2007-2008 USTA New Jersey Jr. Team Tennis
A Guide for Coaches and Players
New Jersey Jr. Team Tennis is a recreational program of the United States Tennis Association (USTA). It is supported by the Southern Region of the USTA/Eastern Section and by member clubs and organizations which give support to the New Jersey League. The program offers players with varying tennis skills an opportunity to compete in a weekly junior team tennis league of increasing competitive levels.
The New Jersey League
The program began its’ fifteenth year in September 2007, and will run from September 2007 through April 2008. The league is predominantly run by volunteer coach/managers for the skill level divisions. Team tennis playoffs are scheduled at the end of the season for Southern Region, Sectional and National events. Additional information will be sent to all teams. We will once again be allowing high school upper classmen to be junior managers.
Eligibility
Clubs and organizations participating in the program are required to become Eastern Section Organizational Members. All players are required to have a USTA membership. Team Organizational Membership is $25, and player membership is $18. Both memberships are available with a credit card and phone call to 800-990-8782 or on www.USTA.com. Players participating in the program must be of school age up to and including their high school senior year. The only additional requirement is in the 14 and under advanced and intermediate divisions where players must not have reached the age of 15 prior to the start of the fall season. Be advised that a player over the age of 14 and playing in our 14 and under advanced and intermediate divisions would not be able to play in the sectional or national tournaments in that age group. The winter session finds that the 3.0, 3.5 and 4.0 designations have been replaced by the 14 and under advanced and intermediate and 18 and under advanced and intermediate divisions.
Registration and Rewards
The following must be received prior to the first match: 1. A $300 team registration fee payable to NJ USA Jr. Team Tennis.
1. Team Registrations must be entered two weeks prior to the start of the season (not player registration). This is necessary for preparing the schedule.
2. Coaches will also submit a roster to the USTA.com website through Tennis Link. Non-advancing teams will be directed on what to do. If you were able to do this prior to remitting the registration fee, you may deduct the $3 per player charge from the registration fee. If not, when a copy of the electronic roster is submitted a check for the charge will be returned to coaches.
3. USA Jr. Team Tennis T-Shirts- T-shirts are free to all teams submitting their roster and registration fee. A maximum of 16 T-shirts will be provided free. Additional shirts and those ordered after November 16 are available for a charge of $5 per shirt. Please email your T-shirt orders to Ken Goldsmith.
4. Trophies will be awarded at the end of the second session to the 1st, 2nd , and 3rd place teams in each division for the year.
National Tennis Rating Program
The New Jersey League is committed to the National Tennis Rating Program (NTRP) for evaluating the player skill level. Coaches have the responsibility of rating and scheduling players within their league’s NTRP guidelines. Player ratings may be verified by Sectional verifiers during match play. Players who are found to have a tennis rating higher than allowed must transfer to a more advanced division. See NTRP tennis rating evaluation on the New Jersey League website at www.teamtennis.org. If it is felt that a player is playing below his or her skill level the coach of the player must request a player’s verification. A Verification Committee has been formed and has formulated rules which apply to our league. They appear as Appendix 1 after this document.
League Composition
For the 2007-08 seasons we have changed the division designations and added an additional division. The New Jersey League has pioneered the development of programs designed to provide players with a level playing field. Teams in the 14 and under intermediate league have NTRP ratings of up to 3.2. In the 14 and under advanced, players are qualified to a rating of less than 3.8 but above 3.2 and 18 and under advanced 3.9 and above. In the 18 and under intermediate players have a ranking of less than 3.5.
Team Responsibility
Teams are required to field a minimum of eight (8) players with four (4) boys and four (4) girls, in order to complete scheduled matches without a default (see Appendix A). This rule applies to the 14 and under advanced and 18 and under intermediate and advanced divisions. In the 14 and under intermediate division, it is possible for a team to sub an extra boy or girl a maximum of twice in a session at the bottom of the player roster to complete an 8 player roster in an emergency situation. Although this will still result in a default, it will at least give all players the chance to play their matches. In all remaining divisions, it is possible to temporarily bring a player up from the number one or number two positions from a lower by skill level division, play in the match and be returned to their original team without having to leave the player on the higher level team in the event that player wins. You can only move players from 14 and under intermediate to 14 and under advanced or 14 and under advanced and 18 and under intermediate to 18 and under advanced.
Since a coach or captain is not able to do this, you should contact the program coordinator prior to the match. The League Coordinator will be able to do this and leave a player up until the match is confirmed.
A visiting team canceling a match in under the 48 hour required time must pay the percentage of the court time the host team requires. A host team canceling in less than the required 48 hours is responsible for paying travel and player fees not to exceed $200. League management must be notified prior to the cancellation of a scheduled match or change in the published location of the match. The only exception is due to inclement weather. In this case, both coaches should avail themselves of Weather Channel updates and satellite projections and remain in close contact. While we want to get matches played, if either team feels that it is a genuinely unreasonable risk to travel to the match; the host club must be notified and the match canceled at least 4 hours before the scheduled match time.
Player Advancement
This is covered in Appendix 1. The exception is that players who are #4 singles and lose 80% of their matches could be asked to move down.
The Player Verification Committee is in place to handle requests for the advancement of players between levels. The committee is composed of the management committee and three coaches who will occupy the committee for the period of September through April.
Rules of the Game
1. Each match requires the completion of four (4) boys singles and four (4) girls singles plus two (2) boys doubles and two (2) girls doubles. Doubles should be started prior to singles. Singles rankings are set from strongest to weakest. Doubles teams are selected with the number 1 and 2 singles players in 1st doubles position and the 3 and 4 singles players in 2nd doubles position. In the event that a fifth player not playing singles is to play doubles, any previous singles history will count towards establishing his/her position in order for the same ruling to apply. In establishing the playing order, any player with a sectional or regional ranking must be placed higher than a player not ranked or ranked lower. Players may only appear on one team roster and play for only one team.
2. An individual match consists of a six game pro set with no ad scoring. A 12 point tiebreaker at 5 all will be in effect. The final score for this match will be 6-5. Sudden death will be in effect if there is a strict time deadline for the courts. Again, the player in the lead will be given 6 games. Host coaches must inform the visiting coach before the match if the sudden death rule is in effect. Warm up time is limited to 5 minutes with serves prior to the doubles matches. It is possible to use the doubles to increase your warm up period. There will be no warm up prior to the start of singles unless there is agreement between both coaches or if the players have not played for 20 minutes. The home coach will decide if the players should switch sides of the court on odd games. It is the recommendation of the league that the players not switch on the odd games.
3. Coaches must establish their team lineup and present it to the opposing coach before the first match starts. All score sheets can be downloaded from Tennis Link.
4. If a team arrives for a match with an insufficient number of players, they must default matches from the bottom of the lineup, ie;. A team arriving with only three girls must default the girls fourth singles and second doubles.
5. If a player is late, however, less than 30 minutes late with a phone call to apprise the coach of the situation, the singles match will be played first. If the doubles match can be completed within the allotted time, it should be. If not, the score will be adjusted to where the player who was on time is moved up to 6 games and the player who was late is proportionally raised. Example 1: Team A was there on time and a player from team B was late. They are in the middle of playing their doubles match when the allotted time runs out. Team A was winning the match 4-3. Team A is given 2 games to give 6 games and team B stands. This make the score 6-5 team A. Example 2: Team B is winning 4-3, team A is given 3 games and team B stands making the score 6-4 team A. Of course there is a gray area here. If both coaches agree that the reason for lateness is a valid one, the coaches can decide on a different option.
6. If the player is over 40 minutes late without a phone call, an attempt will be made to play the singles match, however, the doubles match will be forfeited.
7. Four (4) courts are needed for two hours to play the match and four (4) new cans of tennis balls are to be provided by the host team. A game is won by the first player or doubles team to win 4 points (no ad scoring). Matches are played as first to win 6 games by two games with a tiebreaker at 5 all. Each game is worth 1 point. The team with the most points at the end of the 12 sets is declared the winner. There are a total of 132 points available in a match. The winner can have a maximum or 72 points while the losing team can have a maximum of 60 points. If both teams end their matches with a tie, a mixed doubles 12 point tiebreaker will resolve the score. The tiebreak will be worth 1 point. Mixed doubles teams will be chosen by the coaches. Although, in general #1 singles boy and girl will play.
8. A player is required to make all calls on his/her side. It is important that lines are called honestly, and to make any call that is in doubt in favor of their opponent. If the need for a lines person should arise , the player recognizing the problem should immediately stop the match and notify their coach. The player should walk to the net and raise their hand to ask for assistance. A team representative from each team will act as observer and referee to establish proper calls for the rest of the match. Obvious foot faults, when observed by the players, should be brought to the attention of the coaches by the player who suspects a foot fault has been committed. Once this has been substantiated, the player will receive a warning. In the advanced divisions, after the warning, the offending player will lose a point for each subsequent foot fault. In the intermediate divisions, after the warning, the offending player will be given several (3) more warnings before points are taken away.
9. In any disagreement over scores, both players’ positions have equal weight. Players are to go back to the last score they agreed upon, and then resume play from that point. Help establishing the rules should not be offered unless a player requests this.
10. Players may be added to the roster at any time during the regular season as long as complete player information is forwarded to the League Administrator before the scheduled match.
11. A player who is unable to complete a match due to an injury or illness will receive his/her earned points for any completed games. Their opponent will receive the accumulated points plus the unplayable points in the match.
12. Rules for New Jersey Junior Team Tennis not covered in these league rules Can be found in the USTA Information Resources “2007 USTA Jr. Team Tennis Regulations” and “Code of Conduct”.
13. If an unresolved problem arises between teams or players, the League Administrator should be notified officially in writing as well as disputed in Tennis Link. Initial contact could be posed by phone to the League Administrator. If the problem cannot be resolved, the issue will go to the league Grievance Committee composed of representative league coaches not associated with the issue on a temporary basis and league management. After the issue is resolved, the coach representatives will leave the committee. In the event of subsequent issues, different representative coaches could be asked to participate on the committee along with league management to resolve the problems. The decision from this committee will be final concerning rules of the New Jersey USA Jr. Team Tennis League.
14. In no instance can a team take it upon themselves to leave the facility without completing the match. Failure to abide by this rule, will more than likely lead to some level of forfeiture of matches.
15. All winning coaches must enter the scores on tennis link within 48 hours of the match. All coaches must confirm the scores within 24 hours of the scores being entered to sign off on the scores reported on tennis link. Failure to do this will void the coach’s right to dispute the score. The scores will appear on the Tennis Link website. In the case of a dispute, all coaches will keep copies of the score sheets. These sheets must agree in appearance and content. It is our recommendation that coaches prior to leaving the match compare score sheets. Prior to the start of the season, there will be a training session for all coaches in order to learn how to enter the scores.
16. It is important for all parents to avoid all court areas and not to communicate with their children while on the court. At no time should a parent offer help on line calls or other match maintenance decisions. Only coaches are allowed around the court areas and no coaching is permitted from the sidelines. Furthermore, coaches and parents should be sensitive to the fact that children are present as well as culturally diverse people who might take offence to ‘colorful’ or inappropriate language.
17. Parents and coaches and players must refrain from using threatening or foul language at all times. If a player uses foul language, he will be given a warning. If it continues, that player will first be penalized a game. Continued foul language will result in a default. Once a player is defaulted in this manner, it could lead to their expulsion from the league. To all others, coaches will warn offenders. However, with the second infraction that offender will be asked to leave. If the offender has to leave it will result in removal of their child from the match and forfeiture of any additional points for that player.
18. Cell phones must not be used by the players while they are on court. If the player is expecting an important call, the call should be received by the coach. In the case of an emergency, the coach will stop the match and talk to the player. If it not an emergency, the coach will speak with the player after the match.
Please email Ken Goldsmith, on all unresolved issues not covered in the tennis guide. Check www.teamtennis.org for updates and rule changes. Additions and rule changes will be announced in an email to all coaches.