their league is self-promoted as elite or not.

                    I still find it funny that the U17 ECNL National Championship was played between a team that lost in state cup to a non-ECNL team versus a team that lost 4-0 in the regional final to a non-ECNL team.

                    Elite! Elite! Elite!

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
                      Your mindset will (should?) change as your kids get to recruiting age. The tournment wins become much less important, and getting in front of college coaches becomes the main draw.

                      Even outside the ECNL, by the time you get to showcasing age there are a number of tournament that do not track wins and losses and teams are playing simply to be seen.
                      Don't the tournament games count in the standings? If they aren't keeping score in the showcase events any longer how is this any different from a normal showcase? If it is not different what is the benefit?

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
                        except now they have to scout twice as many events on the same recruiting budget. something has to give and my bet is that it is the exposure the lesser tier players are able to muster.
                        Almost 300 coaches registered to be at first weekend of USYS National League, and it's not until December.

                        atlantafinalfoursoccer.com/TTCollegeList.aspx?tid=ATLF4&tab=7&sub=2&Year=2011

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
                          Not quite accurate.

                          This is true for the u14's only.

                          In u15-17 the top 16 A flight teams qualify for the championship bracket. Everyone else is there for showcasing, and/or relegation/promotion.

                          For u18's only the top 8 teams go to nationals, nobody else. Because they have nothing else to play for (since they are finished with college selections).
                          Think you might be missing something. The A/B flight thing is only supposed to apply to the showcases not the championship. You have to earn your way into the championship. Even then there are only 16 teams out of a possible 66. No matter how you want to coach it, the is still going to be a pretty big gap between the haves and the have nots.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            one thing IS certain. anti-ecnl folk are delivering negative hype here on t-s on a daily basis.
                            we also all know nefc has a talented sc winning girls team traveling the opposite path and we all wish you well. we also know sitting around the home bbq on july 4th would be much preferable to traveling to the boonies of region 1 to overpay for a skanky hotel room.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Originally posted by Unregistered View Post
                              one thing IS certain. anti-ecnl folk are delivering negative hype here on t-s on a daily basis.
                              we also all know nefc has a talented sc winning girls team traveling the opposite path and we all wish you well. we also know sitting around the home bbq on july 4th would be much preferable to traveling to the boonies of region 1 to overpay for a skanky hotel room.
                              don't knock it until you try it. by the way when you guys were filling cyber space with all of your daily information about the merits of the ecnl that was ok. now that you are being called on the carpet for your wild optimism and misinformation it is nothing but hype, is that it? go back and read some of those threads what just about everything people said to counter those early claims has proved true. when it is true it is not hype.

                              Comment

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