16u teams are usually more interested in things like getting in front of college coaches, making sure that wins are quality wins and that losses are quality losses, learning from wins and losses that are not quality, etc. etc. than in getting a buzz from seeing their name on OFC or than in getting irate at the teams who are named. Thus the relative lack of interest in voting. Though I also believe, and some have expressly stated, that teams don't want to vote until we have a bit more data regarding 16u, data that will be supplied by Laser Nation Invitational and ASA States.
I like having the poll because sometimes other teams or parents will post informative information about what is happening on the 16u front. But as I mentioned before, if the number of poll voters doesn't pick up, I'll probably just post a "16u Developments" thread each week.
Especially with the small number of voters, the poll has significant, yea, overwhelming, methodology issues. Don't take it for more than that. I know that while I think Buckeye Heat 95 belongs in the top ten but given my limited knowledge of what has been happening in tournaments that we didn't attend over the past three weeks, I wouldn't place a dollar on that opinion. And more important, based on what did happen in the tournaments that we attended, I didn't vote to be placed ahead of Ohio Ice Black, to whom we lost head-to-head.
One cool thing about the polls is that every voter can have his/her own criteria. Some may emphasize head to head, some may look at the overall record to date, some may emphasize the quality of the opposition in that overall record. So if there are enough voters, the poll can show the results of melding all those perspectives.
But if we don't have more voters after ASA States, I'll probably shut the ranking part of this project down.
