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HEADLINES  | | | 2013-14 Travel Hockey Season by
posted 06/03/2013 DEAR WINTER CLUB HOCKEY FAMILIES,
We know that it is hard to focus on hockey in June, but we wanted to update everyone on where the Hockey Policy Committee (“HPC”) stands right now in regards to the 2013-2014 travel hockey season. Specifically, this letter will address the following issues:
I. New Canaan Winter Club Hockey Policy Committee (“HPC”)
II. Program Overview
III. Projected NCWC 2013-14 travel teams
IV. Anticipated coaches for the 2013-2014 season
V. Follow up Registration – IMPORTANT PLEASE READ
VI. Finances
I. Hockey Policy Committee
We are very pleased to announce that Eric Haley and Glen Reid have agreed to join the Hockey Policy Committee for the upcoming season. Both Eric and Glen are active at the Winter Club and in our community and will be great additions to our efforts. Tom Crystal and Pat O’Connell have stepped down from their roles on the HPC. We thank them for their time and service. Current HPC members are John Almeida (Co-Chair), Lynne Byrne, Eric Haley, Alicia Hart, Ian Hobbs (Co-Chair), Bill Glover, Chris Robustelli and David Tohir.
II. Program Overview
CHC. The Winter Club will continue to approach our level of play the same way that we have since the CHC went to a self- declared Tier System for squirt level travel hockey and above. We look at each team and choose the tier where we feel they will face equally competitive teams. This season, we are expecting to declare that our Squirt A, Peewee A and Bantam A teams will compete in Tier 2. Our A1/B/C teams will compete either in Tier 3 or in the Open Division. Unlike a few programs in our area, NCWC is very clear about what we want to be as a hockey organization. While our A teams can consistently compete against the best teams in Connecticut, we are not a Tier 1 program playing 60-70 games as opposed to the 40-50 that most Winter Club teams play. Additionally, we play the vast majority of our games within an hour drive of New Canaan as opposed to travelling between Boston and Washington. We hope that this makes sense to everyone and sets a level of expectation.
Ice Time. The biggest development last season was the opening of new rinks at Chelsea Piers and Sono Ice House. This was the biggest change to the hockey landscape in this geographic area in the last 20 years. As many of you noticed, we had more full ice practices and more home games last season than we previously had and our players (and families) benefited from the additional ice time and reduced travel. For this upcoming season, Darien Ice Rink and Ridgefield Winter Garden (until the Winter Club opens in early November) will be our primary locations for outside ice.
Goalies. Scott Chaisson returns as our Travel Hockey Goalie Coordinator. This past season, Scott ran several goalie clinics and we expect to run even more this season. We value our goalies tremendously and would like to develop additional goalies, particularly at our younger (Mite and Squirt) levels. If your son or daughter has an interest in playing goalie, we encourage you to give it a shot. Expect Scott to convene a meeting of all goalie families early after tryouts so we can discuss our collective objectives for the upcoming season.
Tryouts and Team Selection – Philosophy. The HPC is committed to making tryout and team selection as fair a process as possible and our goal remains to place our players on the right team for his/her skill level and development. We have had success using outside evaluators to assist in the player evaluation process and expect to do so again this year. One point that HPC wants to make clear to all families with kids trying out is that there are a number of factors that impact team selection. Clearly, we value a players’ past performance, commitment level and a player’s age/tenure certainly impacts the selection process on “close calls”, but the most important factor is tryout performance. Tryouts provide the one opportunity to evaluate all of the players in an age group on an equal footing. We are one of the very few programs that hold fall tryouts, which we have done intentionally as it is our view that players can use the offseason to develop physically and to develop additional hockey skills. Kids grow, many attend camps and put in the time to improve and we believe our players should have the opportunity to display the improvement they have made in the offseason during the tryout process. We emphasize these points to set an expectation level that no player is guaranteed a spot on any team nor will a player automatically move up from one team to another. We owe it to all of our members, players and coaches to select teams based on merit and this will be our philosophy during the team selection process. As in past years, we will only select players to participate in travel hockey if they have the skill level, commitment and maturity to do so.
We once again anticipate holding two or three voluntary pre-tryout skates for all age groups over Labor Day weekend. Try-outs will be held the weekend after Labor Day from September 6th to September 8th. We will send a correspondence further detailing the tryouts as they approach. Given the changes in Mite hockey mandated by USA Hockey, we are considering having our Mite age players skate together for a few weeks and pick teams in late September so we can best assess the different developmental needs and pathways for our Mite age players. More to come on this this front.
Mite Program Update. One very interesting continued development is the strong interest in a travel hockey option for our youngest (Mite level) hockey players. Last season, the NCWC offered three Mite age travel teams for the first time and we have over 90 Mite age (birth years 2005 and younger) children registered. As many of you know, USA Hockey has mandated that all Mite age hockey become cross ice only (with the possibility of playing a handful of full ice games after January 1st) starting next season. During the past few seasons, all of our Mite teams have played a significant amount of cross ice hockey and the quality of this experience has improved dramatically since it was first introduced a few years ago. It is also clear that our younger players can develop great skills using the curriculum underlying cross ice hockey, which will benefit them greatly as they matriculate in the sport. We understand that some of us do not like this policy, but as a USA Hockey (and Connecticut Hockey Conference) affiliated program, we have no choice but to abide by its rules, which we will.
It is our expectation that we will put three Mite level travel teams on the ice next season (Mite A, Mite B and Mite C) and a very robust and competitive internal “Wildcats” house league so that our players have access to lots of ice time and great coaching. More to come on this front but be rest assured that we will continue to offer a great Mite program for our membership for the 2013-4 season. Our mission to develop our youngest players will not waver – big smiles, lots of ice time and a focus on skill development. Should you have any questions about these programs and our plans for Mite hockey next year, please reach out to us.
Lake Placid. A number of our teams will be attending Lake Placid again this season, scheduled for the weekend of October 31 through November 2. Alicia Hart has done an unbelievable job organizing the Winter Club for the Lake Placid Tournament for the past several years. This is the last year that she will be coordinating this effort. We are once again imploring several volunteers to step forward to help Alicia. As you know, our Club functions as well as it does because of the volunteer efforts of many of our fellow Members. Anyone interested in helping out on this please e-mail Alicia at
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Girls Hockey – U10 Girls Team and Ice Cats. There has also been discussion of offering greater opportunities for our U10 girls to play together more this coming year. We will have a dedicated U10 Girls team that competes both against other U10 girls programs as well as in the CHC Squirt Open division. This team will be coached by Sean Hurley and Rob Benson and we expect to hold tryouts for this team the week after Labor Day (but before regular tryouts begin).
I also hope that everyone is aware of the success of our girls’ team joint venture with Darien Youth Hockey. The Ice Cats embrace the fine qualities of both the NCWC and DYHA programs for the benefit of girls’ hockey. Last season our U14 team won the New England Regional Tournament, went to the National Championship tournament in San Jose and lost in the finals. We completed tryouts this past April for the U12 and U14 teams and the season is set up to be a success for both age groups. We will again have four Ice Cat teams – U12A/U12B and U14A/U14B. We have a strong group of members involved with the leadership of this program and they continue improve the program each year. Ian Hobbs and Boyd Harden are the Winter Club Ice Cats representatives this year. Please feel free to approach either of them if you have any questions regarding the Girls teams.
III. Projected NCWC 2013-14 travel teams
Thank you to everyone who responded to Registration in April. We are pleased that interest in Winter Club travel hockey has never been higher. Based on our registration, we expect to offer our Members a great lineup of teams that meet the needs of most of our travel hockey caliber players. However, given our numbers, it is important to note that we will not be able to offer a travel team spot to every child who has registered for NCWC travel hockey. Specifically, at every level, there are more players registered to play travel hockey than we have teams and spots. For next season, we expect to have the following teams:
- Three Mite teams (for birth years 2005 and younger)
- Four Squirt teams, including a dedicated Girls U10 team (for birth years 2003 and 2004)
- Two Pee Wee teams (for birth years 2001 and 2002)
- Two Bantam teams (for birth years 1999 and 2000)
When a player accepts a position on a travel team, he/she is expected to participate fully in practices, games and tournaments. State and other tournaments have traditionally fallen over both the public and private school breaks. While fall sports may present some understandable conflicts, a strong commitment is essential to the program’s success. Please keep in mind the NCWC also offers a house program for those who feel uncomfortable with this level of commitment.
IV. Anticipated Coaches for the 2013 - 2014 season
We are pleased that most of our coaches will be returning from last season, including Mike Carlucci, Chris Gerwig, Scott Linde, Clark Jones and Kyle Mills to complement our strong group of parent coaches that we have identified to coach the other teams. As a policy, we do not post parent coaches until team selections are complete but we have identified most of the potential coaches for the teams listed above pending team selection.Please feel to reach out to us should you have any further questions on the coaching front.
V. Follow up Registration
On July 8, instructions on how to complete your child’s registration will be emailed out. The purpose of this “follow up’ registration is to complete our administrative requirements for travel hockey (USA Hockey registration, waivers, etc.). It should be simple and quick to complete. Any player who is new to NCWC travel hockey will be asked to submit a copy of their child’s birth certificate at tryouts before their child is allowed to step on the ice. We will send out instructions of what paperwork is required prior to tryouts.
The registration deadline is July 19th for travel players and Wildcats House League Registration will occur in the fall. We have over 200 travel players to process so we ask that you don’t wait until the last minute. Late registration will be penalized with a $250 fee.
VI. Finances & Dues
Members must be fully financially current in order to sign up for tryouts including paying this year's dues and any charges from prior seasons.
Each child trying out will need to have a check payable to the NCWC for $2,500 the night of the first try-out in order to get on the ice. The registrar will collect and hold the checks. Once your child makes a team, your check will be cashed. If your child does not make a team, the check will be torn up.
There is a strong effort to cut the expenses for each team as much as possible in order to keep team program fees down. While we will not know all team expenditures until later, we project that the team dues will be between $2,600 and $3,200 per individual ($1,300 for individuals on the Mite C team) for the full season.
Volunteers Needed! Finally, we need volunteers to get involved. We are a "family" club and we all must contribute and work together to make it function. Specifically, in addition to seeking a volunteer to work with Alicia Hart on Lake Placid, we are looking for volunteers to act as Team Managers and Schedulers for the upcoming season. Alicia will take on the lead role for Lake Placid but she would like to have an assistant (or Co-Chairs) with the intent that this person(s) will step in and learn the process before taking on the lead role in 2014/15. The entire planning of Lake Placid does have a system of checks and balances with CAN/Am, the tournament planner, and the main time commitment is between the end of August through Lake Placid weekend in November.
As always, if you have any questions, suggestions or comments please feel free to contact any of the members of the HPC. Enjoy your summer, stay healthy, and we look forward to seeing you in soon.
All the best,
The Hockey Policy Committee
June 3, 2013Back to top  | by
posted 05/31/2013 Dues for the upcoming 2013-2014 NCWC season will be going out shortly. There will be no change in NCWC dues for the upcoming season. We want to remind you of the payment cycle, discuss membership delinquency, and review payment options.
Payment Cycle – basically a pay in advance system with a reconciliation after the season.
Dues for upcoming season in June – bills will go out soon.
Travel hockey fees are paid by check at tryouts in September.
Program estimated fees are billed in December.
End of season reconciliation bills are sent in April.
Member Delinquency Policy:
Members who have accounts past due in excess of 3 months will not be eligible to use the Club for the upcoming 2013-2014 season, and a new member will be admitted in their place. It is your job to make sure you are current. The only exception will be for newly approved Hardship Payment Plans (all plans from 2012-2013 are over).
If you are not certain that you are current, please email Cissy Yorke our Bookkeeper at
If you want to request a new Hardship Payment Plan, please email the Treasurer at
Your NCWC bill comes to you via email and you have payment options:
1. Pay like your other bills – online banking or paper check
2. E-check accessed through your bill - no cost to you
3. Credit Card accessed through your bill - 3.25% added cost for you – NCWC passes the charge on to you
Thanks,
Dan Sparks
NCWC Treasurer Back to top | July 10: The Big Assist Annual Hockey Game by
posted 05/15/2013
TICKETS GO ON SALE
MAY 15, 2013
Ticket outlets: Blueline Sports, Barrett Bookstore, and Bodytuning in Darien; Fairfield County Bank in Rowayton. Also available on-line at:
www.OHHF.org
Back to top | 2013-14: Official travel hockey registration by
posted 05/14/2013 Registration will begin on Monday, July 8. Back to top |
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