| California Midget Minor |
| 16u Tier II Hockey |
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| 2008-09 Season |
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| Summer Shock by Majordomo de CMM.com (posted Jun 20th) - Where do I begin? With the passing of the 2007-08 season, our family's nine year journey through the backstreets of SCAHA and CAHA hockey supposedly came to an end. One kid is off to college and the other looking upon new interests and horizons. We began dismantling the infra-structure that made up our life in travel hockey. I transferred the ownership and responsibility for our local club's and ice rink's websites to the next generation of hockey webmasters. I packed away (sealed in boxes with duct tape) dozens of game and practice uniforms, warm up jackets, equipment, old rosters and tournament notes. Thoughts of Thanksgiving Dinner at home with the family all together for the first time in the 21st Century danced through my wife's head. Tailgating while attending college and pro football games on crisp autumn weekends waltzed through mine. Whoo-hooo!! One of the victims of dismantling the websites was the archives representing three years of CalMidgetMinor.com history (I would have had to pay a $12.95 per month hosting service to keep the archives alive - not happening, time to move on). Good-bye Monkeyboy, good-bye Peeping Tom, R.I.P Gekko Esquire and Skunkworks. Thanks to Kenny Blankenship for writing our obituary on SoCal-Hockey.com. Thanks for the memories….. Then, my kid announces that he wants to play his second season of 16AA hockey. My wife cancelled the 20-pound free range bird from Whole Foods and I recinded the deposit on San Diego Chargers season seats. Then came the call asking if I'd consider managing the hockey team. The sound of duct tape being ripped off the storage boxes exploded through the CMM.com Think Tank as alarms began blarring. "We're back in business, Boys! Get outta the rack!" In for a penny, in for a pound – and what the hell, even a cut-down version of CMM.com might hold some value. So here we sit in the middle of June in the midst of summer shock. Stay tuned….. |
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| CAHA Weekend Venues Disclosed (posted 6/29) - In regards to the all important 2008-09 CAHA Tier II playing weekends, the "when" was established on the "Tier Weekend Bid Request" on CAHA's website. However the critical "where" factor, anticipated since the April 30th bid deadline passed, has remained unannounced. Until now. A posting on SoCal-Hockey.com provides an unconfirmed though very credible listing of dates and venues for all four Tier II divisions. The 16AA lines up this way: Oct 24-26 at Valencia Ice Station; Nov 14-16 at Sharks Ice at San Jose; Jan 2-4 at Escondido Iceoplex; Jan 16-18 at Lakewood Glacial Garden; Feb 6-8 CAHA Playdown (I.e. 1st round State Playoffs) at Valencia Ice Station. This list seems credible since it avoids the Dec 5-7 session, the date of the Silver Stick Pacific Qualifier tournament at Las Vegas. On the other hand, the 18AA Silver Sticks is at the same time and place and the Majors have to play CAHA that weekend. But in light of the fact that neither CAHA.com nor CAHA's real website norcalyouthhockey.com provides any official word, we're going to believe the rumors. As usual. Rink Directory (posted 6/28) - The CMM.com staff has been working on building a comprehensive CAHA ice rink directory for several years. The project started as a simple list of rink addresses and phone numbers, then got expanded for driving directions and a brief facility review including a grade ranging from A+ to F. Now we've taken the final step to a full blown comprehensive directory. We've attempted to record our observations from nine years of making weekly pilgrimages to the ice palaces around Southern California. Some of our pictures may be up to three years old, but we've attempted to be as current as possible. Hope you enjoy it and perhaps make use of it during the season. |
| Tracy MacDonald
Doug Sheridan Jeff Shields Mario Morrissette John Devereaux Rob O’Rourke Mike Annuziato Quinn Quirion Dennis Sly Andy Newton Andrei Runtso Mike Sherman Brad Wheeler Mark Falkowski David Powell Mel Bridgeman Jim Marvin Mike Atkinson |
| The Season Kicks-Off (posted 9/02) - Well we got a whole page-full of game results from the Labor Day weekend tournaments meaning that the SoCal-Hockey.com bookmakers can have a bit more confidence in coming up their lines this week. Anyhow, to put a wrap on Labor Day, congratulations to the California Heat for pounding the competition into submission and bringing home the championship banner. All the pain and suffering they endured last year (the core of this team comes from last season’s West Valley Wolves 16AA2) is paying dividends in very impressive fashion...... What follows is the updated 2008-09 California Midget AA 16u lineup. Click on the team name to go to the newly created Team Pages (also linked from the logos above; we'll straighten out the logos after the final declarations). This is a work in progress, so team pages are still coming on-line as we collect the required data..... |
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| ARCHIVES |
| Seventeen is Most Definitely a Crowd
(posted 9/15) - Today is reportedly the deadline for teams to officially declare if they want to move into or out of the Midget AA 16u division. We have nothing official yet, but indications (I.e. top rated hear-say, as well as grade-A-choice innuendo) are that the Channel Islands Riptide will drop to 16A. It is a mild surprise in that the team has been very competitive in many games, but they apparently don't have enough rostered players. It appears the final roll call of teams will include 14 from SoCal and 3 from NorCal, meaning a whole bunch of CAHA weekend games. Don't be surprised if they end up having to use the Friday night slots on some, if not all of the CAHA weekends. Last year there were only thirteen 16AA teams and only Lakewood had to use a Friday night for three games. We're unsure if the four CAHA Weekend venues this year will have enough ice for what averages out to be 17 games on Saturday and 17 games on Sunday. Another thing, we have no mathmatician on staff, but we don't see how they're going to fit in that 17th team - it'll be a scheduler's nightmare. They really need one more team to throw in the towel and even this thing out at an even sweet 16. Incidentally, CAHA says, "the scheduling of these games is very complicated and the whole season must be laid out before the first schedule is done. This takes some time and you can expect to see schedules for the first weekend sometime around Mid-October." We'll see if the Riptide rumors become fact. If so, the Selects Bantam AAA team could be very busy filling in those new BYE weeks. (Sept 17th Update) - Prolonged discussions took place throughout the night between the CMM.com Think Tank membership and a visiting scholar named Crazyoldgoalie. In the end, COG's simple table overcame the Think Tank's elaborate color coded matrix to prove that a 17-team, four CAHA weekend could work. We stand humbly aside with head bloodied and bowed. Variety of Games on Tap this Weekend (updated 10/02) - As we turn the calendar from September to October, teams begin to expand their horizons by finding new sources of games. The first CAHA weekend looms a mere three weeks away so coaches obviously feel the pressure to more quickly sharpen their squads prior to D-Day. The team making the most imaginative trip of the weekend is the San Jose Jr Sharks, traveling to Colorado Springs to participate in the Rampage in the Rockies tournament. NORCAL teams face inherent difficulty getting games against same-level opponents and must exercise creativity when scheduling. Last September, Jr Sharks 16AA entered the Affton Americans’ event in St. Louis, so an early Autumn jaunt to Colorado is all just a part of the San Jose program. This weekend, they face a line-up of local Colorado opponents, starting with the host Colorado Rampage, followed-up by the Littleton Jr Hawks, Mountain States Renegades and Highland Hills Jaguars….. Another NORCAL team, the Vacaville Jets travel to Phoenix to participate in 1st Annual Arizona Hockey Union Ice Breaker Invitational. The Los Angeles Jr Kings will also be playing there. Both CAHA teams face the same three opponents in preliminary round play: Arizona Hockey Union 16AA 92s, Arizona Hockey Union 16AA 93s, and Phoenix Jr Coyotes. They play a fourth game, but the opponent depends on seeding after the prelims….. The California Heat travel to Las Vegas to play a series of exhibition games against Tier I 16u opponents, twice against the host Nevada Stars and once against Mission Arizona Ice. More importantly, the dads get to watch football this weekend in a Vegas sports book….. The Beach City Lightning 92s become the first CAHA 16AA team to play a game against the newly formed JSerra Catholic High School Ice Lions (San Juan Capistrano) varsity hockey team. In collaboration with the NHL Anaheim Ducks, JSerra is leading the effort in building Southern California high school hockey as a major CIF sport. Two weeks ago, they advanced to the semi-finals in a high school tournament in Chicago. They have games lined up in the next several weeks against the OCHC and the SoCal Titans….. On top of all this unusual activity, we have five garden-variety SCAHA-scheduled CAHA games. Everybody have a safe, yet fun weekend. It’s supposed to rain on Saturday. Valencia CAHA #1 Schedule Released (posted 10/02) - The first game that counts begins on Friday, October 24th at 6:30pm when the Jr Ducks and Jr Ice Dogs face off on the Valencia Ice Station's NHL rink. After that, a record 36 more games will take place over the next 53 hours and the weekend won't wrap up until some time approaching midnight (I.e. Monday morning). But hey, after that we get standings - something we can hang our hat on. Something the experts and odds-makers can point to as a trend, a sign of things to come. For the first time in the four years of CAHA weekends at the Midget Minor level, teams will play five games at a single session. The Jr Ducks, Lightning 93s, Heat, Stars Black, Jr Ice Dogs and Saints will be the proverbial guinnea pigs in this experiment. Uneven scheduling always creates advantages and disadvantages - hopefully the ones that occur this season will not be material. CAHA Tier II Weekend #1 - Preview by the CMM.com Editorial Staff (posted 10/23) - – The first thing that popped into my mind when deciding what to write in this preview was the time ole Gunny Breckenridge sat me on his knee when I was a kid and said sonorously, “Let me tell you son, about how things were done in the old Corps”. The Gunny, you see, was totally old school and not akin to newfangled ideas. Now I’m as high tech as the next guy but while perusing the long list of CAHA games already played – all which don’t count – I can’t help but feel nostalgic for the good ole days when every game after September 1st meant something. Now they are as relevant as pay phones and the print media, or as the Gunny would say, “teats on a boar hog”. Back to the present – Everybody is back to zero wins, zero losses, zero ties. The season begins on Friday night when the Jr Ducks face-off against the SoCal-Hockey.com Jr Ice Dogs. Finally, a game that counts! While we’re all anxious to get started, this piece is an event preview so reluctantly, we have to take a step back….. Anaheim Jr Ducks 7-0-0 against CAHA 16AA teams; 8-4-0 Overall Signature Win(s): 6-3 over the Jr Kings on Oct 11th and 11-1 over the Lightning 93s on Oct 12th Click here to go to the complete text of the CAHA #1 Preview..... CAHA #1 Recap by the CMM.com Editorial Staff (posted 10/29) – The last player from the last game of CAHA’s 16u Tier II Weekend #1 filed out of the Valencia Ice Station just after 11:30 on Sunday night, capping a record 37-game schedule. Now that the dust has settled and we’ve all had a couple days to decompress, it’s time to take a quick look back, then close the book on this opening stanza. First of all, we’ve got to give high fives all around to the CMM.com pencil pushers whose analyses became the basis for some fine weekend predictions. Some were hit right on the head, while many others were near misses. A couple were totally wrong, but we’ll get to those in detail later. Also, hats off to the facilities manager at Ice Station; rink personnel kept games moving and on-time. There was real fear that the last game on Sunday (scheduled for 9:45pm) would for whatever reason get pushed to after midnight with any kind of delay. Having game scores posted on sPortabilty proved a valuable resource for CMM.com. Next month at Sharks Ice, we’ll get the added benefit of downloadable score sheets for each game. Click here to go to the complete text of the CAHA #1 Recap.... CAHA Tier II Weekend #2 - Preview by the CMM.com Editorial Staff (posted 11/13) - College football has the BCS (Bowl Championship Series) to determine who gets to play for the NCAA national championship. It’s a system that is full of….. full of – well you know what it’s full of. Click here to read the full text of the CAHA #2 Preview..... CAHA II Recap by the CMM.com Editorial Staff (posted 11/19) – CAHA II was a weekend filled with ponderables. Consider that after two days of non-stop, hard-hitting hockey action (not just the 16AA games but also the AAA Stars v Jr Sharks and the University of Oregon Ducks v San Jose State University Spartans), a 9-1-1 call from the rink resulted in two fire engines and an ambulance rushing over to tend to a public skater who suffered a broken arm. Ironically, this occurred during the Heat v Gulls grudge re-match – everyone crowded into the South rink to see if the teams’ dads were going to reprise their verbal battle from earlier in the month at Escondido (Ref: SoCal-Hockey.com for the blow-by-blow details from November 2nd). Click here to read the full text of the CAHA #2 Recap..... Thanksgiving Tournaments: Anaheim Jr Ducks - Fall Round-up, Dallas TX Beach City Lightning 93s - (none) Beach City Lightning 92s - Silver Stick, Las Vegas (Dec 5-7) California Cougars - San Diego & Silver Stick Las Vegas California Heat - Silver Stick, Las Vegas (Dec 5-7) California Stars Black - Team Illinois AAA Invitational California Stars Red - (none) California Wave - (none) Inland Valley Wild - Silver Stick, Las Vegas (Dec 5-7) Los Angeles Jr Kings - Turkeyshoot, Lakewood Glacial Orange County Hockey Club - Silver Stick, Las Vegas (Dec 5-7) San Diego Gulls - Thanksgiving Extravaganza, San Diego San Diego Saints - Silver Stick, Las Vegas (Dec 5-7) San Jose Jr Sharks - Fall Round-up, Dallas TX SoCal Jr Ice Dogs - (none) Southern California Titans - Mile High Thanksgiving, Littleton CO Vacaville Jets - Dallas Fall Round-up & Silver Stick (Dec 5-7) Heat Getting Burned ? by the CMM.com Editorial Staff (posted 1/22) - A CAHA Insider confirmed reports today that the 16AA Regular Season champion California Heat might not have an automatic berth into the USA Hockey Pacific District championships as the host team. As a result, they may have to play its way into that event via the State playoffs, starting with the CAHA play-down in Valencia next month. Confirmation came later in the day from CAHA in the form of an email from the Tier Commissioner listing the teams participating in the play-down. The Heat was the number one seed. USA Hockey awarded the 2009 Pacific District Tier II 16u and 18u championships, which begin on March 7th, to Valencia Ice Station. Because host Club bear so much responsibility and cost for putting on the event, USA Hockey awards their teams in those respective age divisions an automatic berth into the tournament. Everybody all season assumed that the Heat, a joint venture between the Valencia Express and West Valley Wolves for Tier hockey, would receive the host berth since they are the only 16AA team to play its home games at Ice Station. However, the problem seemingly comes from the fact that while the host bid was awarded to the Valencia Express, the Heat is registered for USA Hockey under West Valley Wolves. This apparently is only a problem for the 16AA team, as the Heat 18AA is registered as Express. Heat officials are attempting to negotiate this situation with CAHA, stand-by. If the Heat play, the 9th place Orange County Hockey Club gets bumped from replacement eighth seed to out of the post-season. Easy come, easy go. 1/23 Update: CAHA announced late last night that the Heat will get their BYE in the State tournament and the auto-berth in the Districts. The Jr Ducks are the #1 seed and OCHC can keep its ball gown as they're going to the big dance. |
