NISL Meeting Notes

NISL Meeting Notes

October 20, 2015

• Meeting started at 10:30 am.
• The first 20 minutes concerned the administration of the Bonzi website. How to obtain game cards, game changes and game score reporting was discussed. Both home and away teams can upload scores—but only once. If a score is in dispute, call Jason at NISL office.
• When printing the game card, the second page must be printed and handed to the center referee. On the second page are a quick set of rules for the ref and coaches to follow. (See attached final two pages.)
• NISL is looking into subsidizing referee clinics for 14-16 year olds. NISL would pay the clinic fee and then the new referee would have to officiate at two NISL games to “pay them back”. This is just one of the things that NISL is looking into concerning referees. One of the other ideas is that NISL would take over assigning games for all the clubs. This would eliminate assignors and give one central place for referees to pick up games. NISL would then be able to control the qualifications required for each game and each position. This is not happening; it’s just an idea.
• With Bonzi, NISL picked up a referee scheduler called GameOfficials.net. This is a referee assigning software. It is provided free of charge to any NISL game and clubs can pay a fee per game for any other league games they would like to assign. (Our club is looking into this as a way to consolidate our referee assigning. The current system uses three separate assignors and is convoluted.)
• The Birth Year Cutoff was discussed in depth. While it is not mandated to be in place until the Fall of 2017, NISL is going to adopt this in the Fall of 2016. The reasoning was that it made no sense to let teams play together one more year before possibly re-configuring them. (The handout received is attached. The first five pages concern this topic.) The only problem comes with the high school teams as always. Going by the year of birth, some players will still be in 8th grade when some will be in high school on the same team. Since a player is not allowed to play club and high school concurrently, clubs will be left with half a team. NISL proposed three options:

1. Build two teams around the two ages affected.
2. Build the team around the strongest players which leaves you with either one older team or one younger team. Release the remaining players to another team in the club or competing club.
3. Keep the combined team and play half the team up in age.

These are the options that we face every year we try to put together a team so it is the same problem we always have. Bigger clubs will not have a problem because they just have to shuffle their players according to their ages and have the same number of players—just placed on differently aged teams.

• Last we talked about the changes in the field size, goal size and roster size. (page 6 of attached handout) On the handout, the rows that are shaded are the new mandated rules. The rows in white are what NISL follows now. Number of players on the field is only going down for U8. It is 4 v 4 with no goalkeeper. All playing times except U14 and above have been shortened. All field sizes U10 and below have gotten smaller. Goal sizes have changed. U8 has gotten smaller. U9 through U10 has gotten bigger. U11 and up have the same goal sizes as before. Maximum roster sizes have changed too though it is not shown on this page. Each age has a roster size dependent upon dual field play. If a team is playing on two fields simultaneously, the old roster sizes remain in place. If not, the recommendations are to decrease the maximum roster sizes. NISL is looking toward adopting all of the new changes in the Fall of 2017 as mandated with the exception of goal sizes. They are hoping to lobby USYS to change the goal sizes back to what is used now. Their reasoning is that it is impossible for a U9 and U10 player to guard an 18 foot wide goal. One reason is because we are asking players who never played in the goalkeeper position (No goalkeepers for U8) to guard a goal that is approximately half the width of the new field sizes. The other is that it will drive the scores of the games up and cause players to be demoralized. Clubs will hear more about this in the future.

• Meeting adjourned at 12:15 pm.

(attachments)