• Held at the Brahan Springs Rec Building

• 6:00pm on Wednesday, September 25th, 2002

CALL TO ORDER:
       Christie called the meeting to order.  Discussed were the following items:


Present at meeting were:
Craig Hardwick, Christi Clark, David Ghoja, Belton MacCary, Kari Elliott, Jim Wesseling, Ken Gamble, Irene Wisener, and Marty Eaton.

STATE CUP:
Christi called the meeting to order. The first order of business was hosting State Cup in December. The major responsibilities of NASL include: T-shirts, hospitality and parking.

T-Shirts – a suggestion was made to make more small and medium size t-shirts this year as they proved to be more popular than the larger sizes at last year’s State Cup. Also suggested were a simple two color, block design similar to Abercrombie and Fitch or American Eagle t-shirts so that they appeal to teenagers. Christi is going to contact the designer of last year’s shirts with our request and see what she can come up with. We will sell t-shirts to the referees at our cost.
We also need a number of volunteers to share work shifts at the t-shirt tables. All volunteers will be welcomed even if they can only work a few hours. Normal shifts are two hours in length.

State Cup Preliminaries will be held at a central location in Birmingham. They could not be held in Huntsville due to previous commitments of Huntsville’s fields. An idea to possibly sell the t-shirts at the Birmingham location was also discussed although no decision was made. It was agreed that many players at the preliminaries might be interested in buying the shirts even if their team did not make the semifinals or finals.

State Cup Finals will be held in Huntsville on December 8, 9 & 10th and will include both Snickers State Cup and the Division II State Cup. The Division II State Cup was previously called the Kellogg’s Cup but is unnamed at this time until a new sponsor can be found. Snickers will be held at the John Hunt complex and the Division II State Cup will be held at Merrimack complex.
There was some concern that in age groups with four or fewer teams that the cost to enter State Cup of $375 might mean only one game. There was a request to Marty Eaton to bring that issue to the state association’s attention.

HOSPITALITY:
NASL will be responsible for Hospitality at State Cup which will require a committee of 20 to 25 volunteers outside of the NASL Board. David Ghoja had a crew of six volunteers that he was going to confirm would help. The main requirement is to obtain donations of food (deli assortment trays, sandwiches, pizza, etc.) and distribution of the food. We will be responsible for food and drinks for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks. We will also be charged with delivering the food to the referees working the Division II Cup at Merrimac Park. There will be a concession trailer at Merrimac.
Ken is to send out a request to the NASL e-mail list for volunteers for the Hospitality committee.

PARKING:
Suggestions were made to charge for parking this year at both John Hunt and Merrimack in order to raise funds to upgrade the existing fields – particularly to add lighting on some fields. We will probably be sharing the funds raised from the parking fees with the Sports Commission and with the groups actually standing out at the park taking in the parking fees. Several suggestions were made concerning how to decide which groups would be allowed to participate. Several suggestions were made including allowing high school boosters, but it was decided that the NASL clubs should be allowed to share in the taking up of parking fees. If four clubs participated (i.e., Kicks, HSC, NAU and NASC) they could divide Merrimac and John Hunt and Saturday and Sunday into four equal periods. Several suggestions were made as to how to split the money (percentages to go to NASL, clubs and Huntsville Sports Commission) and whether clubs should have to bid on the opportunity to collect parking fees. Those issues were tabled until Christi could determine if the Huntsville Sports Commission would allow us to charge for parking.

NOTE: Christi checked with the Huntsville Sports Commission after the board meeting and was given permission. We also have to clear it with ASA which should be no problem. We also have to make sure that it gets published so that all participants know to
expect the charge.

ODP – Marty Eaton discussed ODP (State Select) and confirmed that Huntsville will host two ODP events. We will host the Boys ODP Festival January 3rd – 5th, 2003 and the Girls ODP Festival January 31st – February 2nd, 2003. Players were evaluated at tryouts and some will be scouted at games. Also coaches can request that

NEW NASL TEAM in SCOTTSBORO:
There is a new U13 boys team from Scottsboro that has joined the NASL. Their coach is Eddie West. His phone numbers are 256-574-6348 and 256-520-6284. This is a U13 team and they will be playing in Division III. If you have a U12, U13 or U14 team and are interested in playing them please contact Coach West. We agreed to charge a pro-rated NASL fee to this team since they are joining in mid-season and since we want to foster soccer’s growth in the Scottsboro area.

U9/U10 GAMES:
Craig asked the question if U9 and U10 teams could schedule more than the ten games allotted. Since there would be no additional cost to NASL it was agreed that was okay if it was not abused – i.e. no 20 game seasons.

STATE GAMES:
It was agreed that we should let people (coaches, parents, players) know that the "State Games are about development and not wins and losses”. However, in reading the State Cup rules it was noted that the results of State Cup games could be used to seed the State Cup semi-finals and finals in those brackets where four or fewer teams are participating. Since some teams “play up” in the state league and then drop back down into their normal age group for Snickers Cup it would require subjective analysis to seed those teams and although no consensus was reached concerning seeding versus “drawing straws” it was agreed that the seeding should be not be subjective. We agreed that Marty Eaton should take our concerns over the way State Cup games are perceived and that juxtaposition to the State Cup draw.


FIELD SCHEDULING:
Craig talked about field scheduling. In recent weeks NASL has taken questions about the fact that our schedules are not fixed until the week prior to games whereas most areas of the state provide a fixed schedule at the beginning of the year. Craig explained the pros and cons of both methods. He explained that by keeping the schedule flexible teams could move games around without incurring the state cost of $75.00. Several options were explored including keeping the NASL schedule flexible while providing a fixed state game schedule. The current method is much more work for Craig but allows our members more freedom. It was agreed by all board members that NASL should not change the way we schedule at this point in the season and that we should consider any changes after the season is complete.
Craig talked about cost to the league for scheduling referees and that there could be a rebate to the league.
There had been some recent questions by e-mail concerning the scheduling times given teams on Sundays. Craig noted that game times on Saturdays are 8am, 10am, 12pm, 2pm, 4pm and 6pm. On Sundays he sets game times for 12pm, 2pm, 4pm, and 6pm. Craig said that unless specifically requested he does not set times before noon on Sundays due to conflicts with church.
There were also some questions about appropriate field sizes for each age group of teams. Craig noted that the fields we have access to and their sizes are:
Kiwanis – 130 yards x 80 yards
City South - 100 yards x 60 yards
Hunt 3 – 118 yards x 76 yards
Hunt 4 – 118 yards x 76 yards
Craig noted that NASL shares fields with recreational teams, and Adult teams and that restricts our use of some of the fields – specifically Kiwanis, Hunt 3, Hunt 4, and the Merrimack fields. Merrimack 4 is for U9 and U10 only – Do NOT move the goals on the Merrimack fields. Huntsville High is available at 8pm on Thursdays since the older age recreational league did not have enough players to form this season.

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES:
Craig brought up several issues concerning referees.
There are certain amount of time that the referees will wait to start a game after the official starting times. Waiting on players, cards, etc. can cause a delay in the start of games but do not ask the referees to wait past these times. For Division I games the refs can wait up to ten minutes. For NASL games they can wait up until 15 minutes after the scheduled start times. For Division II games there is no amount of time that referees are required to wait.
All game cards must be laminated.
All teams must have a coach on the sideline and that coach must have a coach’s pass. There was a question as to whether a manager might coach if the coach was not available for any reason.
Craig noted that he will be out of town from October 4th through the 13th and that he will not have access to e-mail and that his only contact would be via his cell phone.


EFFECT OF STATE GAMES ON TOURNAMENTS:
It was noted that this year’s Rocket City Invitational will only have 20 total teams – down from 80 last year and 150 just four years ago. It was thought that the scheduling of the tournament on Fall School Holidays might have caused the problem and it could be exacerbated by the effect of a tight State League schedule which only allowed for two exempted “no play” dates. Since those local soccer tournaments return some of their money to improve fields it was felt that NASL should determine how this might affect us.
NOTE: Ken Gamble talked to Lee Sims and Lee said that the two biggest drops in teams were from Tennessee and from Birmingham. Lee said that the benefit of the state league providing good competition for the state teams may weigh in the demise of some tournaments as their goal of bringing in good competition is provided in the new state league format.

It was requested that we should suggest that all NASL Division I and II teams get together and hold a preliminary meeting next fall season before the state scheduling meeting to determine what the “no play” dates should be.
 

ADJOURNMENT:
Christy adjourned the meeting.

Thanks for your help.

Ken Gamble
NASL Secretary
dsports@hiwaay.net
http://www.nasl.com