NMAA

Soccer Playoff Format 

By Jay Kroshus
For the Journal

The World Cup is rising to a fevered pitch near you.
No, it's not the FIFA women's World Cup currently being fought for half a world away, nor is it the 2010 men's World Cup in South Africa.

It's the new playoff format Í a World Cup-type format Í adopted by the New Mexico Activities Association for its fall high school soccer championships at the Farmers Insurance Santa Ana Pueblo  Soccer complex in early November.

For all classes Í 5A, 4A and A-3A Í and boys' and girls' team will be seeded by committee from No. 1 through No. 12 and then divided into four pools of three teams for state tournament play starting Nov. 1st.

Each team will be guaranteed two matches in pool play and there is a benefit to being one of the top four seeds in your respective class, you will get a day off in between matches, while the two lower seeds in your pool will have to play on consecutive days.
Pool winners from that first Nov. 1-3 weekend will play in semifinals and finals on Nov. 8-9.

"It really started after the (2006 Men's) World Cup from a conversation between (NMAA Executive Director) Gary Tripp and me about this pool-play format," NMAA soccer-specific committee chair and long-time La Cueva boys coach Larry Waters said. "We talked about it, brought it to the (soccer) committee and to the (NMAA Board of Directors) and it got approved."

The NMAA is the first state to have this type of pool play for its membership and soccer state championships.

"To the soccer community, it isn't really new because teams in club tournaments are divided into four groups
of four and every team plays every other teams, then ou come out of the pool (to compete in single-elimination semifinal and final matches," Waters said.

And that describes one distinction between the typical pool-play tournament format and this NMAA format. The
NMAA pools have only three teams, which begs the possibility of more ties after each team plays twice.

Unlike regular-season NMAA matches, in which ties are decided by penalty kicks after 100 minutes of play, if a playoff pool-play match ends in a tie, each team will be awarded 1 point and ensuing penalty kicks will only be used in tie-breaking scenario if two (or all three teams) are tied at the conclusion of the World Cup weekend.

"We went round and round about the tie-breaking procedure to make it clear," Waters said.

For more details on the tie-breaking procedure, visit Page 6 of http://www.nmact.org/website/files/Soccer_Bylaws.pdf

 Another reason to adopt this pool play format is to enhance the state championship experience by ensuring that each qualifying team has two matches.
"Let's say you're from Hobbs," NMAA soccer representative and assistant director Robert Zayas said. "And you come up for the state tournament and lose, then you have to turn around and drive home again. This way, if you lose your first match, you still have a chance to advance with another match. We really think this will add to the state tournament experience."

In its previous format the state soccer tournament at the Santa Ana Pueblo was already a 4-day state celebration of the sport, but this will expand it.

"We are also waiting as long as possible to choose the 12 best fields out at the complex and we are keeping each classification on the same set of fields," Zayas said. "So if you play on Field No. 1, all of the teams in your pool will play on that same field to take away any advantage of playing one match on one field and then another match in pool play somewhere else in the complex."

Other sports have adopted this expanded state experience format.

"Baseball will have a best two of three series this year in the first weekend of the state tournament," Zayas said. "And volleyball already has a pool-play format and softball is on the verge of adopting a double-elimination state tournament. The members want these changes and we are a membership organization. We're excited about these new formats and we know that other states are looking to see how it will work in New Mexico."

So this breakout of World Cup fever has spread to other sports

.
For a general breakdown of these changes for the NMAA state soccer tournament, visit: http://www.nmact.org/soccer_world_cup