USA Cricket announces domestic calendar for 2023 season

Photo Credit: USA Cricket

• Men’s and U19 Men’s National Championships confirmed to return after a one-year hiatus.
• A more robust pathway to these championships sees the establishment of a Men’s Inter-League competition as well as U19 Men’s Zonal Championships.
• Three new Men’s competitions established, with an U23 Nationals slated for August, and a T20 Inter-League competition (Zonals & Nationals), complemented by a Men’s National T20 Championship tentatively scheduled for December.
• Women’s domestic pathway to commence April 29 with expanded season and more matches to be played.
• Expanded youth pathways sees U11 and U17 Hub and Zonal competitions to be added after the success of the inaugural U13 and U15 Zonal competitions in 2022.
• An U17 Nationals is added in October, meaning a full complement of Men’s National Tournaments are now on the calendar at U15, U17, U19, U23 and Senior Men’s Level.
• A more complete calendar featuring International and Partner/Community schedules to be released in due course.

USA Cricket is delighted to announce a provisional domestic calendar of cricket for 2023 with a very busy schedule of Men’s, Women’s and Youth cricket planned across multiple formats. It will be the busiest ever year of cricket in the United States. Whilst the intention is to host all these events, several may be subject to change as the season unfolds.

2021 saw the hosting of arguably our two most successful and critically acclaimed domestic events in the Senior Men’s and U19 Men’s 50 Over National Championships. We are excited to be hosting these marquee events again in 2023, with both taking on extra significance given that our U19 Men’s and Senior Men’s National teams are competing in World Cup qualification events later in the year. To add further context and robustness to the pathway U19 Zonal Tournaments and Men’s Inter-League Competitions are being planned for 2023.

2023 also sees the establishment of an U23 National Championship in an effort to bridge the gap between those aging out of U19 cricket and those established within the senior ranks. This tournament will likely be hosted prior to the start of the fall semester to accommodate young cricketers of college age.

Further adding to the Men’s domestic schedule are a pair of T20 competitions. Six Zonal Inter-League T20 tournaments will be conducted with the best 2 teams from each Zone going on to compete for National Glory at the Inter-League T20 Nationals. 6 Zonal Representative teams will also be selected from the Inter-League tournaments to compete at a T20 National Championship.

Following the completion of the 2022 pathway for Women and Girls, the 2023 program will be expanded to give players more opportunity to compete and showcase their talent. Beginning April 29, the Intra-Regionals will run over ten weeks, with all teams required to play a minimum of 8 x T20s and 4 x 40 over matches. The USA Cricket Women’s pathway will continue to be played in four regions, as opposed to the Six USA Cricket Zones, with the four regions being East, Central, Southwest & West.

Adding to the ambitious plans for this calendar year is a major expansion of the youth pathway. The U13 and U15 Hub and Zonal events attracted huge interest in 2022, and the lessons learned from that undertaking will also be applied to both the U11 and U17 age-groups as well. A U17 National Tournament will also be conducted over the Indigenous Peoples’ Day Long weekend in addition to the second annual U15 Nationals over Labor Day weekend.

Further details on all these events will be published in due course.

Chair of the USA Cricket Development Committee, Venu Pisike, said, “I really want to thank the Tournament Steering Committee, committed volunteer coordinators and various organizations for their assistance in guiding what was a first foray into the junior pathways space with the U13 and U15 competitions in 2022. This tremendous support encouraged us to plan for a more complete domestic pathways for Youth and Seniors. In 2023 we will be asking for the entire US cricket community to rally behind our efforts. Again, the Steering Committee have been instrumental in pulling together these ambitious plans for the year ahead.”

Chair of the USA Cricket Committee, Sushil Nadkarni, said, “We have experienced a couple of monumental years for American cricket and with today’s domestic calendar announcement, it is certain that we will have an even busier year in the Men’s and Women’s. It will be the largest amount of cricket ever to be played within a calendar year in official domestic cricket in America.

Our key areas of focus in our Foundational Plan include Women and Girls Cricket, Youth Cricket, and developing the pathways for our international sides to qualify for major events and the calendar in 2023 very much reflects these priorities. I’m very pleased that the calendar of cricket we have in place will give our teams the best possible chance to perform to their best abilities.”

USA Cricket Interim CEO, Vinay Bhimjiani said, “After a huge amount of work from the USAC Board, our committees, volunteers and support staff, we are delighted to present this hugely comprehensive calendar of domestic cricket for 2023. There was a record-breaking scale of cricket played in 2021 and 2022 and we will go past that again this year with strong pathways for Men’s, Women’s and Youth cricket. Our pathways and depth are continuing to grow at all levels with further clarity and context given for any young men’s or women’s cricketer on how they can progress to higher levels and National Team honors. I can’t think of a more important year for American cricket than the one we are facing, and I would like to thank all of our players, staff, volunteers and everyone across the American cricket community for their ongoing support.”

The calendar for 2023 will continue to evolve throughout the year as clarity around other events is achieved. There will be additional announcements where necessary and the latest up to date schedule will always be available on the USA Cricket website here.

PROVISIONAL DOMESTIC CALENDAR

FOR MORE DETAILS CONTACT

Email: media@usacricket.org

ABOUT USA CRICKET

USA Cricket is the National Federation for cricket in the United States as recognized by the International Cricket Council. USA Cricket’s mission is to govern, regulate, develop and promote all forms of cricket at all levels in the United States, and to enable U.S. cricketers to achieve sustained competitive excellence and successfully compete in national and international competition. Through a diverse Board of Directors that has representation from most cricket stakeholder groups, USA Cricket will lead the sport to new heights by creating and administering value added programs to grow and develop the sport.

Name of Author: USA Cricket

USA Cricket

USA Cricket (USAC) is the governing body for cricket in the United States, overseeing the national men’s, women’s, and youth teams. It also manages Major League Cricket, the premier domestic Twenty20 competition in the U.S.