Division 2 scheduling imbroglio: Call for suggestions

Scheduling has been a major concern this season in Division 2 for few reasons, "away" games being one of them. A rescheduling exercise was undertaken in the last week of May to fix large-scale scheduling issues and comply with requests from several teams. We tried to satisfy several reasonable requests, which, ideally, should have been addressed during the original scheduling.

In the process of rescheduling we were able to balance "away" games, limiting them to 5 for most teams. Still there are teams with 6 and 4 away games. Unfortunately, there's no opportunity to balance games for those teams in a sensible and uniform manner.

The increase in away games is due to significant increase in the percentage of "away" teams this season. We realize "away" games causes problems for all teams. We have been debating about how to restructure Division 2 in a manner that will limit the # of away games to 3 or 4 and yet have a representative array of matches in the regular season to

Ensure 14 games per season for all teams AND

Protect the quality of Division 2 playoffs

One possible way is to group Division 2 teams into two groups. Groupings may be based on rankings and/or geography. Equally spread the "away" teams into these groups based on rankings.

Alternatively, Geography based grouping may be considered. This however, will call for redefinition of "away" games for the model to be fair.

If we think and move through these models, we may encounter few other issues. May be we need more than 2 groups. So, as a starting point we have atleast one option (groups) that needs to be drilled down further.

There may be few other options and variations

Suggestions invited

We are requesting holistic input from teams and individuals on how best to ensure minimal # of "away" games for all teams. We would like to solicit input/feedback on

What is optimal # of away games

How best to ensure optimal # of away games (by grouping,what criteria for grouping, # of groups, other ideas?)

Necessity to redefine "away" games

Any other considerations

Your input should pass the following test at the minimum:

Model should be independent of size of Division 2. Please test your model with 2008 Div 2 makeup as well as 2007 Div 2 makeup.

Ensure 14 games for all teams during the regular season

Be fair to all teams, including non-chicago teams

Protect the quality of Division 2 playoffs

Please email your suggestions to ram@midwestcricket.org AND sridher@midwestcricket.org by September 5th 2008. We will collate the suggestions and publish it for everyone else to review.

We will consider each and every suggestion prior to coming up with a model for next season.

MCC Management

Paid volunteers Needed

We are looking for volunteers for the Statistics committee to help review, validate and correct all score cards entered every week.

We are looking for 1 volunteer per week. Each volunteer will be paid $75 per week.

Volunteers will be initially trained on the responsibilities before assigning duties.

Please contact praveen@midwestcricket.org if you wish to become a paid volunteer.

MCC Management