[Dakota]

The length of the tournament could be a legitimate beef, except if you notice what is being emphasized is high school players only, location, and college coaches in attendance.

It is at its core a showcase tournament being put on for the convenience of the socal teams, with window dressing to draw in teams from outside socal.

There is no doubt in my mind that ASA handled the long-standing coach's complaints poorly. If, in fact, they merely took suggestions and provided little or no feedback (as you suggest), that is worse than not taking suggestions at all, since it can easily be taken as deceptive.

I'm completely out of the loop on the internal workings of the ASA, but it has been clear even to me that ASA was viewing OKC as the permanant home of the 18U Gold tournament. I still think that is the crux of the issue for the socal teams; they feel they are not being paid their due homage. They'd be perfectly happy if ASA's HQ and therefore the permanent home was in Barstow and you'd hear nary a peep about the hot weather or lack of activities.