NCYSA Challenge Council

Meeting Minutes

March 5, 2000

• The Challenge Council was called to order by Grant Underhill at 10:10 a.m. In lieu of taking roll, an attendance sheet was signed by all participants. This sheet has been included as a separate attachment.
• It was established that we had a quorum to conduct any business that might come before the council (11 associations / clubs represented).
• Grant Underhill welcomed Joe Mosher (RVYSA) and Mike Smith (CVYSA) who were attending their first Challenge council meeting.

• A motion was requested (Grant Underhill - VP, Challenge), made (Frank Gavigan - BAYSA), and seconded (Beau Hodges-CASL) to accept the minutes from the December Challenge council meeting. The motion passed unanimously.

• Grant Underhill introduced Jeff Robson - President, Triad Challenge League (TCL). Jeff presented some information about the structure and workings of the Triad Challenge League including:
• Formed 6 years ago to bring teams together. Covers 14 associations and 10 counties.
• 100% volunteer organization.
• They schedule games and provide rules.
• Run the ChallengeFest Tournament. Main moneymaker for TCL.
• Player development clinic & field development money goes back to member associations.
• Spring tournament with 8 teams in each age group.
• Coaches’ clinic put on at no charge. This year was the first week in February. Served breakfast and lunch. Bring in recognized coaches. This year included: (sp) Gordon Bradley, Lincoln Phillips, Neil Roberts, and Paul Stalschmitt. Had 145 coaches participate. Gave clipboards, rulebooks, etc. to coaches for participating.
• Main sources of income: (1) ChallengeFest (good) (2) Fines (bad)
• There was considerable discussion about TCL by all members present.

State Challenge Cup Business

• There is apparently some confusion over what constitutes odd & even year age groups for the Challenge Cup. This stems from classic’s use of the age group year to determine odd or even year (‘87 - odd; ‘86 - even). For the Challenge Cup, U-10, U-12, U-14, etc. will be even year teams and U-11, U-13, U-15, etc. will be odd year teams.
• 5 Team Brackets - What are the issues? With 5 team brackets, four matches are necessary to determine who moves through to the final weekend. This requires more fields for the host associations and additional referee fees. Some coaches complain about having to play four matches if they are in a five-team bracket and there is also a four-team bracket in their age group. Four matches may be too much playing time for older players. Not allowing five team brackets would reduce revenue for the host associations and their towns. There was discussion of reducing the minutes of each match (possibly 5 minutes / half). It became evident that a consensus could not be reached and that the issue required more study. The discussion was tabled. That means there can be five team brackets in this years’ State Challenge Cup.

• Forfeitures - There are two types of forfeits at the Challenge Cup:
• A team doesn’t show up at all.
• A team only misses one match.
• There was much discussion around the forfeit issue, primarily around the score of a forfeited match. A motion was made and seconded (motion sheet attached) to adopt the classic rule for scoring a forfeited match (3-0 score). The motion was defeated. NCYSA staff will research this issue and bring it back before the council at a later date. For this Challenge Cup, the result of a forfeit will be a 1-0 win for the team not forfeiting.
• Total number of teams at each preliminary site is expected to be around 90.
• Inclement weather policy - There will be a team of five people who will make the call at each preliminary site in the event of weather, darkness, etc. They will be as follows:
• New Bern - Beau Hodges (CASL, NCYSA); Barbara Gephart (NCYSA); Mary Ann Dunn (New Bern); Referee Coordinator; At Large Representative from Club
• Burlington - Grant Underhill (NCYSA); NCYSA Representative (to be named later); Frank Gavigan (BAYSA); Jeff Robson (TCL, at large representative); Referee Coordinator

• Question & Answer Session - Host Sites
• Are clubs developing or have they developed contingency plans to deal with darkness, inclement weather, etc.? Have extra fields been reserved? (Beau Hodges - CASL, NCYSA) Burlington reported that they would have lighted fields if needed and additional fields to move matches to if required. New Bern reports that their fields are in good shape, but that they will have fields available to move matches to if necessary.
• Frank Gavigan (BAYSA) had a presentation for the group. They will have 17 - 18 fields available. Older age groups are on a 2-hour schedule, younger age groups are on a 1 1/2 hour schedule. This has driven the field requirement up. Working on referee scheduling now. There is a conflict with another site.
• Mary Ann Dunn (New Bern) reported that all New Bern teams would be traveling to Burlington to play. Almost all Eastern Carolina Soccer Association (ECSA) teams will have to travel to Burlington (ECSA teams are predominantly formed in even year age groups (U-10; U-12; etc.)). There was a general appeal to all challenge teams that will be going to New Bern to play to volunteer to help with the tournament while they are in New Bern (should New Bern need additional help). Teams that will be traveling to New Bern should call to see if they could help.

NBASA phone number - 252-635-6700 NBASA website - soccer@always-online.com

• Terry Carroll (Wilkesboro - Wings of Wilkes) had a number of questions for NCYSA:
• Will we need a check in point? Yes. It will not be a registration table because teams are already registered. They will need to check in so that organizers know who is present and who isn’t.
• Will trophy presentations be made by NCYSA? Yes. The state provides the trophies and will present them where possible.
• Should WOW supply a photographer? WOW has one they use. Will have a conference call next week between WOW, NCYSA, and photographer to discuss possible arrangements.
• Should WOW try to set aside blocks of rooms for teams? Yes, if possible.
• Can the schedule for the finals be set now? Yes. Teams leaving the preliminary sites will know when they will be playing.

• T - Shirts
• There was a great deal of discussion about T-shirts at the preliminary and finals site.
• Finals site can develop a T-shirt if they choose. Winston-Salem developed a shirt and sold out. It will require the NCYSA logo.
• NCYSA has a T-shirt that is available on a pre-order basis and at the preliminary sites. NCYSA gets $.50 on pre-order shirts. NCYSA requests that preliminary sites order a number of the state T-shirts for sale at the site.
• Can the preliminary sites develop their own T-shirts? NCYSA encourages the sale of the state T-shirt at the preliminary sites. Don’t want competing vendors taking state T-shirt business.
• This essentially ended the discussions on the Challenge Cup business.

• Barbara Gephart discussed the results of the Challenge Survey completed during the December council meeting. According to Barbara, the survey generated almost as many questions as it did answers. Some of the survey results include:
• Most challenge teams play as part of a league (some of which NCYSA was not aware of). This issue will require more in depth study.
• TCL requires three teams from an association for that association to become a member.
• There was some discussion of the ECSA structure.
• Teams are members of their own association even when they play in a league.
• The average season is 10 games over an eight-week period.
• 2/3 of associations have recreational programs.
• 2/3 of associations / leagues do not have a 50% playing rule.
• 2/3 of coaches are not paid.
• 28 associations have responded to the survey.
• Terry Carroll - WOW - Thought information from the survey was valuable.

• State Challenge Cup Issue - A team from North Carolina is playing in a South Carolina challenge league (because the competition is “stronger”). This team could be playing in a North Carolina league. This team is not eligible for the South Carolina Challenge Cup (they were aware of this when they signed up to play in South Carolina). They would like to play in the North Carolina State Challenge Cup. There was much discussion on this item. The sentiment was about evenly split within the group as to whether they should be allowed to play. Bob Dansby of CFYSA was strongly opposed to allowing them to play, while others were just as strongly in favor of allowing them to play. It was decided that this was not an issue that required a vote by the council and that NCYSA would make the decision. There was also discussion that eligibility requirement language would have to be changed in the future.

• A motion was made to adjourn the meeting by Terry Carroll, seconded by Frank Gavigan, and unanimously approved. The meeting was adjourned at 12:35 p.m.