First, congrats to both teams for making it to the finals. From all I read, the WSYL made the weekend a great experience.
Second, I do think the championship clearly showed that at this age a few months really do matter. My 2021 team's average birthday is around 2/1/03. That's not very young, but they do look tiny compared to teams with 3-7 kids born before 9/1/02. It will all even out, but now is when it seems to matter most (of course, right when it starts to even out, the reclassing will begin, but that's another story.)
Third, why was there so little pushing the ball in transition? Especially when Igloo was behind. Not a criticism, just curious. May be as simple as other team was winning faceoffs and wanted to protect a lead by slowing things down. Still, not as fun as watching Crush attack in transition.
Fourth, I did not understand why both teams extended out so much on off-ball defense. I know both teams are very well coached and have incredible lax IQ's, but it often seemed like there were no #1 and #2 slides because defenders weren't sagging in off ball. Looked like a college-style defense, but without the ND or Denver crease slide sagged in.
An good 8th grade fogo might look like a superstar playing 7th graders. Not even close when going against the better group of 8th graders, lucky to go 50/50. See how a grade can make a huge difference!? And Blaze has one of the better 7th graders. Lots of truth about how great some kids seemed to play will be seen in the coming weeks when they play on grade!
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