On the "MPSC Ice" thread, one of the (many) topics that was raised was "upstate versus lower state" soccer superiority. A few folks had different methodologies for showing whether there was any difference between regions, with some claiming superiority for one region and others saying that there wasn’t much difference.
I began wondering about my own assumptions. I’ve always used anecdotal evidence, coupled with gotSoccer.com point ratings, to support my belief that the upstate was superior (note: I live in the midstate, so this belief at least isn't based on where my home is). However, I decided to spend an hour going back and revisiting my assumptions. Here’s what I did. I took the 2000-2003 challenge cup results from U11 to U18 for the teams finishing first and second. I assigned 2 points to the first place team and 1 point to the second place team. I then grouped the teams into clubs and the clubs into regions. While I have no doubt that I have some relatively minor math errors somewhere, I’ve double checked this and I think that the overall results are pretty solid.
The total of all points were as follow:
Upstate: 104
Midstate: 40
Lower State: 38
Breaking these down into girls and boys results
Upstate: Boys: 57
Midstate: Boys: 23
Lower State: Boys: 13
Upstate: Girls: 47
Midstate: Girls: 17
Lower State: Girls: 29
Of the 93 total points for the boys’ teams, three teams accounted for 65 of those points: SGU (34), GFC (20), and Aiken (11). CSC and NECSA had 6 and 5 points, respectively.
Of the 93 total points for the girls’ teams, five teams accounted for 65 of those points: SGU (19), GFC (17), MPSC (12), NECSA (9), and CGSA (8). Greenwood and SSC had 7 points apiece.
In terms of combined club ranking, SGU led with 53 points followed by GFC with 37 points and NECSA with 15 points. The point total for SGU and GFC actually should have been slightly higher – but I got confused by past mergers with those clubs of DSA (2 points, boys), UGSA (3 points, girls), and Sugar Creek (1 point, girls).
In looking at all of the numbers, one thing I could have done would have been to assign a higher rating for older teams. It appears that GFC (girls and boys) and to a lesser extent Aiken (boys) would be the major benefactor of this and SGU would have been hurt the most by this change in methodology. I could have also assigned a higher rating for more recent wins, but ran out of time to try this.
I'm posting this so that others can take shots and tell me fundamentally what I'm missing with this, and perhaps even show other ways of examining this issue that might show different results.
