Just one guess ... its where Cal South recommends CSL Silver teams play. Silver Elite is to play at Presidents, but Silver is a Governors division. Given the fact they were 2nd place, it would have been inappropriate to play up (unless an early exist was the goal).Congrats to the girls, but I do wonder why a 2nd place Silver team chose to play in the Governors division?
Here are some statistics concerning the G2008 Governor's Cup:
- Only one bronze team participated (my own Boca Jrs. G2008 squad). The fine Strikers FC OC White team in the video beat us in the round of 16 by a score of 2-1.
- I believe only about three flight 3 teams participated.
- A couple of flight 1 teams participated.
- All the rest were either CSL Silver or SCDSL flight 2.
- The final-four consisted of 4 CSL Silver teams: FRAM, Worldwide, LA Premier, and South Valley.
- The CSL Silver teams in President's Cup performed well.
- This suggests to me that the CSL Silver level teams - at least where there are no Silver Elite brackets - should ordinarily be playing in the Presidents Cup.
- SCDSL Flight 2 teams should ordinarily be playing in the Governor's Cup.
A number of teams playing Presidents should have been playing Governors and a number of teams playing Governors should have been playing Presidents. Cal South should do a sanity check of where teams really belong rather than just put them in where they apply.I think CSL performed well. CSL had 4 Silver teams entered out of 25 teams, which is about 16% of the teams in the group. It slightly outperformed that percentage in the round of 16, having 3 teams (18.75%) advance. It slightly underperformed in the round of 8, having 1 team (12.5%) advance. All-in-all, I think CSL performed at or near its statistical expectations, so I say they performed "well."
As to your other point, that "only" the 1st place CSL finishers should be in the President's Cup, I have to disagree. But I could see going down to the top 4. If all four semi-finalists in the Governor's Cup came from the CSL Silver bracket, then there was either a remarkable statistical anomaly, or the silver teams were playing below their level.
It all depends on what the team is looking for in this end-of-year tournament; either good competition with a chance to win the tournament (and a claim to be the 25th best in soCal), or a chance to see how you stack up against the best in your age group but without a real shot to make it through to the final weekend. I don’t have a problem with either for borderline teams as I am sure different teams have different goals. It would be different if a team was playing down and destroying the competition, or playing up and getting crushed each game. My guess is the girls don't even know that they played in a lower level tournament compared to Presidents and are quite happy with the way the season ended...which should be what it is mostly about at 9 years-olds anyway.Here are some statistics concerning the G2008 Governor's Cup:
- Only one bronze team participated (my own Boca Jrs. G2008 squad). The fine Strikers FC OC White team in the video beat us in the round of 16 by a score of 2-1.
- I believe only about three flight 3 teams participated.
- A couple of flight 1 teams participated.
- All the rest were either CSL Silver or SCDSL flight 2.
- The final-four consisted of 4 CSL Silver teams: FRAM, Worldwide, LA Premier, and South Valley.
- The CSL Silver teams in President's Cup performed well.
- This suggests to me that the CSL Silver level teams - at least where there are no Silver Elite brackets - should ordinarily be playing in the Presidents Cup.
- SCDSL Flight 2 teams should ordinarily be playing in the Governor's Cup.
Based on the Round of 16 and above results, Fram won every game by 1 point, including the final that went to PKs. It looks like Fram was playing the correct level.