2014 Callahan Award: Nominations Open

Thanks to our technology partner Ultimate Central, we’re pleased to officially open nominations for the 2014 Callahan Award.

Nominate now at Callahan.UltimateCentral.com

Award Rules

1. Nominating A Candidate

Any college or university with an interscholastic ultimate team can submit one candidate for the Callahan Award. Teams can nominate Callahan candidates in whatever manner they chose: they can be selected by a captain or coach, voted for by senior players, voted for by all players, etc.

Regardless of the method used to nominate the player, each team must also submit one name of a team representative for the Skyd Award Committee to contact regarding the Callahan. This team representative can be the player nominated for the award.

In addition to each team being able to nominate one player, USA Ultimate Regional Coordinators can nominate one player from their region as well. Note that this can result in two players being nominated from the same team.

2. Eligibility Deadlines

BY TEAMS: Teams eligible to nominate a player for the Callahan must notify the award committee no later than midnight (PST) Friday, March 14th, 2014 of their candidate’s name. Once a player’s name is submitted to the award committee they cannot be replaced by another player.

BY USA ULTIMATE COORDINATORS: In addition to players nominated by their team, each of the 8 regional USA Ultimate coordinators will be able to nominate one player from the region they coordinate. Nominations by USA Ultimate Coordinators must be received by midnight, Tuesday, March 18th, 2014.

The Award Committee will begin accepting nominations on Thursday, February 20th, 2013.

3. Award Balloting

All voters select a first, second and third place candidate for the award. When determining the winner, the Skyd Award Committee will count each first place vote for a candidate as five (5) points, a second place vote as four (4) points, and a third place vote as two (2) points. The candidate with the most total points will win the Award.

Players can place a third place vote for a member of their own school — first and second place votes for a member of a player’s own school will be discarded. For example, players on a school’s B team can only vote for a player on their A team as a third place vote. And vice-versa.

When submitting a Callahan ballot, the voter must completely fill out the ballot, including the voter’s name, school, email address and mailing address. Incomplete ballots will not be counted.

4. Voting Procedure

Voters can only cast ballots for candidates in the division they play in: open players vote for open candidates, players in the women’s division vote for candidates in the women’s division.

5. Award Ballots

All voters select a first place candidate for the award. The candidate with the most total votes will win the Award.

6. Ballot Submission

All votes for the 2014 Callahan Award must be submitted after May 5th and before May 15th, 2014 at 11:59pm (PST). All votes must be cast on this site.

Votes received via mail, email, overnight post, or telephone will not be accepted.

7. Award Criteria

When casting their ballots, voters are to take the following criteria into account when evaluating the candidates’ play during the season:

A. Overall offensive and defensive abilities

B. Dedication to ultimate and leadership ability

C. Sportsmanship

All candidates should be judged by their performance only during the 2014 spring college season. In particular, when judging sportsmanship, the slate should begin clean with the current spring season, i.e. when determining suitability for the award, head-butting an opponent during the fall season shouldn’t be held against a player.

8. Candidate’s Sportsmanship

When evaluating a candidate’s merit for the award, voters should treat any example of grossly poor sportsmanship (cheating, fighting, kicking, flagrant rule violation, etc.) as an infraction so severe that the player should be eliminated from consideration for the Callahan.

9. Candidate Removal

The Award Committee reserves the right to eliminate a candidate from consideration for whatever reason. Specifically, those candidates that receive support from net (rec.sport.disc) posters or bloggers that habitually make slanderous claims against rivals or attempt to electronically “stuff” the ballot box, may be eliminated from the competition.

Efforts to “game” the Callahan voting (for, by example, making side deals with other teams and swapping votes, having teams vote for 3rd place candidates only, etc. etc.) are severely discouraged. Although ballot stuffing has occurred very rarely in the history of the Callahan, candidates have lost the Award because of these types of activities.

Note that over-the-top, ludicrous claims made on rec.sport.disc, the world wide web, or various ultimate-zines, regarding a Callahan candidate’s prowess on or off the field will not disqualify that candidate and are fully expected. Even encouraged.

All decisions from the Award Committee are final.

10. Awarding of the Callahan Trophies

The winner of the 2014 Callahan Award will be determined by the Skyd Award Committee and announced at the USA Ultimate College Championships to be held in Cincinnati, OH.

Callahan trophies will be awarded at the Championships to those candidates in attendance. For Callahan winners not attending the Championships, trophies will be shipped via United Parcel Service to the candidate’s home address.

11. Property Rights

All material sent to the award committee (photographs, etc.) becomes property of the Award Committee and Skyd Magazine.

12. Communicating with the Committee

Communications regarding the Callahan Award can be made via email. All questions, comments and suggestions can be sent to: callahan2014@skydmagazine.com