StXBomber88

Those are the two best teams we have faced this year. Glad they are opposite side of the bracket along with NCC. In my opinion right side of bracket looks tougher than the left judging by the teams we have faced. Upper left looks stronger than lower left. While the freshman players and parents may be the only ones who care about winning the tournament, I think winning it helps build confidence. It may also help programs looking to re-establish themselves and attract players who are on the fence about trying out. I constantly hear how strong soccer is in this area and then I go to freshman games and see 5 or more grade school kids playing on teams because they cannot get any high school aged kids to tryout. I would love to see more involvement from freshman.

Are there any official rules about who is allowed to play in the freshman regional or is it up to the individual schools to set there own policies? We played a team this past weekend who had a kid playing that played most of both the freshman and JV games. I also heard he gets varsity minutes. I was told he has varsity goals but cannot confirm. If numbers on the freshman level make it necessary for him to play I could understand, but I think they had 16 or 17 players. We get them again first round of freshman regional so at least we are now prepared for what to expect. He was a really nice player. If it was my kid I wouldn't want to risk injury playing in three games in one day.

St Henry wins 8-0. I think Conner changed goalies for the second half. Conner played nearly all sophomores. St Henry mixed up their lineup. Some starters played more minutes than others. I was told both teams had starters out with injuries.

I was at the game last night and this is pretty much exactly what I saw also. Based on the reaction of the Holy Cross coaching staff and the way they pulled the 6th player off the court I do not think anything intentional was going on. It was an exciting game to watch. Holy Cross couldn't buy a basket down the stretch. They missed several contested layups. It was one of those games where you could just see it slipping away from Holy cross and there was nothing they could do to stop it.

Newport had a couple of underclassman shoot the ball really well from outside the 3 point line. #4 shot the ball extremely well, I think he is a freshman. Made some deep threes in both JV and Varsity.

I think a couple players were held out, coaches decision is what I was told by a Newport fan. Sometime in the second half it appeared one of them left the bench for the locker room and then left gym loudly. Not sure of the circumstances involved.

St Henry plays Heritage in the opening game. Bracket looks pretty balanced.

I'm working on it but the Force is strong down there. Last year it was 70% Cov Cath 30 % St Henry. It is now closer to 60% St Henry 40 % Cov Cath. He's in 7th grade his choice will probably change again once or twice before he has to decide.

Again, I am sorry. You didn't quote who you were referring to and it came right after my post so I assumed it was in response to my post.

Well then I am sorry. I guess I am up too late and need to go to bed. Please accept my apologies.

If your response is in regard to my post, then apparently it must be, because the best you could conjure up would be the type of response I would get from a 7 year old. If you disagree with anything I said then let's discuss it. I thought thats what this site was for. Or do we only partake in pro Cov Cath discussions here? I can only imagine two things I expressed that could have provoked your response. 1. What I saw from the big men was that they caught the ball and passed back out to the guards. Very rarely did they turn and face the basket or attempt to shoot. 2. CVH had great looking shots when he stepped into them. When he shot off the dribble there were more than a few times the shot was flat. He can get away with that now, but at the next level he will need to get the ball over taller players. Thats it. It is always impressive when a player puts up big numbers and you look at the box score thinking they only got 15 or so. That means he played within himself and didn't overshoot. I root for Cov Cath whenever they don't play St Henry. There is a chance my 13 year old may end up there. As and administrator I would have expected more from you. Maybe my expectations were too high.

My impressions from the game were as follows: St Henry turned the ball over way too much. Cov Cath defense was tight and all over Crusader guards. Cov Cath needs to develop their inside game to have a chance for a deep run in March. They had size on Cru and most of their points felt as if either from outside or guards driving to the hoop. Both teams will improve as the year goes on because of the coaches they have. CVH scored 27 points and it didn't feel like he forced anything. His shot appeared a little flat off the dribble, but it went in. Fun game, just wish the Cru would have fared better.

It was also nice to attend a game and not hear the fans yelling out at refs and/or players. I don't remember hearing one fan on either side complain about a bad call. Last night reminded me of how games went when I was a kid. Both teams played really hard and the fans were respectful. We need more of this!

St Henry scored at 39:21 of first half. Cooper tied game at 39:11 of first half. That is correct, not a typo. Cooper scored again in the first half for 2-1 lead. St Henry tied game with less than a minute left in the match. Both teams had multiple chances for other scores but did not capitalize.

I'm predicting a final four of Ryle, NCC, Highlands and St Henry/Cov Cath winner ( tied 1-1 in first game of the year). Because I'm a homer I'll go with St Henry in that game. And a thank you to the Cov Cath coaching staff for moving the game to Friday night to 5pm at St Henry so the St Henry JV would finish in time to go to the Homecoming dance.

Missed the entire Trinity and Conner game due to work or would help out. We have had several games this year when one half looks fantastic and the other looks less than fantastic. Hopefully tomorrow brings out the intensity for both halves.

That's good to hear. I personally have never seen it and it would take a lot of guts to do something like that.

I agree, not a PK. There were a few calls that went our way that had me thinking that if we were on the road I would accuse the other team of some good home cooking. SH player definitely did not flop. He tripped over Henry Clay player after the ball had cleared. When the calls are going your way you smile and thank the soccer gods for their generosity. I haven't seen a team yet turn down a penalty kick because the ref made a bad call. Henry Clay looked really fast. I couldn't imagine how fast they play on turf.

Game is at St Henry 10am

I was at the game last night as well. As the player of a Crusader player my view is probably a little biased also. But what I saw was a game of two halves. In the first half St Henry held possession and controlled the ball. Good shots on goal were about even. St Henry converted 2 and NCC missed their opportunities. St Henry goalie Johnson made a really nice save on a direct kick and deflected another point blank shot. In the second half NCC attacked. They outshot the Crusaders and had a few really nice shots that hit the posts. Their goal came on a direct that it appears the goalie jumped too early. He had to swat it away as he was on the way back down and it got through. There were a ton of fouls called both ways. Mainly for pushing on headers. The only legitimate complaint I believe NCC could make was on the above mentioned no call late on an obvious hold in the box. I'm not sure how that one was missed unless the center ref's view was blocked out. In the end St Henry converted on more of their shots than NCC did. I thought NCC played much better in the second half than they did in the first half. Or maybe the Cru played much better in the first half than they did in the second half. Take you pick. It was an entertaining game. On another note I must say, it is sad to hear students heckling other teams players and ball boys, parents heckling refs. Our school is not immune to this either. I have been at many a matches where I hear students yelling at players of the other team. Why is this tolerated by the parents of their respective schools? Is it because they see the parents yelling at the refs so they feel it is okay to yell at someone also? Very disappointing. I hope I never catch my kid doing this. He will be yanked out of the stands. Cheering and booing are okay. Heckling is not.

Ooh that sounds a little harsh. No ill will intended towards the CovCath fans. Sometimes I wish our own fans were as passionate as your bunch.

Well said! Any fans concerned with where they rank the last week of August might find better use of their time figuring out how to win the region for a change. Everyone in NKY knows who the best team is this year. If we forget, there are a number of helpful fans to remind us. :lol2: The rest of us are only hoping to be in the conversation for number 2. Since these ranking do not determine seeding or anything else that I can see, the only rankings I am concerned about are the final rankings.

I thought the JV and Varsity games were both very well played last night. CCH was definitely the better varsity team last night. Their front line speed was faster than our backline speed. They were also a little more aggressive in the battle for the ball. On both the JV and Varsity they appeared to win more than their fair share of 50-50 balls. We will get to where we need to be by the end of the year. I felt the first CCH player to receive a yellow was lucky not to get a red card. Grabbing someone by the shoulders and twisting/throwing them to the ground and only getting a yellow had the Cru faithful a little aggravated. But, if the ref only felt a yellow was warranted then that's what we have to live with. Again, CCH was definitely the better team last night.

Played 4 years back in the 80's, 3 on varsity and we had over 100 try out freshman year. Freshman year we cut down to around 80-90. Never had to cut after that, but always carried a large squad. I hear nowadays the GCL has an A,B,and C freshman, and maybe even JV, team that each get to play games against teams in their division so that more kids get playing time. I am not sure about how this works since I have been on this side of the river the last 20 years. It would be nice to see something like that over here but I think many schools would struggle to field B or C teams in some sports. Basketball would be a no brainer, most schools have more than enough interest to field multiple teams.

All three of my boys have played in it and two are in it again this year. Some years have been better than others but overall it is a good experience. Called like an AAU game so you better be strong with the ball. They have straightened the goals out and cut the trees back on the one end so that they do not interfere with the baskets. It is a good kickstart to the season.