PUMAS TRYOUT RESULTS
First, thank you all for your choice of Andover Pumas as the club you wish to play for. We work very hard to make your experience one that you would like to return to each year. With 31 teams, we are the largest girls club in New England. Thanks to many people, we've been able to recruit several new coaches to be able to keep as many players as practical. Still, we did made some cuts.
We had 342 girls come to our power and club tryouts. If you were at any of the tryout weeks, you saw how many coaches we had rating girls. These coaches spent up to 10 hours on their feet each tryout day with constant attention to the girls. We collected approximately 350 rating sheets spanning a wide variety of skills, with up to 250 individual scores on each sheet, plus liberal comments on girls who stood out by how they carried themselves, both positive and negative. There was a mountain of data that had to be processed, and in the end I think the data are as good as any tryout of this size could possibly be.
Choosing Teams
We consider many factors when building teams and assigning timeslots. They are:
| Skill level, from data and observations collected at tryouts, and from Pumas coaches evaluations from last season |
| All positions covered on each team, especially setters |
| Girls' impossible timeslots |
| Coaches' impossible timeslots |
| Enough players on the team in-town for the second April tournament (spring vacation) |
| Teammates - carpooling for far-away girls |
| Applicability of a gym to a particular team (eg, Lowell Catholic has a very short service zone on one side) |
| Putting teams in the same gym/timeslots who can scrimmage together (similar level). |
This process is very complex and time-consuming, and has been done with a great deal of care. Therefore, we can't honor requests for team changes except in the most extreme or dire circumstances, as any change can throw off the entire structure of a division and cause hours of work. One of the best concepts of club volleyball is to meet and play with girls from other schools!
Standbys and Cuts
If you are listed as a standby, this means that you may be called if someone drops for whatever reason: chooses another club, injury, change of plans, etc. The chance of a standby being called is low, but not impossible, we usually need a couple each year. However, the standbys should consider contacting another club and not wait to be chosen.
If you did not make a team, the following clubs may be still open to accepting new players:
North Shore Juniors - Doug Beach, Director - beach206@verizon.net
Practices at Masconomet in Topsfield, with a developmental program in Danvers, both on Sundays
Merrimack Valley Juniors - Carla Montano, Director - mskmontano@comcast.net
Practices in the Chelmsford area on Sundays