Effie Dawson, The Examiner
2008-04-09 07:00:00.0
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BALTIMORE -

In my book, the NCAA men's national basketball championship tops all the other sports tournaments - the World Series, Super Bowl, you name it.

But those of us who embrace youth sports had a pretty special week beyond the Final Four in San Antonio. We were up at the Polo Grounds in Harford County, for the first round of the Maryland State Cup, the state qualifier in the U.S. Soccer National Championships, in which 185,000 players on 10,000 teams vie for championships in seven age groups.

Rooted in the World Cup tradition, the U.S. Soccer National Championships series is a real grass roots program dating to 1935. It has been expanded in the past decade and now allows participation by any U-13 through U-18 team, as long as they are carded through U.S. Youth Soccer. U-13 teams play in regional competition, but all the older teams vie for national titles.

Only semifinalists from the previous year are seeded. Beyond that, match-ups are by draw. The tournament differs from most other youth sports tournaments. Most tournaments, in most sports, accept teams based on skill level. Then organizers place teams into appropriate brackets, considering recent league play and previous tournament success. The process generally prevents blowout games and convinces teams to return to those tournaments that offer suitable competition.

Most of the time, this is the right way for children to play sports. That's why there are recreational leagues, school teams and club programs. It produces the maximum number of opportunities.

Still, it's exciting to see a tournament designed to identify the best of the top teams. Teams have a chance to compete against teams they would never be paired with in a traditional tournament format. For the weaker teams, it is a chance to see a different level of the game, something that might be devastating for a full season but is merely humbling on a single afternoon. And, as we know from the college basketball court, there is always a chance for an underdog win.

And like school sports, these soccer championships are also based on established teams. The Little League World Series promises to identify the best youth baseball in the world. But it is a competition among all-star teams and more likely to point out the best players than the top local teams. The soccer championship has always been about individual teams and how far they could advance.

In recent years though, the soccer championships, like so many other youth sports programs, have been changing to accommodate the commercial interests in athletics.

The strongest teams are looking more like all-star squads, refashioned every season to fill a perceived weakness. And this year, additional U-15 and U-16 teams will be included in an expanded regional tournament process. Teams were selected through a new national fall league, and they can bypass this traditional single-elimination process.

It's pretty clear that the process is moving away from the grass roots program and into yet another showcase for top athletes whose parents think they deserve college scholarships or professional contracts. In literature explaining the new plan, USYS notes that the regional tournaments last year attracted more than 600 college coaches.

Still, a long windy day at the polo grounds is still a showcase of the love of a great sport. And the tournament foundation - the full-length games, strong officiating corps, precise coaching and spectator rules - still makes this a well-devised process for highlighting the best of the game.

And hopefully, this tournament won't bow to the economic pressure that could turn it into just another event on the college showcase circuit.

Effie Dawson writes about high school and youth sports. Reach her at edawson@baltimoreexaminer.com