Monday, January 14, 2019
For any of you who read yesterday's blogpost early in the morning, this blogpost will be a bit of a repeat.
The original last half of that blogpost included information on Sunday's FIDAF, the governing body of American football in Italy, meeting to finalize the structure of the 2019 DII and DIII seasons.
I received some information that turned out to be FIDAF's Super Secret decisions and published them not knowing that I was stealing some of FIDAF's thunder by doing so.
I received an e-mail from the Varese Skorpions intelligentsia stating that someone at FIDAF had read my announcement and was hopping mad, could I please erase that part of the blogpost.
But of course.
Monday night, FIDAF posted the new breakdown of the 2019 season but not the actual schedules.
Thus we try again to inform the general Italian American DII football fan about the fast approaching campaign.
Here we go again
Suday was the day that YOUR
Skorpions Varese found out the
makeup of our 2019 DII league
Our National Federation had some
serious issues in regards to DII this year
In 2018, DII was made up of 24 teams. These 24 teams were then divided into six, four team leagues or Groups.
At the end of the campaign, the top two teams in each of the Groups (A, B, C, D, E and F) made the playoffs. Based on FIDAF's Power Rankings, the top four teams then had first round byes while the other eight clubs played in a Wild Card Round.
The problem for FIDAF this year was a restructuring of DI, DII and DIII.
Last year's DII Champion, the Bologna Warriors (11-0), moved up to DI.
The Milano Rhinos (4-6), a perennial DI power, has fallen on hard times and decided to drop down to DII to re-group. In 2017 the Rhinos were DI Playoff Finalists and in 2016 they were the DI Champions.
Five of 2018's DII clubs have opted to play the nine-man brand of American football in Italy's DIII this year in order to rebuild. These five clubs are the Baretta Mad Bulls, the Cagliari Crusaders, the Legnano Frogs, the Ravenna Chiefs and the Toscana West Coast Raiders.
Unfortunately, one 2018 DII team, the Sant'Agata Knights, has apparently given up playing American football entirely for the 2019 season. Hopefully they will be back in 2020.
Finally, one 2018 DIII club, the Ferrara Aquile, decided that the time was right to move up to DII this Spring.
The problem for FIDAF was that all of these DII changes left us with only 19 teams for the 2019 campaign.
In 2019, DI will have nine teams while DIII will be the home of 43 clubs.
Now, how would FIDAF break up the DII leagues this year was the big question that was to be settled in a meeting Sunday.
Here are the 19 DII Clubs for 2019
So what was FIDAF's final take on DII?
How many leagues or Groups, in FIDAF parlance, would there be in 2019!
The answer this year, if my translation of the official FIDAF message is correct, is that there will only be only one large Group divided into three, mostly geographical regions in order to save on travel costs.
Are you listening Spanish American Football Federation?
Two regions will be made up of five teams each with each team playing home-and-home games versus their other four regional mates making for an eight game regular season schedule.
These two five team divisions are:
Castelfranco Cavaliers
Ferrara Aquile
Isonzo Sentinels
Padova Saints
Verona Mastini
Bologna Braves
Modena Vipers
Reggio Emilia Hogs
Roma Pretoriani
Sarzana Red Jackets
We were placed in the mostly northern, nine team league. We have seven teams from our region of Lombardia, one from the neighboring region of Piemonte and one outlier from the exotic, southern island of Sicily
Our division's teams will play each of the other eight teams once, with each clubs eight game regular season schedule being comprised of four home and four away contests.
Here are the teams in our regional division:
Brescia Bengals
Busto Arsizio Blue Storms
Canavese Mastini
Martesana Daemons
Milano Rhinos
Monza e Brianza Hammers
Palermo Sharks
Varese Gorillas
Varese Skorpions
At the end of the regular season, the top twelve teams based on FIDAF's Power Rankings will make the playoffs regardless of which of the three regional divisions they are members. Unfortunately that means that running up scores will be encouraged. I believe in clearing the bench in every game if possible and even more so in a blowout game. This philosophy may hurt our chances to make the playoffs but I strongly believe in getting all of our players as much playing time as possible each week. It is good for morale and makes for better, more meaningful practices as the season wears on and on.
Just as in 2018, the top four seeds will again get first round playoff byes and the other eight clubs will play opening round Wild Card contests.
As for our Varese Skorpions, 5-4 in 2018 and second place in Group C play, here is a quick breakdown of our regional opponents in 2019.
VARESE SKORPIONS
2019 OPPONENTS
Brescia Bengals
5-3 in 2018 DII
Tied for Second Place in Group F
Busto Arsizio Blue Storms
9-1 in 2018 DII
Group C Champions
Canavese Mastini
3-5 in 2018 DII
Third Place in Group D
Martesana Daemons
6-4 in 2018 DII
Group D Champions
Milano Rhinos
4-6 in 2018 DI
Tied for Fifth Place in ten team DI
5-4 in 2018 DII
Second Place in Group D
Palermo Sharks
4-5 in 2018 DII
Second Place in Group A
Varese Gorillas
1-7 in 2018 DII
Tied for Third Place in Group C
This looks to be a grueling schedule to me, much tougher than the one we played in 2018.
Nevertheless . . .
Go Skorpions GO!
Meanwhile in Camarillo . . .
rainy Monday with us
He thought that we should play the Monopoly board game that he got for Christmas.
We should have known better . . .
Note all of the properties
that he owns here
He wiped me out in about 45 minutes while Laurie lasted another 45 minutes against our budding financial wizard who beat us fair and square by building a luxury hotel on Boardwalk.
Think Bellagio Last Vegas.
When he went home after his Dad Michael helped me pack for my flight to Varese, Jacob melted our hearts when he read a book to his sister Mary.
See what I mean?
Three more days . . .
No comments:
Post a Comment