December will run normally with BY teams since EA, MLSN, and ECNL teams will be on break until March, including SOCAL/CSL for state cup until January. The real question is what happens from March 2026 to August 2026.
ECNL, MLSN, and EA teams will still be in season, which means SoCal and CSL leagues will be the only ones officially in their offseason. There won’t be much reason for current BY teams in those two leagues to stay together since many SoCal teams are already forming new SY teams this month. Once the State Cup wraps up in late February or March, there won’t be any remaining SY teams in CSL or SoCal.
Tournament organizers won’t want to lose money, so they’ll likely start offering SY-format tournaments in March so the newly formed SY CSL/SoCal teams can begin registering.
Now imagine March 2026 rolls around and organizers continue hosting BY tournaments, the only teams eligible would be ECNL/RL and MLSN/EA/EA2 teams. But good luck getting them to register or commit to weekends while they’re still in season through June.
