DougL
Active Member
JO Cup had a tremendous number of college coaches there for 3-4 days of the event. Some, if not many left on Thursday to head to the PGF in Peoria - allowing them to double dip recruit in the same area. You are right, mostly midwest players - and colleges - but that is our organizations sweet spot - so our players got to compete against the midwest teams that we are positioned against recruiting wise.
PGF in Calif is great, we sent our 16u team and it is a different experience - lot's of west coast colleges and teams of course.
Our 18u/16u teams are pretty much all recruited (I have 2 2020's and 2 2019's to go) - and 3 of the 4 locked down offers post JO Cup.
Our 14u is the one that killed it - they had a ton of colleges watch them - for 3 days, it was their coming out party. With all games in the same 3 quad complex coaches only had to walk 5 min between games - highly convenient for them.
Cost was high at $3000/team - we were able to get $4500 back due to our teams 2 and 3 place finishes - that was helpful. The Hawks also made the decision that the JO Cup participation furthered the org's brand and we paid 2/3 of the entry fee from the org level, the teams only took $1000/team budget hit - that we will continue next year.
There is a selection committee of USA Softball staff and 4 travel team heads - Donnie from Finessee, STL Chaos Beatty,etc. Teams are vetted by that group.
All in all, a great experience, one that we will definitely participate in next season.
PGF in Calif is great, we sent our 16u team and it is a different experience - lot's of west coast colleges and teams of course.
Our 18u/16u teams are pretty much all recruited (I have 2 2020's and 2 2019's to go) - and 3 of the 4 locked down offers post JO Cup.
Our 14u is the one that killed it - they had a ton of colleges watch them - for 3 days, it was their coming out party. With all games in the same 3 quad complex coaches only had to walk 5 min between games - highly convenient for them.
Cost was high at $3000/team - we were able to get $4500 back due to our teams 2 and 3 place finishes - that was helpful. The Hawks also made the decision that the JO Cup participation furthered the org's brand and we paid 2/3 of the entry fee from the org level, the teams only took $1000/team budget hit - that we will continue next year.
There is a selection committee of USA Softball staff and 4 travel team heads - Donnie from Finessee, STL Chaos Beatty,etc. Teams are vetted by that group.
All in all, a great experience, one that we will definitely participate in next season.
