6/10/2009
First thank you to all who responded to our request for votes for or against a DIII side (It was great to hear from several old boys as well. Your input and wisdom are much appreciated). Everyone posed valuable information and good arguments. With that said. The majority of votes came in FOR establishing a DIII side.
After discussing this with the Midwest, we found out that 7 out of the 8 teams in the DI league have a DIII side. This means there would be little opportunity to have competitive B-Side matches in the Fall.
What this means for our club…
1. Everyone will now get a chance to play on a competitive Impalas team, in a league, with an opportunity to advance to playoffs.
This should help retain and recruit players. Help foster improvement in individual player’s skills, help increase the numbers at practices, increase the competition for positions (In the beginning more so for the DI side). It will help recruit both the social player and the young players.
2. We have to begin recruiting. That means everyone. Talk to your friends, old teammates from HS/college and get them interested in coming out. We will have a meeting to discuss other methods of marketing our team.
3. We will have additional coaches to help with the increased player numbers. The idea is to have a head coach who focuses on the DI team, another coach who is directly responsible for the DIII side, and other assistant coaches who help out in more specific areas for both squads. The head coach will ultimately be responsible for managing the entire staff of coaches. This should improve the over all coaching and make practices more fulfilling for players at all levels.
4. More administrators. We will need to discuss and create new admin positions to manage both squads. Evan did a tremendous job this past season with travel arrangements communication etc. Dave Toth also was a tremendous help through out the season (Outside of the required dues collector persona). We will need more individuals to step up.
We will have a meeting within the next couple of weeks. Specific date TBA (you should see an email the next few days). I hope everyone will make the effort to come. (Especially those who wanted to see this happen.)
Final thoughts……..Long email, I know….This has been the best season by far of any team I’ve been apart of the past 12 years. Not because of how well we did (although that helps), but because of the mutual respect you all had for each other. I’ve always loved being apart of this club and probably will be until the end. This respect and your skills on and off the pitch, are what have helped us grow and will take us to the next level.
Sincerely,
Carson
