Don't Be Left Out #1

Extremely Important please read

One of the hardest aspects of working in the homeschool community is that parents don't mind expressing their displeasure when they feel that their child has been slighted. It doesn't matter whether that child is 8 or 18 and it doesn't seem to matter where the blame lies. One of the things I have tried to do the last eight years is put the responsibility back in the hands of teams and parents to make sure they aren't left out. Last year we had a player who was absolutely 100% good enough to be a 2nd team All-American that didn't get to play in the All-American game because his coach did not nominate him. The parents were upset and the coach was upset but the problem was that he just had been too busy to read the e-mails about nominating his players.

With these thoughts in mind I would like to share a number of things with you that I believe are important for you to consider. First each of the four things that I need to make sure you know are so important that I am going to only write about one at a time.

Don't be left out #1

This year we will have 5 Regional Tournaments -- yes 5 we have added Atlanta (see information below).

Top Ten Reasons your team needs to attend:

10. Higher Seeding -- Teams that attend Regionals will end up seeded higher than teams they were equal with during the year that did not attend Regionals.
9. JR High All-Region Team -- this is the highest award available for JR High players, players must play at Regionals to be eligible. Awards will be presented at the special Award Night along with Varsity All-Americans. This is a great first step for future All-American Candidates to get on the radar.
8. Varsity All Region Team -- First Time for this award and this will also serve as a great step for players to move up to All-American in future years.
7. JR High All-Region Rings will be made available for a JR High players who are selected to the All-Region team. These are fantastic looking high quality Balfour rings that players will be proud to wear for many years.
6. Varsity All Region Rings --see above
5. Automatic Bids into Division 1 at Nationals -- each region will be awarded a certain number of Division 1 automatic bids, the best way to secure one is to attend Regionals and earn yours.
4. JR High Regional Championship Rings will be made available to Regional Champions.
3. Varsity Regional Championship Rings will be made available to Regional Champions.
2. All-American exposure and votes -- If you want to be an All-American you need to play in front of the coaches that will be voting for you.
1. Varsity Winners Guaranteed #1 Seed at Nationals and a 1st team All-American.


Here is how you can help make sure your team isn't left out next spring-

1. Contact your coach and/or board members and make sure they know about the regional tournaments, much of this is new and during the summer many coaches are tuned in. You want to make sure they don't schedule games on the Regional Tournament dates.
2. If your team would like to attend your Regional Tournament (not committing just planning or hoping), encourage your coach to go to http://nchbctournaments.com and reserve a spot right away. Four of the five Regionals are in new locations and we are trying to make plans for gym rentals and need to get an idea what to anticipate for the participation level at each tournament.
If you are planning to attend


How important are the Regional Tournaments? Ask Arkansas

Arkansas changed the date of their state tournament last week to make it so Arkansas teams could attend the Regional Tournaments either Oklahoma City or Shreveport, LA depending on what part of Arkansas they live in.

New Teams

We are getting a great response from new teams. Here is a list of teams that have already expressed plans to attend:
Hattiesburg,Miss
Jackson,Miss
Huntsville,Ala
Birmingham,Ala
Tuscaloosa,Ala
Baton Rouge,La
Minneapolis,Min

Medals
Last year half of the All-Tournament Medals were placed on back order. We have shipped all the medals that we have addresses for, if you are still waiting for a medal please contact ashley@flattmail.com tell here your team, the division and your address.

Girl's Top Ten
To be Released the week of September 15th

Preseason All-Americans Candidates
To be released the first week of October

Basketball Nationals Update

This is a busy time for our Nationals staff and we are going to try to communicate on a regular basis so that we won't overwhelm you with information all at one time. We will be looking for individuals and families to help with various things this year and will post those opportunities in these e-mail updates. In this update we are looking for a few people to help with Media Relations (see below). We would also like to ask you to forward this e-mail to knew families in your program.


Springfield Drive Time Savings

One thing that we liked about Springfield is the size of the city. While it is big enough to accommodate a tournament the size of Nationals, it is small enough that all the gyms and hotels are in a 6-7 mile from the center of the city. This makes all gyms and hotels within about 12 miles.
A special thank you to Randy Martin from Memphis actually did a Google map of all the hotels, colleges and high school gyms, here is the link. http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=114826141753583136334.00045443d920c7bac7c90

To give you an idea of the economic impact of this, if the average family that travels to three gyms in a day they would travel an average of 50 miles fewer per day or 300 miles per week. If the average team has 5 vehicles that is 1500 vehicles driving 360,000 fewer miles and at say 15 miles a gallon and gas at $4.00 per gallon (although last weekend I saw gas in Springfield gas was $3.33 per gallon), the savings will be $120,000 for the homeschool families.



All-American Nominations

Next week we will be announcing the procedure for All-American Nominations. There will be many new facets to this year's procedure and it will be very exciting, stay tuned.


National's Hotel Link -- Springfield CVB

The link for hotels in Springfield is http://www.springfieldmo.org/housing Many hotels are filling up quickly. I was surprised to see that the Double Tree (which is widely considered the nicest hotel in Springfield) hasn't received very many reservations. Every team that books through this link with the CVB will receive a rebate details to follow.


Television Deal

We are getting close to having a TV deal finished and making and hope to make an official announcement soon.

Preseason Tournament

The Tip Off Tournament will be held in Springfield MO November 13-15th. We already have teams from Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma and Tenessee signed up (Where's Texas?). If you would like more information please contatc Kurt Talbot at 1-417-880-4875.

Media Relations A Family Project

I am looking for 3-4 families from around the country that would be willing to serve as Media Relations Directors. I will be glad to train individuals for this project. This will be a huge help to Nationals and a great learning experience.

NEW Regional Tournaments

Next week we will be releasing the new Regional breakdown that will include information on All Region Teams, Automatic Division I bids and a couple of new Regional Tournaments.

Fundraising Project

The year we have introduced a new fundraising program for teams and families to help offset their expenses to attend Nationals. For example if a team raises $2500 they receive FREE team fee, FREE players registration, a $75 gas card for each player and coach (total of 11) and a FREE Pizza Party ticket and Gymsack for all players. For more information go to the website and click on Founders Club in the left column. www.homeschoolbasketball.com We will also have some more exciting news about this program relating to FREE All-American and National Championship rings.



Tim Flatt