Originally Posted by Anonymous
This is 100 percent true. Two teams from Long Island Showed up to play. One team was missing the best player on the team and the other had about 15 players. Not sure if the 8 or so missing players were the better ones or not. This is not an excuse but just a fact. Truth is the top three teams from long Island were not at the tournament and chose not to play short handed. I'm sure they could have got 15 kids to show up and if not take a kid off the B teams just to play. Icon is one of the best teams around and at full strength can play with anyone. Even missing a top player they showed they can play with Elite teams outside Long Island. If your team was not there and you have never seen these other teams play you have no idea how good they are. Of the two teams the NY teams had to play one beat Igloo and the other lost by one goal to them two times in the past. We will see what happens in the Summer when all these teams play and we all hope the top Long Island teams have a chance to play MANY TIMES and represent Long Island. Beating any of these teams one time means nothing as far as who is the better team.
Originally Posted by Anonymous
Winning one game by two goals is not enough to say one team is better than another. Express beating Icon by two a couple of weeks ago is not enough to say Express is better. Just as one tournament in the Spring where kids are missing is not enough info to say one team is better than another or even one team is good or bad. In PA yesterday all teams were missing kids and one team had 14 or 15 kids. Anyone who knows about sports knows you can't say one team is the better team or the best by one tourney or game. You need to see results over an extended period of time. Icon has been a top team for years and still is. I'm sure icon and Express will play a few times this year and after that if it is important enough you can say which team is better but also need to know how they did the entire year.



I am also in agreement with what this person has stated. These teams are very comparable and 1 game does not mean much of anything in terms of status. For example, this time last year, ICON and Sons played each other in a close game where ICON emerged victorious over the Sons. That doesn't take anything away from how good the Sons are. In fact, that same day I remember the Sons beating Igloo. Does that mean Igloo isn't a top team or that the Sons and ICON are better than Igloo? There's no way you can draw such a conclusion from a game or a day of games. We are lucky to have such good competition for our boys at this age, and we should take full advantage of it and enjoy it along the way. It doesn't last forever.