At this year’s USA Field Hockey U-19 tournament, there were 42 pools of four teams each.
But one pool, Nagano, had an unusual occurrence. Two teams were dead level for the pool championship. Each team had two wins, one draw, and no defeats. Both teams had a goal differential of +19. The teams scored 23 goals each, the defenses conceded just four each. Naturally, when the two teams met each other, they tied 2-2.
One of the teams, New Heights Red, is a team from northern New Jersey which has a not-insignificant imprimatur from Summit Oak Knoll (N.J.). The other team, Northeast Elite Black, has a not-insignificant influence from Uxbridge (Mass.). Both Oak Knoll (No. 7) and Uxbridge (No. 1) are amongst the finest teams in the nation and have some generational talent on the outdoor and the indoor space.
I saw this all play out late last Saturday, with NEE needing to make up a pretty sizable goal differential in order to catch New Heights Red. And there was some scoreboard watching during both of the final Nagano pool matches which were held in the same hall.
Friends, it is situations like this why you sometimes see runaway scores in pool play at some field hockey tournaments. Each minute on the clock is an opportunity, and it is vital to score as many goals as you can.
So, how did this story end? Well, according to the latest indoor hockey rules published in January, two teams that are drawn like this in pool play would have to either go to a penalty shootout (if time and space allows it) or the flip of a coin.
Now, I’m guessing that the tie was broken by either one of those procedures late Saturday, because Northeast Elite Black was placed in Honor Tier 1, and New Heights Red was placed in Honor Tier 2. This is the “tiered” competition that I referred to yesterday as being similar to the way that FIFA World Cups were contested in the 70s and early 80s until that 1982 game in France when Germany and Austria settled on a 1-0 result to keep Algeria out of the second round.
But even with written rules about how to break ties, unusual situations can happen in the world of sports. I’ll have more on that tomorrow.