Youth Club Guidelines

Updates

• Minor updates on the Promotion/Relegation tables, including:
  • Increasing the maximum points which an LDO can earn for FMP team participation.
  • Adjusting how points are allocated for states and territories with State HS Athletic Association State Championships.
• Adjust the Mixed team player minimums to better promote gender balance.
• Allow co-hosting LDOs to split credits towards their points, rather than requiring consensus on which LDO receives sole full credit.

Youth Club Guidelines

A. Overview

The Youth Club Division is designed to include as many players as possible who have not yet completed the high school (HS) phase of life, while also maintaining consistent age-based cutoffs (under-20 and under-17) that allow for fair competition. During the summer months, we extend the high school phase to include players who have just recently graduated from high school in the past few months, often right before they actually transition to the next phase of education, career, military service, apprenticeship, etc.

Team Requirements

1. On-time receipt of application or other official intent/bid to participate.
2. Adequate adult support personnel for youth players:
   1. At least two USAU-qualified chaperones.
   2. At least one rostered coach with USAU Youth Coach Certification.
      Information on where to obtain certification can be found here.
   3. All coaches attending teams at any event must be rostered and have completed some level of Coach Certification.¹
   4. No coach or chaperone may be rostered on two or more youth teams at the same youth event (including across multiple gender or age divisions).
   5. Those fulfilling the required minimum roles of certified coaches or chaperones CANNOT compete or coach in ICC (the adult U.S. Open) during YCC.
   6. A coach who meets the chaperone requirements may fulfill both the role of a coach and the role of a chaperone on one team roster.
3. Must be made up of players residing in the same USAU Youth Region, with residency defined as:
   1. The location where the person is living for the majority of August, AND the location where the person is living for the majority of the 3 months prior to August.
   2. If the above definition results in a player’s team’s region not matching the region of their personal “residence”, then the player is considered to be an out-of-region player.
   3. Teams are allowed a maximum of 4 out-of-region players. If you have out-of-region players, you will need to provide the reasons that these players are on your roster in this Out-Of-Region Players form.
4. A minimum of 14 total players registered and in attendance at the event.
   For mixed divisions, at least 7 boy-matching and 7 girl-matching players.

C. Player Requirements

1. Players must be students currently enrolled in high school, middle school, or junior high. Recent high school graduates are permitted if they have graduated (or received a GED) within the 9 months prior to the YCC event start date (planned to be either 7/31/2027 or 8/7/2027).
2. No player can currently or previously have played college ultimate; rostered as practicing with team or competed at a sanctioned event
3. Each player on the roster must be a USA Ultimate member in good standing at all times during the event. Players may not use Affiliate Membership or pay one-time event fees for YCR or YCCs.
4. No player may be listed on two or more rosters at the same event (including across multiple gender or age divisions).
5. Players under the age of 18 must have a completed Medical Authorization Form onsite at the event with their coach or chaperone.
6. To be eligible for an Under-20 (U20) Division, players must be between ages of 14 and 19 on both the start date of the Youth Club Championships (planned to be either 7/31/2027 or 8/7/2027) and at the end of the year (i.e., birthdate between 1/1/2008 and 8/1/2013).
7. To be eligible for an Under-17 (U17) Division, players must be between ages of 12 and 16 on both the start date of the Youth Club Championships (planned to be either 7/31/2027 or 8/7/2027) and at the end of the year (i.e., birthdate between 1/1/2011 and 8/1/2015).
8. For Youth Club Regionals only: younger age divisions (e.g., Under-15) can be offered at the discretion of the Local Organizers and Tournament Director.
9. Organizations may apply for player eligibility exceptions based on special needs to fill their team roster(s). All divisions are eligible for this process. Girls’ teams and female-matching players in mixed are more likely to receive consideration. Organizations will submit their eligibility requests through the Organization Request for YCC Player Eligibility Exception Form.

D. On-Field Personnel Ratio for Mixed Divisions

1. The personnel ratio for the mixed division of the Youth Club Championships and Regionals will be 4:3 (4 boy-matching players and 3 girl-matching players, or 4 girl-matching players and 3 boy-matching players).
2. The 2026-2027 Official Rules of Ultimate, Appendix B applies to Youth Club play, with the following clarifications and exceptions.
   Determining the ratio – All Mixed games will use the “prescribed ratio” rule (See Rules Appendix B, B1.B.)
3. Majority Pull – All Mixed games will use the “majority pull” rule (See Rules Appendix B, B3.A.)
4. If a team cannot match the on-field personnel gender-matching ratio of all 7 players, then it must play with fewer than 7 players, matching the personnel gender-matching ratio with as many players as possible. This includes injury situations mid-point.

2027 Youth Club Regional Events (YCR)

A. Overview

USA Ultimate wants to support organizations to help expand the regional youth club competition structure beyond the national Youth Club Championships (YCC) event.

These regional events should bring together teams from different areas, ideally from within the host region, to compete against one another.

Geographically, these regional events should be much more accessible than Youth Club Championships (YCC), and may also allow for inclusion of younger age divisions that are not included at YCC (e.g., Under-15 or even younger).

These tournaments will serve three major functions by providing:

1. Warm-up opportunities for teams preparing to compete at YCC in August.
2. An accessible event for teams who may pursue attending YCC in subsequent years.
3. A season-culminating event for teams who are not competing at YCC.

B. Bid Application

Any organization that wants to run a Youth Club Regional event should email the Youth Competition Manager in order to pursue sanctioning, promotion, and other appropriate support.

Application and Team Selection

• Application deadlines will be set by the tournament organizer. Teams must be eligible by the USAU YCC and Youth Club Regional guidelines to participate in these events:
• Events must offer equal playing opportunities for boys and girls.

C. Event Registration

Information on paperwork requirements and deadlines will be sent to selected teams along with the invitation to the event.

D. Schedule Formats

Formats for Youth Club Regionals will be determined by the local organizer/Tournament Director and will depend on the number of teams and fields, showcasing the division at its best, and providing a great playing experience for all the teams.

2027 USA Ultimate Youth Club Championships

A. Overview

The goal of this event is to provide national-level competition for youth ultimate players and encourage local playing opportunities for youth within the USAU structure. USA Ultimate will be hosting divisions for two separate age divisions – Under-20 and Under-17. The guidelines that follow are USAU’s requirements for qualification and criteria for acceptance for the USAU Youth Club Championships. Guidelines and the tier placement process are subject to change each year. 

B. Application Process and Dates

After May 5th any available spots will be filled on a first come – first served basis. This includes offering spots to new international teams who apply at any point. And this also includes new U.S.-based teams who miss the March 3rd deadline and apply at a later date (their late applications will be held until May 5th for determination of acceptance).

With returning team notifications/confirmations in the fall rather than winter/early spring, USA Ultimate seeks to support and encourage programs to take advantage of the full off-season time to plan and form teams, in order for students, coaches and support staff to be able to appropriately prevent or plan around any conflicts which might otherwise prevent them from attending YCCs. For example, programs should consider running a team tryout in the fall, at least for a critical core of players (perhaps the YCC minimum rostered number) with room to add more at a later tryout stage, even if the team does not start practicing until the following spring or summer. That earlier formation timing might hopefully provide more viable stability for teams & their rosters or cores (than in the past when returning teams did not have acceptance confirmation until a few months before YCC). Official final rosters will still have a due date in mid-July, only a few weeks before the event. Programs that hold tryouts in the fall or winter could reserve a few spots for “late bloomers” to be added to the team in the spring or early summer.

C. Team Bid Allocation Limits and Gender Balancing

With the goal of accepting all teams that want to attend YCCs in some tier for their age-gender division, there is also an ongoing goal to increase the number of girls division teams, which have historically been far fewer than boys division teams hosted by YCC events.

For an LDO to send a second team (a.k.a, “B-team”) in a boys gender division in either U-20 or U-17 age groups, that LDO must also send at least one girls division team in either age group.

For every additional boys division team, the LDO must send an additional girls division team.

All additional teams in the mixed division & girls divisions will be accepted without any additional requirements.

D. Team Tier Placement Process

The process is designed to encourage communities to develop both youth club playing opportunities, outside of the school structure, as well as school-based opportunities that support the USAU High School State Championships.

In the past (from 2005 through Aug 2025), team acceptance to YCC was entirely based on growth and sanctioning metrics for the local disc organizations (LDOs) that sponsored each team.  In 2027, the goal will be to accept all interested teams.  In any age-gender division with 24 or more interested teams, the division will be separated into two tiers: DI (upper) and DII (lower).  Age-gender divisions with DI and DII tiers will use the Points Chart (see “Promotion/Relegation Points System” section below) to determine team tier placements.

For more background information on the youth club competition restructuring effort, please see this document.

E. Promotion/Relegation Points System

See this document for a written description of the process rationale for the Points System charts.

YCC 2027 promotion/relegation points system

Competition (placing team earns points)

LDO-Level Growth/Youth Activity Goal

State-Level Growth/Youth Activity Goal

The points system is designed to offer approximately ⅔ of the achievable points based on a team’s final placement at the previous YCC (team competition results/strength) and ⅓ of the achievable points based on local & state growth/program factors (as supported directly by each team’s supporting LDO and home state). While it is a goal for YCC to showcase the highest level of youth ultimate competition, it also a goal for the event to showcase and reward LDOs that promote & encourage growth and accessibility of the sport for youth locally, in order to increase the overall number of players at all levels, not just those with the time, resources and commitment levels to attend national-level travel events.

Achieving the maximum growth/activity points is designed to be a relatively high bar that only a few states and organizations typically reach.  Most organizations are likely to be already operating programs that earn growth points, and those who are not should be able to make relatively small and/or modest changes to begin earning growth points.

• All LDO-Level/State Level youth activity must have taken place in the 12-month period or “guidelines year” immediately preceding YCCs.
  • For example, the promotion/relegation points for the 2027 YCCs will be earned by youth programming that takes place from Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 as well as teams’ final placements earned at the 2026 YCCs.
• Competition points are only earned by each specific team within an age-gender division.
• New teams will be placed into DII for their first year and then have an opportunity to move up in the future.
• Each LDO can only get one DI invite for their top team in an age-gender division.
  • All subsequent teams (2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc, a.k.a. “B/C/D teams”) will be offered DII placement and will only gain access to DI if fewer than 16 total LDOs accept DI placement (or if fewer than 24 total teams register for the division).
• For LDO sanctioned youth event points, a maximum of two “events” in each gender category can be earned by sending youth club teams to a Youth Club Regional event.

Teams that place 1st through 3rd in DII will earn more competition points than those that place 11th through 16th in DI, in order to increase the likelihood that they will be offered DI in the following year.

If every team earns the same number of growth points (i.e., looking only at competition points), 3 teams would move from DII to DI (and 3 teams would move from DI to DII):

F. Tie Breakers

For teams tied in total promotion/relegation points (sum from the 3 buckets/charts), tiebreakers will be awarded in favor of the program with the higher points total in the following categories, listed in descending order of priority:

• Competition
• LDO-level activity
• State-level activity
• Girls division state championships (State-level)
• Mixed division state championships (State-level)
• Open/Boys division state championships (State-level)
• Girls division sanctioned youth events (LDO-level)
• Mixed division sanctioned youth events (LDO-level)
• Open/Boys division sanctioned youth events (LDO-level)
• Outreach clinics/programs (LDO-level)

G. Prior Years

Teams that were not in the previous year YCC but that competed in one of the 3 prior years will earn Competition Points equal to their most recent finish with a 25% absolute reduction for each year. For example, for 2027 YCC competition points:

• If an interested team only missed 2026 YCC, they would receive 75% of the competitive points for their 2025 placement.
• If they missed 2026 & 2025 YCCs, they would receive 50% of the competitive points for their 2024 YCC placement.
• If they missed 2024-26 YCC, they would receive 25% of the competitive points for their 2023 YCC placement.
• If a team has missed more than 3 years immediately preceding the event year being placed, then no competition points are available.

H. Growth Percentages

The “Growth %” column indicated in the chart will be used for 2027 YCC tier placement. Growth activity that is reported and verified for Sep 2024 – Aug 2025 will be used as a comparative baseline for determining percentages in the subsequent years’ data aggregation.

For any states or LDOs with no activity in a category in the previous year, no growth will be possible in the subsequent year (with zero as the previous year denominator) until they establish that activity as a new baseline. For example, if a state has no USAU State Championship in Fall 2024 – Spring 2025, and then host a USAU State Championship in Spring 2026 with 4 teams, they will not be considered to have grown by any fixed percentage (having gone from 0 to 4 teams). But if the subsequent Spring 2027 State Championship has 6 teams, then they would have 50% growth indicated. This will apply to LDO’s USAU-sanctioned events also. We will use Sep 2024 – Aug 2025 activity as a growth baseline for Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 activity.

I. Youth Event Requirements

For the purposes of the Points System for YCC, youth events will be defined as follows:

1. Youth League or Tournament – must be operated within the previous “guidelines year” preceding the YCC event’s guidelines year (e.g., for YCC in August 2027, events operated from Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 are eligible for promotion/relegation points). Required event features:
   1. Sanctioned by USA Ultimate.
   2. Provides playing opportunities for youth in a youth-focused environment
   3. Competing teams at the event can be based on school affiliation (e.g., High School League/Tournament) but do not have to be.
2. USA Ultimate reserves the right to determine whether submitted events meet the above criteria for promotion/relegation points for YCC tier placement.

J. Player Uniform Requirements

• All players participating in the USAU Youth Club Championship tournament for a given team must wear jerseys of identical color and design.
• Teams must have two jerseys of distinctly different colors.
• Jerseys must have numbers on the back that are in sharp color contrast to the jersey color (for ease of stat-keeper visibility and distinction). The numbers must be at least 6 inches high and be one or two digit Arabic numerals. No two players on a given team may use the same number or numbers with the same absolute value (e.g. 00 and 0, 01 and 1, etc.).
• Names, logos, and graphics on jerseys must comply with the Name/Logo/Uniform Guidelines above.
• Uniform bottoms (shorts, pants, skirts) worn by players on the field must be the same color.
• It is recommended, but not required, that uniform accessories including weather related gear, tights, undershirts, hats, and socks be of identical or coordinated style and color.
• USAU reserves the right to disqualify and/or fine players who fail to meet the uniform requirements.

K. Coach Uniform Requirements

• All coaches participating in the USAU Youth Club Championships must wear either a uniform of identical color and design as the team, or professional coaching attire as defined below.
• Professional coaching attire is defined as any combination of the following:
  • The team jersey, or a sleeved shirt/polo matching the team uniform colors
  • Team shorts/skirt or hemmed slacks/shorts/skirt of an appropriate solid color    
  • Business casual attire    
• Closed toe shoes such as cleats, flats, or athletic shoes. Flip flops, open toed sandals, and bare feet are not considered professional coaching attire.    
• Coach jerseys and shorts are not subject to the number requirements for players.
• Names, logos, and graphics on jerseys must comply with the Name/Logo/Uniform Guidelines above.
• It is recommended that uniform accessories including weather related gear, tights, undershirts, hats, and socks be of identical or coordinated style and color.
• USA Ultimate reserves the right to remove from the sideline/field and/or fine coaches who fail to meet the uniform requirements.

L. Event Registration

Information on paperwork requirements and deadlines will be sent to selected teams along with the invitation to the event.

M. Schedule Formats

Formats for YCC will depend on the number of teams and available fields, showcasing the division at its best, and providing a great playing experience.

N. Seeding

Youth Club Regional results will be the first factor considered in seeding decisions.  Teams that attend and are successful at YCR events will be given priority seeding.

After considering results from YCRs, the rest of the teams will be seeded by the USAU Championship series staff using the following information: results of last year’s Championships; input solicited from all coaches of participating teams; and other applicable information such as team composition during or prior to the Championships and geographic location. 

Application and compliance of all guidelines will be subject to the discretion of the USA Ultimate Manager of Youth Competition.

¹Starting in the 2027-28 guidelines, all coaches coaching youth ultimate will be required to have Youth Certification.