Sports Illustrated Play Launches App For Mobile Youth Sports Management

Sports Illustrated Play, Time Inc.’s business devoted to youth sports, launched a mobile app Wednesday, aimed to assist administrators, coaches and families with managing youth sports.

The free app is available on iOS and Android and requires a pre-existing account with Sports Illustrated Play. With the app, users can use their smartphones to access similar features of the digital SI Play, like managing league registration, team communication, scheduling, attendance tracking, rosters and real-time scoring.

The app also integrates curated content from Sports Illustrated and Sports Illustrated Kids.

“From day one, our mandate has been to modernize the youth sports market by providing this underserved sector with the digital tools they need to have a more enjoyable and rewarding experience in every way,” stated SI Play CEO Jeff Karp.

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The app was created by the SI Play development team, with input from SI Play’s community of 2,000 members during the app’s beta period.

“We are working hand-in-hand with this community to identify the acute areas of need and hear their ideas,” Karp added. "We applied own experiences as volunteers, coaches and parents of players to create a series of exclusive features and tools.”

Key features of the app include team scheduling tools, news feeds with SI articles and photos, attendance tracking and reminders and score alerts during live games for coaches. For parents and players, families can organize their children’s sports schedules in one location, as well as post, share and tag moments captured during games.

The company expressed their plans to expand the app beyond its 10 million platform users to “the general public in the near future,” but did not give more details on how they hope to reach more users.

According to SI Play, there are roughly 40 million American kids aged 5 to 18 who participate in youth sports.

Last summer, Time Inc. launched SI Play after acquiring League Athletics, SportsSignup and iScore.

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