New to Gold

[MavFan]

And what is wrong with the number of teams qualifying and playing at the "Gold" level?
Are all those kids supposed to sit back and just be content to play 18u? They go through the qualifiers, get to experience Nationals in OKC or other locations. I don't see where anyone is hurt by it.

I guess I would ask why have a Gold designation if anyone can play Gold?

I would think it would be the same reason why all 900ish college teams aren't DI, or why all 200ish DI teams don't qualify for the NCAA tournament. But at the NCAA level they have some sort of requirement to be classifed DI versus DII. Nothing is saying DII is not a great option, but you don't see Cal State Dominguez Hills playing in the DI NCAA tournament.

I know of several "Gold" teams that have NEVER played an ASA sanctioned tourney- many of those teams are in reality "showcase" teams- Gold has become a very common name to attach to programs

That is not the point Jon. ASA created the Gold classification back in the day to distinguish the elite teams from all other 18U teams. The contention was that the elite teams were tired of playing in nationals that had 150 or more teams. As a result, the Gold classification was formed. After a number of years, teams began putting Gold at the end of their name all the way from 18U to 10U, when that began to happen the ASA Gold classification began to lose what distinguished it from 18A. As PDad pointed out, prior to the advent of PGF, California had enacted a qualification standard to be considered a Gold team. As he also mentioned in Texas the Region 7 tournament of just Texas teams had like 60 teams for a three day qualifier, where 3 teams qualified for nationals by contrast only 2 teams signed up for the 18A Houston metro tournament.

But the question that was asked in the OP was when the location of the ASA qualifiers for Gold were going to be announced. I don't think the OP was referring to 12U or a showcase in North Carolina.

If there is nothing to distinguish Gold from 18A, I still ask why have the Gold designation?

All true- but that's what is going on out there. What distiguishes Gold from 18a is the restriction of college players. It is a restriction made at ASA Gold Tournaments, PGF and some TCS. Other than that a team can call itself Gold and not much anyone can do about it

Again Jon I agree that teams can call themselves whatever they want, that was not the discussion, 12U teams can add Gold to their name but they will not attempt to qualify for the ASA Gold tournament.

Prior to just a few years ago college players could play ASA Gold as well as ASA 18A, what was it that differentiated Gold from 18A at that time?

[Fredegar]

Prior to just a few years ago college players could play ASA Gold as well as ASA 18A, what was it that differentiated Gold from 18A at that time?

Good point. The only difference was that true Gold teams qualified for one of the 64 spots at ASA Gold Nationals.

[AlwaysImprove]

And what is wrong with the number of teams qualifying and playing at the "Gold" level?
Are all those kids supposed to sit back and just be content to play 18u? They go through the qualifiers, get to experience Nationals in OKC or other locations. I don't see where anyone is hurt by it.

I guess I would ask why have a Gold designation if anyone can play Gold?

I would think it would be the same reason why all 900ish college teams aren't DI, or why all 200ish DI teams don't qualify for the NCAA tournament. But at the NCAA level they have some sort of requirement to be classifed DI versus DII. Nothing is saying DII is not a great option, but you don't see Cal State Dominguez Hills playing in the DI NCAA tournament.

I know of several "Gold" teams that have NEVER played an ASA sanctioned tourney- many of those teams are in reality "showcase" teams- Gold has become a very common name to attach to programs

That is not the point Jon. ASA created the Gold classification back in the day to distinguish the elite teams from all other 18U teams. The contention was that the elite teams were tired of playing in nationals that had 150 or more teams. As a result, the Gold classification was formed. After a number of years, teams began putting Gold at the end of their name all the way from 18U to 10U, when that began to happen the ASA Gold classification began to lose what distinguished it from 18A. As PDad pointed out, prior to the advent of PGF, California had enacted a qualification standard to be considered a Gold team. As he also mentioned in Texas the Region 7 tournament of just Texas teams had like 60 teams for a three day qualifier, where 3 teams qualified for nationals by contrast only 2 teams signed up for the 18A Houston metro tournament.

But the question that was asked in the OP was when the location of the ASA qualifiers for Gold were going to be announced. I don't think the OP was referring to 12U or a showcase in North Carolina.

If there is nothing to distinguish Gold from 18A, I still ask why have the Gold designation?

All true- but that's what is going on out there. What distiguishes Gold from 18a is the restriction of college players. It is a restriction made at ASA Gold Tournaments, PGF and some TCS. Other than that a team can call itself Gold and not much anyone can do about it

Again Jon I agree that teams can call themselves whatever they want, that was not the discussion, 12U teams can add Gold to their name but they will not attempt to qualify for the ASA Gold tournament.

Prior to just a few years ago college players could play ASA Gold as well as ASA 18A, what was it that differentiated Gold from 18A at that time?

Gold teams had 'gold' at the end of their name. There was no other difference. Anyone was/is allowed to add gold to the end of their name.

It was left to parents to chat each other up and message boards to find out who the true gold teams were. Previous years list of 64 teams were definitely gold. Sometimes you would have a really great coaches not qualify one year, they were no less gold than the year before when they finished top 10.

[MavFan]

And what is wrong with the number of teams qualifying and playing at the "Gold" level?
Are all those kids supposed to sit back and just be content to play 18u? They go through the qualifiers, get to experience Nationals in OKC or other locations. I don't see where anyone is hurt by it.

I guess I would ask why have a Gold designation if anyone can play Gold?

I would think it would be the same reason why all 900ish college teams aren't DI, or why all 200ish DI teams don't qualify for the NCAA tournament. But at the NCAA level they have some sort of requirement to be classifed DI versus DII. Nothing is saying DII is not a great option, but you don't see Cal State Dominguez Hills playing in the DI NCAA tournament.

I know of several "Gold" teams that have NEVER played an ASA sanctioned tourney- many of those teams are in reality "showcase" teams- Gold has become a very common name to attach to programs

That is not the point Jon. ASA created the Gold classification back in the day to distinguish the elite teams from all other 18U teams. The contention was that the elite teams were tired of playing in nationals that had 150 or more teams. As a result, the Gold classification was formed. After a number of years, teams began putting Gold at the end of their name all the way from 18U to 10U, when that began to happen the ASA Gold classification began to lose what distinguished it from 18A. As PDad pointed out, prior to the advent of PGF, California had enacted a qualification standard to be considered a Gold team. As he also mentioned in Texas the Region 7 tournament of just Texas teams had like 60 teams for a three day qualifier, where 3 teams qualified for nationals by contrast only 2 teams signed up for the 18A Houston metro tournament.

But the question that was asked in the OP was when the location of the ASA qualifiers for Gold were going to be announced. I don't think the OP was referring to 12U or a showcase in North Carolina.

If there is nothing to distinguish Gold from 18A, I still ask why have the Gold designation?

All true- but that's what is going on out there. What distiguishes Gold from 18a is the restriction of college players. It is a restriction made at ASA Gold Tournaments, PGF and some TCS. Other than that a team can call itself Gold and not much anyone can do about it

Again Jon I agree that teams can call themselves whatever they want, that was not the discussion, 12U teams can add Gold to their name but they will not attempt to qualify for the ASA Gold tournament.

Prior to just a few years ago college players could play ASA Gold as well as ASA 18A, what was it that differentiated Gold from 18A at that time?

Gold teams had 'gold' at the end of their name. There was no other difference. Anyone was/is allowed to add gold to the end of their name.

It was left to parents to chat each other up and message boards to find out who the true gold teams were. Previous years list of 64 teams were definitely gold. Sometimes you would have a really great coaches not qualify one year, they were no less gold than the year before when they finished top 10.

Sorry this thread lost its direction and turned into whatever this is.

I guess I just see that the Gold classification has turned into what 18A was prior to the creation of Gold. My observation is that you have a limited number of berths for Gold nationals and too many teams competing for too few berths. In Texas, there two Gold qualifiers in 2012 with 3 berths on the line in each, 68 teams in one tournament and 58 in the second. For 18A Houston Metro, 2 teams signed up and 2 teams received berths. The problem is not necessarily the number of teams, its just the tournaments take place on a weekend over a 2 and a half day period, 68 teams to get 3 berths is like 130ish games played over the period, winners bracket could have played 6 to qualify, final loser's bracket qualifier could have played 11 games. That is insane

What exactly did SoCal ASA do when they created the Gold qualification system a few years ago?

[wichita]

Well in central cal ASA we have a classifier for 18 Gold and the top three teams are the only ones that get Gold status

[PDad]

What exactly did SoCal ASA do when they created the Gold qualification system a few years ago?

Here is the original proposal for 2009 - http://socal-asa.com/documents/GoldClassification.pdf
See page 44 for the actual reg - http://www.socal-asa.org/jo/forms/YellowBook2010.pdf

Basically, it limited Gold teams from SoCal ASA to 50. Teams that qualified for Gold Nats were automatically classified the following year. The remainder of the teams had 2 opportunities to classify in January tournaments.

There were 81 teams in the 2007 Regional Qualifier. I can't find how many were in 2008.

[tcannizzo]

What does GOLD mean? From what I have seen
Great
Organization
Lots of
Disappointment

[rdelawder12]

Wouldn't mind seeing ASA moving the 18A to the same location as 18 Gold and doing 64 teamsin each division. So more Coaches could see more kids playing that aren't committed and keep it the week before Premier! That may put that tournament back on the map, otherwise it's losing it's luster and Gold definetly doesn't mean what it meant 5 years ago!!