[MYSA Parents] NCYSA Festival OFF - MYSA Festival ON

[Mike Baptiste]

Parents and Coaches,

Many of you likely received the email from the NCYSA that due to so many 
teams dropping out, they've canceled the Rec festival statewide. This is 
unfortunate and was due to a number of things happening at the state 
level which we plan to try and help fix this summer as part of a 
statewide Rec festival committee. I just hate they dragging things out 
this long knowing they couldn't field enough teams.

ANYWAY - we have over 100 kids who want to play soccer this weekend, so 
we're going ahead with our own festival 'Plan b', since we're 90% of the 
way through organizing it anyway.

Here it is in a nutshell.

We are going to take all of the U8 and U9 players who said they would 
play Saturday and form 7 festival teams. They will be coed, as we did 
not have enough people to make gender split teams. These teams will play 
three matches this weekend, in 6v6 format with no offside (since the U8 
players played without it while the U9 players played with it) We'll 
encourage the coaches not to cherry pick and coach the kids like we ARE 
calling offside. Each team will play 3 matches between 9 and 4:30. Each 
team will have 8-9 players so everyone will get a lot of playing time.

We will also be combining the U10, U11, and U12 players onto 4 teams 
that will play 8v8. This will give the U10's a chance to play 8v8, which 
they'll play in the Fall. Offside will be in effect. Each team will play 
three matches on Field 3D from 9-4:30. So we'll have three matches going 
on at once on fields 3D, 2C, and 2D at 9, 10:30, 12, 1:30, 3, and 4:30.

I'm in the middle of making up the teams right now and will alert 
coaches tonight who is on their teams. Parents should hear from coaches 
tomorrow and I know a couple may try to practice the team for a bit 
tomorrow or Friday for fun. It'll vary by coach. I hope to have a full 
schedule available by tomorrow morning.

So despite the letdown of the state canceling the festival, we think we 
can have a lot of fun on our own and give many of the players a chance 
to experience how the game will change for them in the Fall (U8 - Bigger 
goals and field. U10 - going to 8v8)

Thanks for your patience! It's all about fun and this should be a new 
and exciting experience for the kids. I appreciate so many of you 
allowing your children to participate!

Also - if we can find 5 more U8 or U9 age players to participate, we'll 
make an 8th U8/U9 team which will make scheduling a lot easier! So if 
you'd like your child to play and hadn't let us or your coach know yet, 
let me know ASAP (like within the next 6 hours) so I can try to get them 
on a team.

Also - many of you have paid $12 already for the festival. I want to 
assure everyone we have it and are tracking who already paid and who 
didn't. We are working out how to handle any refunds (we may ask to 
apply it to Fall registration fees to save the hassle of writing checks, 
etc), but we're leaving that piece until later. We MAY ask players who 
do participate Saturday for a couple dollars of their already paid $12 
to cover referee costs. But we're still working that out and the league 
may just cover the referee fees completely. But most important now is 
team assignments and schedules.

If you have any questions, let me know!

Mike