Good morning Coaches, Managers and Administrators.  Note IPhone’s are not the best way to review these notes.

This communication is to advise you that the Tournament Schedule will go live sometime this evening.  I will alert you when that occurs.  I am going to spend part or most of the day trying to resolve some remaining issues, which I may or may not be successful in doing!

Before I provide some information on scheduling, I want to share with you a change in our Scheduling concept.  We have now set up our venues into TWO Cluster Groups to facilitate more convenience for our Tournament guests, teams, and officials.  The Venue locations have been assigned into Two Cluster Groups:

• Cluster West:  All 7v7 games will be played in the west end of Rocky Hill.  It will be comprised of 2 Venues, West Hill Elementary and Maxwell Park. 
  • West Hill Elementary has 2 7v7 fields, West Hill Lower and West Hill Upper.
  • Maxwell Park has 2 7v7 fields, Maxwell 1 and Maxwell 2.
  • Maxwell Park is approximately ½ mile from West Hill Elementary.
  • A couple of 9v9 games will be played at Maxwell Park
• Cluster East:  All 9v9 and 11v11 games will be played at the East end of town.  It will be comprised of 3 venues, RHHS / GMS complex, Sunnycrest Park and Moser School. 
  • RHHS / GMS complex has 2 9v9 and 2 11v11 fields.  It will also be home to the TOURNAMENT DIRECTOR’S TENT.
  • Sunnycrest Park has 1 9v9 and 1 11v11 fields.
  • Moser School has 1 9v9 field.
  • Suncrest is approximately ¼ mile from the RHHS / GMS complex.
  • Moser School is approximately 2-3 miles from the RHHS / GMS complex and Sunnycrest Park. 
• Directions and GPS locations will be provided over the next week or so to share with your families. 

SCHEDULING:  My first request is to disregard the Tier assignments.  Most Tiers/Brackets are comprised of combined requested competition levels.  For example, mix of A, B, C, D requested competition levels were combined into A/B, B/C, C/D, or combinations of, for many of the age groups.   Please keep that in mind.  There will be NO changes to the Brackets. 

The schedule is complete but still going through a QA & conflict resolution process.  I would appreciate it if all reviewed the following points and to keep in mind as you review your schedules:

• The goal is always to try minimizing team stays whenever possible.
• Unfortunately, I was not able to accomplish this for all, mostly due to the significant number of coaches who had more than 1 team in the tournament and other scheduling requests.
  • Also, the difficulty of having little to no flexibility due to 282 games to schedule with no extra time slots.
  • Note we have scheduled 13 Friday night games to assist more teams to get into our tournament and help some of these teams with weekend conflicts. 
• Please understand, one change to this matrix creates several other conflicts that need resolution, making it almost impossible to resolve.
• Because of the conflict resolution process, there may be some scheduling that may concern you.  Again, I ask for your understanding as I have done almost everything I can to minimize:
  • Game Spacing:  Ensuring that all teams, not coaches, get at least one opening between games.
  • Coaching conflicts:  Coaches that I was provided requests from and cross checking for those having 2 teams to coach.
  • Correcting these conflicts caused some imbalance in the schedule: 
    • Some will be playing at more than one field but working on making sure you and your teams have time to get from one venue to another. 
    • Note the 2 Cluster Groups create minimal travel time to and from. 
    • Those that have a mix of teams e.g., a 7v7 team with either a 9v9 or 11v11 team, the travel to and from Cluster Groups is a couple of miles but may take 15-20 minutes, depending on traffic. 
    • There will be some that have early morning starts, tried to avoid for those that are traveling distance and needed to use to get the games scheduled. 
      • Note that some of these have a time disparity in between games. I have done this for many years now and it literally takes hours to try to resolve, with very limited success.
    Therefore, due to all of this, please keep in mind that it will be extremely difficult to make changes. 
  • One change to this matrix creates several other conflicts that need resolution, making it at times impossible to resolve.
• I will entertain the most crucial issues, being a specific team playing back-to-back or at the same time.... Other than these specific issues, I respectively request that you make every effort to make the schedule work.
• If by chance, you have one of those issues, I ask that you let me know within 24 hours from the release time of the schedule.
• If the schedule once released is not live, it will be due to changes being made. I will notify any brackets that are impacted.

Everyone has 4 games. Note that brackets with 4 teams will have 3 round robin games with their 4th game being the bracket Championship or Consolation Game.
Also note that we will have 5, 6 and one 7 team bracket.  Standing will be based on the point system that is communicated in our Tournament Rules.  Tiebreakers will be used to resolve standing ties.  These are also in our tournament rules.  NOTE THAT ALL 7V7 BRACKETS ARE DEVELOPMENTAL AND ALTHOUGH STANDINGS ARE VISIBLE, NO CHAMPION IS CROWNED.  ALL 7V7 PLAYERS WILL RECEIVE PARTICIPATION MEDALIONS.

Please note that in the next week, you will begin receiving several communications, some through email and will try to use GotSport for messaging, or both, to help with tournament logistics.  Note that many contacts are not updated on GotSport as several administrators registered multiple teams and are noted as the contact.

To minimize confusion, I implore you to please read these and forward onto your parents who will find the information most helpful.

Thank you for making our Tournament a success once again this year!!!

George Hatzikostas