SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Club Soccer & ODP Youth Southern Regional scores and updates

I've seen SC Boys ODP teams beat NTX, Oklahoma, Florida, Georgia, and NC in Regionals at Alabama. My Sons ODP team made the final of ODP Regionals (beat North Texas, Alabama/Oklahoma, Louisiana, Florida II) and lost narrowly 1-0 to Florida I, who won Nationals. No one wanted to play them, I can assure you.

Again my experience is ODP is not political. I think there was a lot in the past, but once they dumped the club coaches and moved to college coaches, the best players got selected. When it was club coaches, they didn't. So I understand people remember that.

The money and club coach (lack of) support is the other thing. As undoubtedly some players don't come out for ODP. If they do, my experience is they get picked and SC teams do well.

Some interesting things from Region III regionals:

• SC CESA U17G lost their quarterfinals match to NTX Dallas Texans 1-0. NTX Dallas Texans went on to win the Region III championship 2-0 against NC Greensboro.
• SC Bridge U16B lost their quarterfinals match to Georgia Concorde Fire Elite 1-0 in overtime. Concorde went on to win the Region III championship 2-1 over Oklahoma.
• SC CESA U16G lost their quarterfinals match to Oklahoma 2-0. Oklahoma went on to win the Region III championship 1-0 over NTX Dallas Texans.

It appears that the "luck of the draw" wasn't very kind to SC teams this year.

After defeating CESA U17G 1-0, NTX Dallas Texans won 3-0 in the semis and 2-0 in the finals, suggesting a solid showing by CESA. I agree that the draw was a rough path.

http://championships.usyouthsoccer.org/index.php?s=&url_channel_id=35&url_article_id=227&change_well_id=2

The majority of the teams advancing to finals are from the big state of TX. It is difficult to compare our best state club, CESA, to the many Atlanta area clubs, but it would be interesting to see how CESA did in comparison to the comparable club up north, CASL.

CESA U17G defeated CASL during premier league and finished ahead of them in the final standings. CESA U17G tied CASL in regional pool play, advancing out of the group; CASL did not. The confusing thing is that CESA has outperformed CASL in U17G all season, but the CASL squad has remained ranked ahead regionally and nationally.

Here's a quick comparison between CASL and CESA at regionals:

CASL 9 teams
CESA 7 teams

CASL 3 teams advance out of group play
CESA 3 teams advance out of group play

CASL U-14 Boys and U-19 Girls in Finals, U-15 Boys lose in Quarters
CESA U-15 Girls, U-16 Girls, U-17 Girls lose in Quarters

U-14 Boys CASL 1-0 over CESA
U-17 Girls CASL 1-1 with CESA

Gotsoccer.com ranks CASL 17th nationally and CESA 30th nationally.
ESPN ranks the top 15 clubs in boys and girls:
2006 CASL boys 15th CESA boys not rated
2006 CASL girls 15th CESA girls not rated
2005 CASL boys 5th CESA boys not rated
2005 neither girls rated

tommyboy: Great statistics and information!

One note: another way to look at the 2006 regional performance is as follows:

CASL: 2 teams lost in playoffs to Region III winner.
CESA: 2 teams lost in playoffs to Region III winner.

However, that's a quibble -- it's clear from the totality of your statistics that CASL is ahead of CESA. CASL's recreation program is 2X to 3X the size of CESA and CASL has done a great job of penetrating its area in terms of youth soccer.

CASL has the enviable situation of being the only main club in that large metro area, without any competing clubs, as does CESA.They are also 2 1/2 hrs from Charlotte, their main in-state competition. With those results from Regionals, it is clear that CESA is progressing to the level of CASL. But since CESA has far fewer numbers than CASL, the progress has to be based on the specialized training and excellent coaching.

Cab..why do you think that happens?