I agree. Most of the time people get caught up in the madness. But, wait until the week after finals when things are getting back to normal because there will be some buyers remorse assuming your kids team didnt win it all. If there was a sense of impropriety because of the seeding the buyers remorse will be double.
ECNL Girls Playoffs 2025
- Thread starter diamondcoach
- Start date
5 of the 6 age groups last year, there was a SoCal champion. Surf won 3 of them. Koge did well the year before. KSAT year in one age group, all 4 teams were from SoCal. ECNL isn’t stupid—they have to give the rest of the country a belief and a chance.
RandomSoccerFan
PREMIER
I think you've landed on an explanation that doesn't make sense, and doesn't seem to be supported by game results. You believe that the SoCal Blues are an example of this variation? I've just gone through every one of their top teams, from 2015G through 2007G, and their results are anything but inconsistent. There are very few overperform or underperform results compared to their rating across the board. Some have only 1 or 2 game examples in the past year. If not the Blues, which teams do you think fit the model you've laid out, we can post the game histories to confirm.
I'm seeing a 0-5 game against 2010 Koge which occurred right after 4-0 and 6-0 out of league games. Which is exactly what I was talking about.
But yes other than that I agree they've been consistent.
RandomSoccerFan
PREMIER
I'm not sure we're interpreting it the same way. Here's the game background of that 2010 Blues team. They are a 48.66, ranked only 14th in the state, 55th nationally.
They mainly perform pretty close to that rating, with the green showing overperform, and red showing underperform. The 0-5 loss against Koge is in fact listed as underperform, but it's not by much - Koge is a 51, and the predicted estimate for that game is already a 0-3 loss.
The clear wins the previous month you list are over pretty lowly ranked teams, which aren't even listed as overperforms because they were expected to win 5-0 and 3-0 (and actually won 6-0 and 4-0).
There is no mystery here, and nothing abnormal to explain away. This team isn't any more helpful to the rating of an opposing team, than any other.
They mainly perform pretty close to that rating, with the green showing overperform, and red showing underperform. The 0-5 loss against Koge is in fact listed as underperform, but it's not by much - Koge is a 51, and the predicted estimate for that game is already a 0-3 loss.
The clear wins the previous month you list are over pretty lowly ranked teams, which aren't even listed as overperforms because they were expected to win 5-0 and 3-0 (and actually won 6-0 and 4-0).
There is no mystery here, and nothing abnormal to explain away. This team isn't any more helpful to the rating of an opposing team, than any other.
Its nice to see the explanation of exactly what I said was happening.
1. Highly ranked
2. Plays other teams out of league and over performs
3. Plays against a team in league that consistently wins and underperforms
In this case Blues are exactly who Koge wants to play to maintain a high ranking.
Although I have no way to prove it. My gut tells me that teams that consistently win tend to work with players more long term while the teams that go up and down are chasing what they think is the next best player.
RandomSoccerFan
PREMIER
You are completely misunderstanding what you're looking at. This isn't the first time, and isn't likely to be the last.
Lightning Red
GOLD
Is Slammers HBK 07 the best youth team of all time?
U14 - ECNL National Finalist
U15 - ECNL National Champion
U16 - National Finalist
U17 - National Quarterfinalist
U19 - National Champion
Certainly an argument can me made for a few of those Baker Blues teams of yesteryear. Let's keep in mind that not all top teams played in ECNL during those years. I'm def not discrediting them because they were amazing.
Baker trained the HBK 07's on many occasions & certainly during the buildup to ECNL Playoffs.
U14 - ECNL National Finalist
U15 - ECNL National Champion
U16 - National Finalist
U17 - National Quarterfinalist
U19 - National Champion
Certainly an argument can me made for a few of those Baker Blues teams of yesteryear. Let's keep in mind that not all top teams played in ECNL during those years. I'm def not discrediting them because they were amazing.
Baker trained the HBK 07's on many occasions & certainly during the buildup to ECNL Playoffs.
2010 Koge is most likely going to take this Throne and never give it up.
Lightning Red
GOLD
Great team!!! Good luck in Richmond this week!
Solar 07g team right there with them.
For 2010 if Hawks didn’t pull off the massive upset it would have been Surf vs Koge in the first round.
Best team of all time—meaningless.
I think all these “best youth team of all time threads” are overlooking a major point. In the oldest two age groups, the strongest players leave the youth system and turn pro. For example, the ‘06 Scott Gallagher team won back to back titles, and then Pfeiffer went pro. She was scoring 3 goals a game (and she was playing up 2 years). SLSG ‘06 was a Richmond quarterfinal team after that.
In the last few years we have seen many 15 yr olds turn pro. The best youth teams of all time simply have the least amount of players leave for the pro game.
MVLA ‘03 side would be a tough record to beat. Before all the great ones turned pro early.