Gut Check Time: Does USA Team Handball have a plan to hike its way out of the forest or is it just walking in circles?

This past Saturday, the USA Women and Men lost to Uruguay in the 2nd Leg matches for the Last Chance Qualifier for the PANAM Games.  The Women lost 24-22 and the Men lost 28-20. The USA Women ended up with a 7 goal aggregate loss and the USA Men ended up with a 4 goal aggregate loss. Match Recap: Link

These results simply cannot be sugar coated. Failing to qualify for the Olympics is one thing. Anyone familiar with our National Team’s results the past few years knew it was going to be tough to beat Argentina. But, losing to Uruguay and not even qualifying for the Olympic Qualifying Event (i.e.; the PANAM Games)? Without a doubt this is an unavoidably stark reminder as to where our National Programs stand.

Let’s be honest: The U.S. is not even close to the level it needs to be to qualify for an Olympics. We don’t just need a couple more players, or a few more months of training or a few more games. Maybe if we had qualified for the PANAM Games and gone toe to toe with Argentina and/or Brazil in the semifinals this summer before falling short we could rationalize that we’re almost there, but that didn’t happen. Not even close.

With Failure Comes Opportunity

Failure, however, can also be an opportunity. Olympic qualification for the Men is no longer possible and the Women now only have a very, very remote chance. (The U.S. Women’s would need to qualify for the World Championships and then finish in an unprecedented 7^th place.) While there are other goals for our National Teams for a variety of reasons Olympic Qualification is without question the main target. With 2016 gone as a possibility the U.S. will now not play another match related to Olympic Qualification until December, 2018, at the earliest. With no immediate pressing need it’s therefore an opportune time to step back, take stock and plan for the way ahead.

2020 Olympic Prospects

Part of that taking stock is an assessment of what the U.S. prospects are for 2020 qualification. And, taking a look at our current teams and our Pan American competition reveals a very tough road ahead. For the Women, it’s particularly bleak. The average age of the 2^nd chance roster is 28 and the bulk of the scoring is coming from athletes 30 and older. The U.S. needs a roster overhaul and it’s debatable as to whether there are enough quality prospects joining the program with the right age/athletic ability combination to take the U.S. to the next level. Seriously, there would have to be several already on the team making key contributions before we could even realistically contemplate the monumental task of taking down the current World Champions, Brazil. Brazil will likely not be as strong in 2019, but it’s unlikely they will drop down near as much a we need to go up. With the men’s team it’s much the same story. The Argentine and Brazilian Men aren’t as good as the Brazilian Women, but there’s still a huge gap. And, the U.S. Men aren’t very young either with the roster for the 2nd chance tourney having a guestimated average age of 27. A couple of players are on the younger side, but several players are pushing 30 or have passed it.

I’m not suggesting that the U.S. shouldn’t even try to qualify for the 2020 Olympics, but a real hard look should be taken at how resources are to be expended towards 2020 qualification. For example, if expenditures for a residency program and/or full time coaching are only going to improve our chances of qualification from 2% to 5% are they still worthwhile expenditures? Might it be better to expend resources towards a development initiative that would improve qualification chances in 2024 from 10% to 40%?   Those are questions that should be asked.

Planning for Today vs. Planning for Tomorrow

With many efforts there is an inherent conflict between either planning for today or tomorrow. Or, perhaps more accurately, the “near term” or “long term.” Or, even more accurately planning for a “defined” near term” or a “defined” long term. I say defined, because sometimes people would just as soon not define what their time frame is because in doing so they will be forced to make decisions they’d prefer to avoid having to make.

And, sometimes folks will like to argue (or worse, just assume) that near term efforts are by default also supporting long term plans. This, however, is often a bad assumption and one that has all too often been true for USA Team Handball. Case in point: Have the efforts of the past 3 years (hiring full time coaches, rushing to build a residency program and in the case of the women populating that program almost entirely with athletes over the age of 25 really paved the way for long term success? Or, has it been overly focused on questionable, short term goals? For sure, I’ve got my opinion, but what’s done is done.

Instead, it’s best to start fresh and ask some tough questions regarding what makes sense going forward. Here are just a few questions that should be asked:

Full time head coaches: Despite limited resources, 3 years ago the decision was made to hire full time coaches. Have these hires produced satisfactory results? How is their performance being measured? Can the U.S. continue to afford this expenditure or should the funds and man-hours be spent on other critical needs? Will having full time head coaches significantly improve U.S. performance or would the U.S. have similar results with just part time coaches?

Recruiting: Is USA Team Handball successfully recruiting the types of athletes it needs to build long term success? Or, is it recruiting too many athletes that are in their mid 20s with limited raw athletic skills? Is it even realistic for USA Team Handball to recruit the types of athletes that were more readily available in the 70s, 80s and 90s? Even if these athletes can be recruited can they be trained quickly enough to beat quality teams like Argentina and Brazil that have developed through their youth programs?

Residency Programs: In the fall of 2013 the U.S. established a residency program at Auburn University. Is this program producing satisfactory results? What are the established metrics being used to assess performance? Is the program too austere to attract the types of athletes desired? Can the program be effectively focused on both near term National Team performance and individual player development? Is Auburn the best location for this program or should other locations like Boston be pursued? Or, would USA Team Handball be better off sending its handful of top notch prospects to an overseas location like the Aarhus Handball Academy where they could get weekly match competition?

Some More Prognostication

It’s my own personal opinion that asking and answering these questions and others will logically lead USA Team Handball into a different direction than the path it’s been on the past couple of years. At the very least it would lead to some major tinkering with the structure and goals of the Residency Program at Auburn. And, it could depending on more detailed analysis lead to radical changes such as closing or mothballing the program at Auburn, pumping resources into targeted youth programs, an arrangement with an overseas entity like the Aarhus Academy or even going all-in on the likelihood of a Boston Olympics.

My fear, however, is that little such introspection will take place and the U.S. will muddle about for the next few years with a program at Auburn that looks much like it does now. Our national teams will continue to struggle, but hopefully show some signs of marginal improvement. Perhaps improving to the point where we can beat other 2nd tier nations in PATHF and qualify for the World Championships, but not progressing to the point where we can beat Argentina and Brazil. And, then when we fail to qualify in 2019 there will be a changing of the guard. Dozens of players will have already come and gone and several more will retire. And then a new batch of crossover athletes will be brought in. If there’s an Olympics in Boston we may even finally decide to move the Residency Program there. Recruiting and funding will naturally tick up and the U.S. will field some respectable sides that won’t embarrass. We’ll also have an uptick in grass roots interest like that which was seen in LA and Atlanta, but we’ll again slide back into to the same 3rd tier status the sport has always had in America.

Stay the Course? Are We Really, Really Sure that Makes Sense?

Maybe those are satisfactory results for some. With several years of “nothing” going on for our national teams under the Esch regime, the common refrain has been “at least we’re doing “something” now.” And, to many old timers I think the idea of setting up a Residency Program similar, if but a little more austere, brings back nostalgia for the good old days. That the program will soon be back to the level of the 80s and 90s.  And, maybe just maybe, we’ll somehow even exceed expectations this time around.

Believe it or not, I fully understand why some folks have this outlook. Heck, occasionally I even find myself guilty of such nostalgia. I guess I’m just a bit too analytical, though, to keep the rose colored glasses on very long. The bitter reality is that those good old days weren’t nearly as good as we like to remember them. The historical results are an epic pile of losses. The Men’s Olympic record is 4-24-1; The Women’s Olympic record is 4-19-0. In World Championship competition the men are 0-16-0 and the women 4-24-0.

And, keep in mind those are the “great” results are from a different era. We haven’t even been good enough to qualify for those events for several years otherwise we’d be adding quite a few more “L’s to those dismal records. Further compounding the problem is that handball is way more professionalized today and our competition is much stiffer in Pan America. Time was that we could take some great athletes in the 22-25 age range, spend 2 or 3 years training them up and qualify for an Olympics. The new reality is that even if, and it’s a big if, we can recruit the same quality of athletes post college we recruited in the past it’s doubtful that we could now even qualify a team for the Olympics, let alone come close to beating a European team.

Maybe what’s been started at Auburn is going to be truly different. That this past weekend’s stumble in Uruguay was just a momentary hiccup on the road to slow and steady improvement. That it’s only a matter of time till our Residency Program at Auburn starts building teams that will make short work of sides like Uruguay, Chile and Greenland. And, just a bit more time till we’re beating Argentina and Brazil, qualifying for the Olympics and even knocking off some European sides.

I guess anything is truly possible. The thing is, though, I’ve seen this movie before and I’ve yet to read or hear anything that articulates just how this movie’s going to have a different ending. We may be doing “something” but so is a lost hiker in the woods walking around in circles.

Time to Start Focusing on 2024

As I see it, the alternative is to develop a long term strategic plan with 2024 as a target and focus point for both National Team and Grass Roots development. Why 2024? Two reasons:

• There’s no quick fix to our National Teams that will dramatically improve our chances for 2020 Olympic Qualification. Focusing on 2024 will buy more time to identify, recruit and develop talent. Still a challenge, but a more realistic one.
• There’s a significant chance that Boston will host the 2024 Olympics meaning that the U.S. will not have to qualify. And, a hosted Olympics could be the vehicle to build some sustainable grass roots that can keep the U.S. competitive for years to come.

How exactly would this be done? Just how would it be different than what is being set up at Auburn? Very good questions. I know that perhaps, I come off as a “Mr. Know It All” sometimes, but, I’ll be up front and state, I don’t know the answers to those questions. Sure, I’ve got some ideas and I’ve started to flesh out some possibilities, but it’s not a simple problem with an obvious solution.

What I do know, though, is this. A comprehensive plan is needed. The sooner, the better.  But, that’s just what I think. The real question is what USA Team Handball leadership thinks. If there ever was a time to take stock and potentially change course, that time is now.

The Greater Boston metropolitan area has the population equivalent of 14.5 Iceland’s. Boston also has a pretty decent chance of hosting the 2024 Olympics which would result in substantial opportunities for local sponsorship. The Auburn-Opelika metro area is the equivalent of less than half an Iceland. Which location would be a better candidate for focusing limited resources in the hopes of creating a “home for handball” in the U.S.?

Part 1 of this option highlighted the potential benefits of focusing resources in one geographical area and the historical limited success the U.S. has had in doing so. This part explores how the U.S. might learn from the past should it decide to try and create a “Home for Handball” in the U.S.

Building a Better Mousetrap

One could infer from the lack of success highlighted in part 1 that you simply can’t artificially create a Little Iceland. But, maybe the lesson is just that it wasn’t done the right way.   That to execute such a strategy successfully, better planning, more resources and more patience are needed. It’s certainly debatable. One thing is for sure, though: The potential benefits of creating a Little Iceland or Home for Handball in the U.S. merits a further investigation. An investigation that would first take a long hard look at what’s worked and what hasn’t. A full assessment of the failures of the past and some real thought into how it might conceivably work in the future. I haven’t fully assessed those failures, but have a fairly solid understanding of what happened and what could be done differently. Here are some thoughts on building a better mousetrap:

1. Very Carefully Select your Location. Ask any real estate professional what the 3 key issues are for selling a house and they’ll tell you: Location, location, location. It’s no different in assessing where best to focus limited resources. Here are some key factors that should go into making the all important location decision.
   • Population: In general, the more people living in the location that’s selected, the better chance you are going to have in reaching critical mass. It’s simply a numbers game with the acknowledgment that your conversion rate (i.e. converting someone who doesn’t care about handball to a truly devoted participant/fan) could be really, really small.  After all, a good portion of the population at-large doesn’t care about any sports, let alone one they’ve never heard of. Converting 1 out of every 100 people would be a pretty darn good conversion rate. 1 out of 500 or 1,000 might be more realistic. This reality means that choosing a large metropolitan area will greatly improve your chances of creating converts.

     For example take a metro area like Boston with a population of 4,684,300 people. To create 5,000 handball fans/participants you would need a conversion rate of .11% or roughly 1 out of every 1,000 people. Now contrast that to the Auburn-Opelika metro area and its population of 135,800 people. To create 5,000 handball fans/participants you would need a conversion rate of 3.68% or roughly 37 out of every 1,000 people. Ouch. Those are some tough numbers. I’m not saying that it’s impossible to reach critical mass at a college town in rural Alabama. But, I will say that without a doubt the smaller population base means it will be way more challenging there than in a major metropolitan area.

   • Job opportunities: Athletes are far more likely to move to a location where there are varied job opportunities including professional positions for recent college graduates
   • Education Opportunities: Athletes for both the residency program and collegiate league would be interested in quality education opportunities.
   • College League Possibilities: The potential to develop a collegiate league in the regional area should be an important factor. And a league with reasonable driving distances for competition.
   • School District Pilot Program Possibilities: The potential to engage local high schools and middle schools to adopt team handball as a sanctioned sport
   • Cost: The costs of setting up a handball academy and supporting leagues and other development initiatives will be substantial. Some locales will be more suitable and cheaper for a number of reasons.
   • Sponsorship Opportunities: The likelihood of obtaining local community support for a handball academy and other development initiatives.
   • Existing local handball support: Ideally, there would already be at least some dedicated supporters of the sport in the local area. Having a ready group of dedicated volunteers will facilitate implementation of several development initiatives.
2. Fully integrate all aspects of regional development: It’s important to highlight that focusing resources in one location would be a lot more than simply establishing a residency program/development academy. Such a high performance training environment would be a key part, but just one part in a true regional development effort. And, all those parts (youth development, a high school league, college league, club league, development academy) would need to work closely in tandem to maximize the success of this initiative. This would mean maximizing staffing to support all these elements. In particular, athletes could be justifiably compensated for their support to youth and high school league support.
3. Fully commit and prioritize this regional development effort: Make no mistake, this would be a major effort and for it to work it might well be required to substantially decrease support to many other Federation activities. Doing a regional effort, “on the cheap” with only partial commitment/funding support also lessens the potential synergy possible with a multi-pronged effort.
4. Give the effort time to blossom and mature. This effort could very well take several years to fully bear fruit. Pulling the plug or lessening support prematurely due to the lack of immediate results will defeat the purpose of such a concentrated effort.

Pros

Establishment of a recognized “Home for Handball”: Having a recognized home for the sport will help in a number of tangible and somewhat intangible ways. Name recognition and identity in one concentrated geographical area has value. With it comes media exposure, sponsorship opportunities, greater public awareness and “buzz”. All of those could even mean real crowds and eventual TV broadcasts.

Improved Recruiting Prospects:  Co-locating youth, high school, college and a Residency Program/Development Academy efforts together will create a pathway/pipeline that athletes can see and join. Critically, this will make it far more feasible to recruit athletes from ages 10-18. An age group that has been very difficult to recruit for a variety of reasons.

Cons

Lessens the possibility of broad based nationwide growth:  A very strong focus on one regional area will by default result in less support to other regions. Correspondingly, there will likely be less chance for growth on a broad coast to coast basis. Rather than taking advantage of it’s huge population, the U.S. will be restricting itself due to a de facto self-imposed restriction.

Shows favoritism to one “blessed” region:  Handball supporters in other parts of the country getting less support will likely voice their disfavor with an intentional and pronounced unequal sharing of resources. For sure, historically there has been grumbling at even minor appearances of favoritism towards a club or region. And this time the grumbling would be somewhat justified because their efforts will indeed be getting fewer resources.

Risks

If the basket breaks, so will all the eggs.   It’s important to remember the cautionary basis for the “all the eggs in one basket” saying. Namely, that is a warning not to do it, because you won’t have any eggs if you drop that basket. And, just like that basket of eggs if the region you choose to focus on fails to pan out then you will have nothing to show for. This could be a spectacular failure. But, then again there have been far too many failures with many of the other piecemeal strategies that have been tried in the past.

Costs

In theory, a regionally focused strategy will save significant money and resources. This is because staff, athletes and volunteers would be concentrated in one location and could readily focus on multiple, integrated development efforts without significant travel costs. Keep in mind, however, that this only works if the effort is truly focused on a particular region. If you spread efforts such as a residency program, High School Pilot Program and collegiate league to different regions of the country it will be less feasible to share staff and funding to support multiple efforts.

Creating a Little Iceland or Home for Handball in the U.S. is certainly an enticing prospect, but also a risky one. In part 3, I’ll tackle the timing for implementing such a strategy should USA Team Handball decides that it’s a risk worth taking.

All the eggs in one basket: What if all of the major handball clubs scattered to the 4 corners of the U.S. were instead focused in one metropolitan area?

Would the U.S. be wise to develop a very focused development strategy around one metropolitan area? In part 1, I lay out the arguments for doing so and review historical efforts to spark development regionally. Part 2 will focus on the pros/cons, costs, risks and timing for doing so.

Iceland: 1,000 Times Smaller

Ever since I had the opportunity to play against Iceland at the 1993 World Championships I’ve been a little bit fascinated with Iceland and it’s national handball program. I even remember getting out my world almanac (yeah, this is a little bit before widespread internet and Wikipedia) because I was asking myself, “How many people live there, anyway?” Not sure what it was 22 years ago, but the current population is roughly 323,000 people. Coincidently, the population of the U.S. is approximately 323,000,000. This disparity inevitably leads to the question: How does a country roughly 1/1,000th the size of the U.S. kick our butts in handball?

Obviously, in terms of handball national team performance, there’s a lot more at play than total population. And, the key difference is that a significant portion of Iceland’s very small population is very focused on handball, whereas in the U.S. a very miniscule percentage has the same dedication. Seriously, depending on how you want to define it, it’s really small. I would argue that there are only around 300 really dedicated handball followers or around 1/1 millionth of the U.S. population. Bump it up to a 1,000 if you want, but you’re still talking about 1/300,000th of the U.S. population.

Creating a Little Reykjavik

Compounding the U.S. struggle is the reality that the handful of folks that really care about the sport are scattered throughout a huge nation, making it a struggle to work together to grow the sport.

Over the years I’ve found myself thinking about this problem, relating it to Iceland and playing a little numbers games of population comparison. I grew up on a farm in the state of Iowa (around 10 Iceland’s) and not too long ago lived in Las Vegas (6 Iceland’s). I remember driving across town and looking over towards the sprawling suburbs next to the mountains and thinking, “Hey, I just drove past a couple of Iceland’s.” And, now I live in Colorado Springs with a metropolitan area a bit bigger than 2 Iceland’s.

As, I’ve played this little game I’ve thought about what could be done if everyone who cared about the sport of team handball lived in the same place. Be it Iowa, Las Vegas, Colorado Springs, Boston or even Auburn, Alabama.  In short, I’ve asked myself:

What if we could throw all the eggs in one basket?

What if…..

• Instead of top clubs scattered throughout the country they all resided in one compact area?
• In one metro area, there were 10 top senior club teams regularly playing each other in a league competition?
• There were 20 collegiate teams feeding those programs.
• There was a Handball Development Academy training the top players in those colleges on a regular if not daily basis?
• There was a sanctioned High School sports program in that city feeding those college programs with new recruits?
• There were 50 youth clubs training and playing games, feeding the high school program?

Why, if all this were true and somehow came to pass it would be, as if, the U.S. had a little Reykjavik all its own. Or, as I like to call it the “All the Eggs in One Basket, Iceland Strategy.”

Organic Success

To some extent such a strategy has indeed been implemented to varying degrees in other sports. In most cases, though, it wasn’t actually a strategy. It just happened organically or naturally without artificial help. Case in point, are a couple of sports that for many years were essentially Californian, water polo and volleyball. Yes, there was a time not that long ago when competitive volleyball was very California centric. And, it still pretty much is when you’re talking men’s volleyball. And, although water polo has spread it’s wings some, all one has to do is look at where the bulk of the collegiate programs are to see that it is still very California centric.

The advantage to this regionalism is that the sport had critical mass in terms of local competition and development. Critical mass in that there were plenty of teams to play each other and create development at younger age levels. However, if that interest had been spread out evenly across the vast United States there would have been no critical mass. Clubs would have had to travel vast distances for competition. Isolated clubs might have sprung up, but these pockets of growth would be susceptible to periodic collapse of clubs and lack of interest.  Youth teams with no one to play would struggle to even get started. Why volleyball might never have become what it is today. Water polo might even be the equivalent of what Team Handball is in this country. A non-relevant sport from coast to coast.

Non-Organic Experiments with Limited Success

But, can such a regional massing of clubs and interest be created nonorganically? Can a federation take steps to proactively create a little handball Reykjavik? The answer is yes: steps can be taken. In USA Team Handball’s case the primary tools for doing so has been national team residency programs and investment to capitalize on the Olympic host city exposure.

Since the mid 1980s residency programs have been located in Colorado Springs, CO; Philadelphia, PA; Atlanta, GA; Cortland, NY and most recently Auburn, AL. In each case the massing of athletes in one spot has had some development effect on the local area. First off, just simply practicing an unfamiliar, but cool looking sport inevitably attracts a few onlookers to try it. Some of those athletes even became national team players. The athletes based at those locations also often did community outreach to facilitate development. Finally, for a variety of personal reasons some athletes settled in the residency program location and still live there today.

Unfortunately, none of these locations have had much success in terms of sustainable impact. Today, Colorado Springs has a local club mostly comprised of aging veterans that gathers occasionally to provide competition for the AF Academy. Over the past decade or so there have also been some decent youth programs in the Colorado Springs area, but no program is currently active. To the best of my knowledge pretty much nothing exists handball wise in either Philadelphia or Cortland, NY, but neither or those locales were residency sites sufficiently long enough for any side benefits to take effect.

In terms of an Olympic boom, both Los Angeles and Atlanta clearly benefitted from the exposure that an Olympics can bring. In the case of L.A. the 1980s were clearly the high tide for the sport there. At one time there was as many as 5 clubs in the LA area and the Boys & Girls clubs had dozens of programs throughout the area. But the buzz was not sustained and by the mid 1990s there was just one club, LA THC which still exists today.

And then we have the test case of Atlanta, which benefitted from an Olympics, a Residency Program and even having the Federation HQ co-located there in the late 1990s. For a time, Atlanta was indeed the closest the U.S. has ever come to having a little Reykjavik.   Atlanta had two solid clubs (ATH and the Condors), a development program with the Boys & Girls Club and the South East Team Handball Conference, the largest collegiate league the U.S. has ever had. Years later, however, there is little to show for. Gary Hines who rose up through the ranks is a mainstay on the national team, but the youth programs and ATH and the Condors are no more. All Atlanta has now is a newish club, Georgia Team Handball which has little link with the past.

What’s to be learned from these experiments? On the one hand, you could look at all of these experiments simply as failures and proof that you can’t artificially create a little Iceland.  I would argue, however, that position doesn’t take into account the limited planning that went into these experiments. In LA’s case the growth that occurred was pretty organic. There was funding from the 84 Olympic Foundation, but there were also dozens of firm believers willing to put in the work. The same can be said, as well, in Atlanta. There was funding support, but there were also plenty of dedicated volunteers. Colorado Springs may be somewhat of a disappointment, but that fails to account for its smaller size. Finally, the programs in Philadelphia and Cortland never were around long enough to take root. And Cortland was also probably hampered by its smaller size and location.

So, maybe the problem wasn’t so much with the concept, but with the choice of locations and with the lack of overall planning to make it a truly focused integrated effort. Maybe the U.S. could learn from it’s past mistakes and modest successes to build a better mousetrap? In part 2, I’ll lay out what could be done with a very focused regional effort.

The USA Women are hard working, motivated and fired up, but results on the scoreboard are still lacking.

Previously, I reviewed the Men’s program and their 3 game series against Puerto Rico in October.  This time around I take look at the Women’s team and the state of the Residency Program on its one year anniversary.  (Additional note:  The video for these matches is no longer available at the USA Team Handball Youtube channel)

Results of USA – Puerto Rico Series

Friday, 17 October
Final Score: PUR – USA  25-24 (12-11)
Goals – USA: Van Ryn (6), Levinkind & Gascon (5), Graham (3), Hardison & Taylor (2), Lewis (1)
Saves – USA: Self (11), Scherer (4)

Saturday, 18 October
Final Score: PUR – USA  26-21 (13-10)
Goals – USA: Rhoads (5), Abou-Zeida (4), Pierce (3), Hardison (2), Lewis (2), Farrar (2), Nguyen (1), Elder (1), Morrison (1)

Sunday, 19 October
Final Score: PUR – USA 22-22 (14-12)
Goals – USA: Graham (4), Dunn (4), Van Ryn (4), Gascon (3), Taylor (3), Hardison (1), Pierce (1)

Extrapolating Team Progress

To provide some context to those results, here’s how Puerto Rico, the U.S. and Uruguay have performed in recent competitions.  (Uruguay is included since that’s whom the U.S. Women must beat next March just to qualify for the PANAM Games.)  And, it’s also important to note that prior performance is no guarantee of future performance.   Teams can improve or decline substantially in the course of a year or two

2011 Pan American Championships
Puerto Rico: Did not participate in qualification
USA: Did not qualify (Lost to Venezuela and Cuba in North American and Caribbean tournament)
Uruguay: Finished 4^th

2011 PANAM Games
Puerto Rico: Finished 6^th out of 8 teams; Head to Head result: Beat USA 29-27 in consolation semifinal
USA: Finished 8^th out of 8 teams
Uruguay: Finished 7^th out of 8 teams; Head to Head results:  Beat USA 36-24 in group play; Beat USA 30-23 in 7^th place match

2013 Pan American Championships
Puerto Rico: Did not participate in qualification
Uruguay: Finished 5th out of 8 teams; Head to Head result: Beat USA 30-17 in consolation semifinal
USA: 8^th out of 8 teams

2014 South American Championships
Uruguay: Finished 4^th out of 5 teams and was assigned to the 2^nd Chance Tourney.

2014 Guadaloupe Tourney
Puerto Rico: Head to Head competition: Beat USA 24-21
USA: 23-13 win against Puerto Rican juniors

An assessment of these results from the past 4 years yields the same old story.  Scoreboard wise there’s nothing to report in terms of progress.  The USA women played Puerto Rico this past March on a neutral court in Guadaloupe and lost 24-21.  At home last month in Auburn they lost twice, 25-24; 26-21 and drew once, 22-22.  Going back further in time my records have the U.S. losing to Puerto Rico, 29-27 at the PANAM Games in 2011.  Teams change, rosters change, but with several months of practice at Auburn progress could only have been claimed with solid victories at home against a lower tier PATHF nation.  That didn’t happen- plain and simple.

The Visual Assessment

But, while the scoreboard is important it doesn’t always tell the full story.  This can be particularly true when you are talking about friendly matches where coaches often experiment with rosters to test different player combinations and to provide playing time and experience to newer players.

So, before I start my critique I would first like to point out that I think the athletes training at Auburn are a hard working group who’ve undoubtedly made some very significant personal, professional and financial sacrifices to better themselves as players.  “You know what?  How about I write that again with a little more emphasis.  I say again”:

“I think the athletes training at Auburn are a hard working group who’ve undoubtedly made some very significant personal, professional and financial sacrifices to better themselves as players.”

Seriously, as a former national team player with modest skills who made quite a few sacrifices few people can say that bold faced statement with the credibility that I can.  So, if you happen to be an athlete at Auburn please don’t take this critique as a personal indictment on your efforts.

The offense is inept.   The U.S. currently has no backcourt player on its Auburn roster that can individually create scoring opportunities in a “1 vs. 1” matchup against an average defensive player.  And, only one backcourt player (Ashley Van Ryn) can score reliably when the opposing defense breaks down.  If you watch the video of the U.S. set offense here’s what you’ll see over and over:  The backcourts will play catch amongst themselves a few times at 12-14 meters, occasionally throwing to their wings.  At no time during this “playing catch” is there even a hint of a threat to attack. Then, if the ball hasn’t been turned over yet, one of the backs will head towards 10-11 meters where they might get a bad shot off.  It’s downright painful to watch.  For the uninitiated, this is what happens if a team doesn’t have a credible backcourt scoring threat.

In terms of wings, Julia Taylor is becoming technically sound, but I’m not so sure she has the quickness needed to play at a higher level.  Lisa Dunn is also doing her best, but really a lefty is what’s needed at right wing.  At circle runner inexperience also seems to be at play, and this surely exacerbates the backcourt’s ineffectiveness.

An adequate defense.  The defense is adequate when it’s allowed enough time to get set up.  The players appear to communicate well and in a 6-0 set they can be tough to shoot over, particularly, for an undersized team like Puerto Rico.  The team, however, lacks quickness and is very vulnerable to 1 on 1 offensive moves from quicker players.  These “quickness” mismatches led to several breakthroughs or passes to open players for easy shots.  Against a team with more experienced and even quicker players the U.S. defense would be severely tested.  In terms of goalie play I didn’t get a full read from the video to make much of an assessment one way or the other.

The team is way too old to be considered a “developmental team”.  A team, mostly composed of inexperienced players is bound to have technical shortcomings.  With good coaching, frequent competition and hard work, however, technical skills will improve.   Unfortunately, these improvements also take time.  Perhaps 3-5 years for real improvement and I would guestimate that the athletes training at Auburn have an average age of 26 or 27.  (It’s hard to say exactly how old as the Federation has decided to no longer list athlete ages for the past couple of years.)  It’s unlikely for a number of reasons that these athletes are going to stick around to age 31 or 32 and even if they did, they would also be seeing their athletic skills decline.  Maybe if the bulk of the athletes were in the 18-22 age range this lack of technical expertise could be justified, but that simply is not the case.

The team lacks significant raw athletic talent.  However, I’m not so sure that even if the Auburn based athletes were in the coveted 18-22 age bracket that this group has the raw athletic talent to get them over the hump. Judging talent is an inexact science, even more so via web stream.  Still, I just don’t see any “knock your socks off” talent.  The type of player that you just know will be great given the time and effort.

Near Term Lens:  In March 2015 the U.S. will play Uruguay and the Dominican Republic, the 4^th place Central and Caribbean nation in a second chance tournament to determine the 8^th and final qualification spot for the PANAM Games.  Based on recent results there is nothing to suggest that the U.S. is poised to win such a tournament.  There has been no progress on the scoreboard and the visual evidence supports and amplifies that reality. Even if the U.S. hosts, I would make Uruguay, a team that beat the U.S. by 13 goals in 2013 a big favorite.  And, that’s just to get to the PANAM Games.  In Toronto, they would be even bigger underdogs to Argentina.

Long Term Lens:  Peering out further into the future (Post 2015 PANAM Games) and the chances for 2020 Olympic qualification look pretty grim.  Even if the U.S. turns around its residency program and modifies it into a credible developmental program with younger and more gifted athletes they will face the enormous challenge of assembling a team that can beat Brazil, the current defending world champions.  Most likely the 2019 Brazilian side won’t be as strong as they are now, but they surely will still be a top notch team.  In short, the U.S. could do an unprecedented job of recruiting, find a windfall of funds for frequent overseas trips and substantial player stipends and it still wouldn’t be enough to close the gap against a weaker, but still good Brazilian team.  Yes, 2024 is the earliest that U.S. women will have a realistic chance of qualifying and if you do the math that means you need to add 9-10 years to the current ages of players in training at Auburn.  That means only a handful of players (if any) are chasing a realistic Olympic dream.

Déjà vu all over Again:  A Possible Coaching Change?

As I watched the matches and wrote this assessment I couldn’t help but notice the striking similarities between the Women’s team now and the situation it was in almost 8 years in the spring of 2007.  Following a string of disappointing performances in the Quebec Club League and with an all important PANAM Game 2nd chance tournament just weeks away the National Team Head Coach was either fired or perhaps forced to resign.  It was a surprise move and at the time I assessed it as either a desperate or decisive action.  In the end the move had no impact as the USA women failed to qualify for the 2007 PANAM Games.  Ancient history with no relevance, you might wonder?

Well, the USA Women’s coach back in 2007 is now the current USA Women’s coach: Christian Latullipe.  And the USOC administrative manager of American Team Handball interests (the Federation had been decertified) is now the current CEO of USA Team Handball:  Mike Cavanaugh.  Talk about a striking and unlikely repeat of circumstances.

So could this repeat of history continue and conclude with yet another coaching change?  It’s at least conceivable to contemplate such a change as the circumstances are so similar.  And this time around, Cavanaugh wouldn’t be firing the coach he hired, but simply the one he inherited. Often it’s quite a bit easier to fire someone else’s choice rather than tacitly admit that your hiring choice was wrong in the first place. Time will tell, but the USA Women clearly have a long way to go and a short time to get there.  Pure speculation on my part, but perhaps more is on the line than just pride for some upcoming friendly matches scheduled this December at Auburn against Canada and Guadaloupe?

One Last Thought

I guess I could idly sit by and not express an opinion.   Just sit back and watch.  But, I think it’s better to have some independent commentary about our National Teams, be it good or bad.  I’ll leave it to my readers to assess whether I’m just some Negative Nellie always seeing the dark side of things no matter what or just someone who’s objective and coming up with the dark side.

Trust me, I’d like to be dead wrong a bit more often.  Here’s hoping that this is a misguided commentary that gets pinned up on the National Team bulletin board and becomes the inspiration for a remarkable turnaround.

The USA Team Handball Collegiate Club Graveyard: Why have so many teams come and gone over the years? And what could be done to prevent this from happening?

This option for USA Team Handball requires a little more explaining than the other options for consideration.  Part 1 provides the background information.  Part 2 will tackle what could be done.

Background (Framing the Problem)

Last weekend Army beat Air Force 31-26 in what is surely USA Team Handball’s longest, continuous club rivalry, collegiate or otherwise.  It dates back to at least 1986 when I traveled to West Point as an AF cadet to play in my first of two collegiate handball matches.  The other match took place in the Spring of 1987 at the National Club Championship when our pool play game vs West Point also served as the Collegiate Championship.  Yes, back in 1987 there were just two collegiate men’s teams, Air Force and West Point. 27 years later there were 10 men’s colleges and 2 women’s colleges at the Collegiate Championship, but as anyone who follows the sport in this country knows this number has ebbed and flowed for years.  In reality there are just 3 firmly established men’s collegiate programs (West Point, Air Force and North Carolina) and 2 firmly established women’s programs (West Point and North Carolina).  Yes, if you’re looking for positive spin could say that collegiate Team Handball has almost doubled in size (from 3 to 5 programs) since I started playing.

First, a short aside from those who might want to point out that there are currently more than 5 collegiate clubs in the U.S.  This is true, but as the graveyard map above so ably demonstrates there’s a big difference between showing up at nationals for a couple of years and being a program that’s consistently there, year after year.  Maybe the Texas A&Ms and Illinois States of today won’t join that graveyard, but they’ve got to stick around for about 5 years before I’ll grant them “firmly established” status.

Still, even if you use a looser definition and counted every college that formed a club and played in one tournament we’d still be way short of where this country needs to be.  To be at 5 programs in 27 years is a huge disappointment to say the least.  Contrast those numbers to other club (non NCAA sports) like Rugby which claims to have 900 collegiate clubs and 32,000 players.  Or, Ultimate Frisbee which claims 700 clubs and 12,000 players.  I don’t know what the numbers were for those sports back in 1987, but Ulitmate, for sure, was in its infancy.

But, is a lack of collegiate growth an over-riding concern or just one development problem of many that USA Team Handball faces?  After all, this country doesn’t have many clubs in general.  And arguably, we have only one program currently at the High School level in New Jersey and just a couple at lower levels like the programs Craig Rot has started in Minnesota and suburban Chicago.  Does collegiate handball deserve extra attention.

Why Collegiate Handball is (or should be so) important for USA Development

Here are some arguments as to why collegiate handball is worthy of some extra attention:

• It’s the first realistic opportunity the USA has to get some quality athletes to devote themselves full time to the sport: Sure, it would be nice to get younger athletes fully engaged, but the traditional American sports present very stiff competition.  Unless Team Handball can become a fully sanctioned sport in high school almost all (if not all) of the better athletes will gravitate to the traditional sports.  After, high school, however, a good portion of these athletes will see their careers end when they are not awarded a college scholarship.  These athletes may not be part of the “elite” in their chosen sport, but they may be strong candidates for elite status in Team Handball.  And, at the other end of the spectrum:  While it might be tempting to wait for some even better raw athletes after their collegiate careers are over, these athletes are older and may age out before they can be great club or national team players
• Colleges have infrastructure that can more readily support club start up and sustainment: Starting a club requires a number of things to include a place to practice, athletes and organization.   Gym space can be an issue, but virtually every college has gyms that could be used for team handball.  Colleges are also chalk full young adults, mostly aged 18-22 and by default some portion are athletes making recruiting less challenging.  Finally, many colleges have policies in place that encourage and support clubs with funding and resources.  It doesn’t usually pay for everything, but it provides structure and a base for support.
• College sports have tradition and name recognition: Team handball lacks recognition in this country and if you were to hype a TV broadcast between our nation’s best club teams, NYAC and NYC you would get some blank stares from many a sports fan.  However, if you were to talk about a match between Air Force and West Point, or say the acronym “UNC” the typical sports fan will immediately think, “Service Academy Rivalry” and “sky blue” uniforms. If you ever want to sell the sport the aesthetics of school colors and tradition will beat no name clubs with aging veterans.

The impact of having so few collegiate club handball programs

While few would argue that it’s not good to have so few collegiate programs is it really a big deal or just something that would be nice to have? Well, here’s some of the impact our low numbers have had on the development of the game and our national teams.

• Fewer collegiate clubs means a dramatically smaller player pool for our National Teams: If you are an advocate of Residency Programs this reality surely hits home.  Over the years, collegiate clubs have been a primary recruiting source for our National Teams.  Army, Air Force and UNC have been the handball starting point for dozens of players.  It would be interesting to see a statistical breakdown of National Team players and how many started first with a collegiate club, but I’m guessing it’s somewhere in the neighborhood of 30%.  Higher for the men and lower for the women.  Imagine what that percentage might be with more clubs and then imagine how much higher the quality of players would be with a larger pool to draw from.
• Fewer collegiate clubs means a dramatically smaller fan base and accompanying smaller revenue stream: Setting aside the National Team player pool aspect think about everyone who’s put on a collegiate jersey.  Everyone of those former players is a potential ardent fan of USA Team Handball, European Club Handball and the sport in general.  Someone that might purchase the upper tier cable package to get Champions League matches on beIN Sport, someone that might buy a USA Team Handball jersey, or attend a USA national team match.  Last weekend USA Rugby played the All Blacks of New Zealand in front of 61,000 fans at Soldier Field.  For sure there was more than a few New Zealand expats there, but I bet there were a sizable number of former collegiate rugby players in the stands.  Handball couldn’t even fill an arena if we had 100% attendance from every collegiate player from the past 3 decades.  And, another potential revenue stream:  The philanthropic billionaire former player.  The greater the number of former players, the better chance you have that someone like former collegiate rugby player Mark Cuban:  ready, willing and able to open their sizable wallets to help.
• Fewer collegiate clubs means fewer youth coaches, referees and club leaders: And apart from the direct revenue aspect if there are more collegiate teams there were surely be more former players giving back to the sport.  Rugby for many years in the U.S. was mostly a collegiate sport with a few clubs consisting of expats and college graduates.  (Does that sound familiar USA handball followers?)  As more and more collegiate club programs got on solid ground and an alumni base grew into the thousands, though, the growth started occurring in youth programs.  Now there are even sanctioned high school programs and colleges that are recruiting those athletes.

Why there are so few collegiate club handball programs

So why has the “sport of the future” had such paltry growth at the collegiate level?  More importantly, what can be done to change this?  Answering the “why question” is fairly straightforward.  Here are the two main reasons why growth has been so minimal:

1. It’s difficult to start a club program: Starting any team handball club in the U.S., collegiate or otherwise isn’t easy.  As I’ve pointed out before it’s drudgework that many (including dozens of former national team players) don’t want to go anywhere near.  Heck, in some respects it’s amazing that we’ve had several programs get started even if they inevitably flamed out.  Which alludes to the 2nd reason.
2. Transitioning from a fledgling program to an established program isn’t easy: While starting a new club is challenging, there often is a level of energy which is invigorating and allows new clubs to overcome those challenges.  In most cases, however, that energy level wears off after a year or two and eventually the club encounters some new challenge that isn’t overcome.  That challenge could be dwindling numbers, the need for a new gym or as, often is the case, the departure of key individuals leading the charge.  All too often, in fact, in almost every case over the past 27 years, the new challenge is not met and the grave digger heads out to the cemetery to add another gravestone.

So, how can USA Team Handball turn things around for its collegiate programs?  In part 2 of the “college focused option” I take a closer look at what could be done and the pros/cons, costs and risks associated with doing so.