Attendance: John Veentjer, Mike Pattison, Shawn O’Brien, Ed Rafferty, Greg Pardee, Bill Kusulos, Bob Woods, Scott Shelton, Leah Murphy, Rick Hansen, Donna Eken and Meredith Cutting, Allen McDowell, Chuck Nichols, Bud Freeman, Zach Hector
Absence: Paul Manjarrez, Matt Campbell, Ron Walker, Bob Goldberg, Rick Wells, Bob Peterson, Neil Aguiling, Roger Moore, Ed Claxton, Gregg Meyers (Knights, Kirkland and SnoValley not represented)
Call to order @ 8:00 pm
Followed the agenda. Had hope to fly through agenda and finish by 8:45 pm, however, interesting discussion won out over what was otherwise good intentions.
Minutes of the last meeting (September 3, 2002) are not yet available. They will be distributed when finished and posted to the web site.
All forms should be turned in by now. Master rosters should all be stamped. Eastlake reportedly has stamped rosters in their possession but the copies in the book do not show the stamp. Some SnoValley master rosters in the book are without a stamp – SnoValley needs to make sure they have stamped master rosters at all levels. A few master rosters were missing jersey numbers (Kirkland, Redmond, and Univac). Some missing or incomplete Code of Conduct forms; Bothell, Issaquah, Woodinville need to follow up and ensure all have been turned in; I have also asked Bob Peterson to look for them in case they were just misplaced. All fees are current, except I don’t have confirmation from Bob Peterson on a few systems that were previously missing Boys and Girls Club fees.
Shawn has done a super job of maintaining the game schedule, almost entirely by himself. He has kept the schedule updated as field problems occurred (more than we would like to see). Shawn has hooked up with a couple of other programs to get games for our Seniors and some for our Sophomore teams with a bye. Matt’s work on the web site – posting schedule changes, notes and game results in a very timely manner is also very noteworthy. Thank you Shawn and Matt. No reported problem with delinquent score reporting – keep up the good work of getting all scores to Matt by Saturday night or Sunday morning.
Mike Pattison reported on Game Reports. Several systems are doing a super job; others are delinquent or incomplete. We will put into practice previous used policy that coaches who fail to submit a Game Report may be brought before Grievance Committee to address corrective action. Some discussion regarding why Game Reports are necessary even for those games where nothing significant is to be reported. We need reports from all coaches for several reasons: (1) need to be able to compare ratings from one game to the next (might have 3 games where officials all rated high, and one game where rated low – having all reports helps in the overall evaluation; (2) we need a report on how each game was conducted – opposing coaches may differ in their perception; (3) if only exceptional reports when problems occur are required, too many coaches will exercise the option not to do one even when they should; and other reasons were mentioned. We will strive to make the Game Reporting System as simple as possible.
Mike Pattison then made presentation regarding the conduct of several coaches he observed this past weekend. These coaches need to correct their behavior or suffer consequences. Mike made available a memo, which was distributed with the agenda, in which he addresses his concerns.
John continued the sportsmanship discussion by addressing “ZERO TOLERANCE” -- anything more than a request for clarification regarding a call or lack there of is beyond the line of zero tolerance; that some officials have been tolerant beyond that line doesn’t mean that they won’t suddenly burst and throw a flag. This is not a problem with the officials attitude as some coaches have alleged in the past; rather it’s a problem with the coaches attitude and understanding of zero tolerance. Don’t expect all officials to be that tolerant or any of them to continue to be tolerant. If coaches are picking on the young officials because they think they can get away with it, think again – we are watching and assigning officials accordingly. Two years ago, we made those coaches even in the gray zone (no flag necessary) officiate a game the next week; it end up punishing the officials (who disliked this practice), and other teams who then had to endure some coach who was a worse official. If any of your coaches are still having problems with the officials; tell them to consider a game without officials. Problems are to be reported by Game Report; they are not to be argued with the officials during or after the game.
Grievance Committee has met once – head coach ejected due more to the continued poor behavior of his assistants and then some of the parents. High school rules, GEJFA Rules, Code of Conduct either directly or indirectly put responsibility for addressing conduct on the shoulders of the head coach. The ejected coach came to the Grievance Committee meeting ready to accept responsibility and presented a plan for correction. This was unlike many coaches in the past who have come loaded with excuses (there are no excuses for poor behavior) or suggesting that their behavior was not that bad (it was beyond the line of zero tolerance as discussed above).
Couple of situations reported by complaint or in a game report.
1. There was a roster problem at the Skyline vs Skyview JV game that led to some kind of heated disagreement; each system rep was asked to look into the details; we are adults who are supposed to be setting an example; disagreements/problems can be worked out without losing our cool.
2. Also had report of coach instructing his defensive players to take a knee against an offense already up by 26 or more points apparently in an attempt to get the opposing coach (of the leading team) an automatic one game suspension for exceeding the 32 points winning differential. In the future, such action by the defense will get the an unsportsmanlike call on the coach; coach might be brought to Grievance Committee whether or not ejected.
3. Inappropriate use of the PA System – last year we had announcer giving away offensive plays while in progress. This year we have someone reportedly playing outtake comments by John Madden that are embarrassing to players of other team – “You got to make those catches. No excuse for play like that with the kind of money these players make.” An appropriate litmus test regarding the use of the PA system, and what is said, would be that which would be allowed at a HS game. We will instruct the referees to ask that the PA system be secured if they hear inappropriate comments or otherwise think that its use is disrupting the good conduct of the game.
Substitution Rule – Still having problems with substitution rule violations. Make sure that your coaches know the substitution rule. I think the next time we have a substitution rule issue where we hear the alleged offending coach’s response was “oh, I didn’t know that”, we will bring that coach to Grievance for stupidity. Remember, the system director has to come to the Grievance Committee meetings as well.
We have unwritten policy that a player who doesn’t make weight for three games will automatically be moved up. We will continue that policy this year. However, Council needs to revisit this policy – why 3 games, should it be 2, should it be less, why would we want a player to miss any games, are there some exceptional cases, etc. This needs to be put into the rules for next year. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES is any player who doesn’t make weight to be allowed to play (unless moved up).
No reported problems with game jersey colors this year; only bring it up now to ensure that where conflict is anticipated, system continue to coordinate in the week prior to the game to ensure jersey colors are not a problem.
There too many games in which the 32 point differential is an issue. However, it appears that coaches are doing a better job of managing the score by mixing up the players – giving lineman an opportunity to carry the ball, giving defensive players an opportunity to play offense and vice versa, etc. Having players routinely running out of bounds is not an appropriate management technique. Some additional discussion ensued about other means to manage the score differential, e.g., turning off the score board. This is topic for off-season work. See discussion below regarding proposal for divisions at sophomore, JV and Varsity levels.
Officials -- we have the numbers now, but many of them are inexperienced. Although we have a greater number of senior officials this year, including more PNFOA officials, they are not available as much as we need them. Bear with us as we continue to make improvements.
We’ve already had two teams participate at a Huskies pregame; they really enjoyed it. One more Huskies game and two Seahawk games (29 Sep and 14 Oct). Participating teams need to coordinate with each other regarding their arrival – when, where, be there.
Based on master roster review comments and discussions that followed at the September 3 Council meeting, some systems need to take a look at their current program and prepare for expansion. Remember, we are a program that takes all comers – we don’t want any one turned away or run away. Neighboring systems should not be faced with significant transfers in from systems that indicate they are full. “Full” systems need to consider splits where necessary. Another offseason task will be to better define the boundaries in the rules.
Shawn put together a proposal regarding divisions at the Sophomore, JV and Varsity level in the future. Essentially, we would put the eight top teams from previous year (those in the quarter finals) into a Division of their own. All other teams would be divided north and south. Regular season would be 7 weeks with the first playoff games involving sixteen teams in week 8. The eight teams to make it to the quarter finals become the upper division for the next year. See Shawn’s proposal, handed out at the Council meeting, for more details. We will discuss this proposal in greater detail at the next meeting.
Adjourned at 9:15 pm