jk-mcp-ecnl

AI assistants like Claude have a knowledge cutoff — they can't tell you today's ECNL standings, last weekend's scores, or how your club's team is doing in its conference right now. This project fixes that.

It is an MCP server — a plugin that gives Claude direct access to live ECNL (Elite Clubs National League) and ECRL (ECNL Regional League) youth-soccer data: schedules, standings, results, teams, clubs, and RPI ratings, for both boys and girls across every conference and age group. Once connected, you can ask Claude natural-language questions and get accurate, up-to-date answers. No subscription, no API key, and no programming required to use it.

Built as a sibling to jk-mcp-nwsl: Python 3.13, FastMCP, httpx, hexagonal architecture. Data comes from the public Total Global Sports / AthleteOne API that powers theecnl.com.

Contents

• Data model

• Tools

• Example prompts

• Production

• Requirements

• Quickstart

• Configuration

• Claude Code

• Claude Desktop

• Docker

• Development

• Contributing

• License

Related MCP server: SportRadar MCP Server

Data model

league (ECNL/ECRL) × gender (boys/girls) × conference × season is one event (event_id). Within an event, divisions are age groups (e.g. G2008/2007 ≈ "U17"), each with one or more flights; standings and schedules are keyed by flight_id. Start with find_events to turn a human description into the IDs the other tools need — Claude does this chaining for you, so you never supply IDs by hand.

Tools

All tools are read-only and idempotent. Data comes from the AthleteOne / Total Global Sports public API (api.athleteone.com) that powers theecnl.com — no auth required, but the contract is not officially documented; if a tool stops working the upstream format likely changed. Endpoints, the org IDs used for event discovery, and the data hierarchy are documented in docs/decisions/0001-data-source-athleteone-api.md.

RPI

get_rpi and get_team_rpi compute the Rating Percentage Index using the standard NCAA structure from the women's-soccer RPI reference:

RPI = 0.25·WP + 0.50·OWP + 0.25·OOWP

WP = (W + tie_weight·T) / (W + L + T), with tie_weight defaulting to 1/3 (the 2024 convention; pass 0.5 for the pre-2024 convention). OWP and OOWP score ties at 1/2 and exclude the rated team from each opponent's record. Note: within a single conference (typically a complete round-robin) OWP/OOWP converge to ~0.5, so RPI ≈ WP there — RPI's discriminating power comes from cross-conference pools, a planned future enhancement.

Example prompts

Once the server is connected, ask Claude natural-language questions — it chains the tools for you (typically find_events → get_event_overview → get_standings/get_schedule/get_rpi), resolving the event, division, and flight IDs along the way. Age groups map to birth-year divisions (e.g. "U17" ≈ the G2008/2007 division).

Discovering events

What ECNL girls conferences are there this season?

List the ECRL boys events for 2025-26.

Is there an ECNL boys conference in Northern California?

Standings

Show me the ECNL Girls Southwest U17 standings.

Who's top of the table in ECNL Boys Northern Cal U16?

How many points separate the top three teams in ECRL Girls Carolinas?

Schedules and results

What's the schedule for the ECNL Girls Southeast U15 flight?

What were last weekend's scores in ECNL Boys Texas U17?

When does Slammers FC HB Koge play next?

Give me Beach FC's results so far this season.

Teams and clubs

Which clubs are competing in the ECNL Girls Southwest event?

List the teams in the ECNL Boys Northern Cal U16 flight.

RPI analysis

Rank the ECNL Girls Southwest U17 flight by RPI.

What's Slammers FC's RPI, broken down into WP, OWP, and OOWP?

Recompute that flight's RPI using the pre-2024 ½ tie weight.

In ECRL Boys Carolinas, which team has faced the strongest opponents (highest OWP)?

Playoffs

Is there a playoff bracket for the ECNL Girls Southwest U19 flight?

Production

A live instance runs on Fly.io behind the api-gateway. The MCP server itself is private (no public address) — all access goes through the gateway:

https://jk-api-gateway.fly.dev/mcp/ecnl

No installation, no Python, no cloning required. Point your MCP client at the URL above and you are done.

Claude Code

Install globally (recommended) so the server is available in every project:

claude mcp add --transport http --scope user ecnl https://jk-api-gateway.fly.dev/mcp/ecnl

Verify it's registered and healthy:

claude mcp list

You should see ecnl: https://jk-api-gateway.fly.dev/mcp/ecnl (HTTP) - ✓ Connected. Restart Claude Code if you had it open.

Other scopes:

• Drop --scope user to register only for the current project (cwd must match when you run claude).

• Or commit a .mcp.json to the repo root to share with collaborators:

  {
    "mcpServers": {
      "ecnl": {
        "type": "http",
        "url": "https://jk-api-gateway.fly.dev/mcp/ecnl"
      }
    }
  }

Claude Desktop

Add the following to your Claude Desktop configuration file.

Location:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ecnl": {
      "type": "streamable-http",
      "url": "https://jk-api-gateway.fly.dev/mcp/ecnl"
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop after saving. The ECNL tools will appear in the tool picker.

Roadmap — tool authorization

Tools are currently open on both transports. Tool annotations (readOnlyHint, destructiveHint, idempotentHint) signal intent, but nothing enforces it at runtime. The portfolio-wide agentic-posture page lays out a phased plan to close that gap (P1):

• Streamable HTTP transport will require a bearer token verified against identity-platform-go JWKS. Stdio remains unauthenticated (subprocess trust boundary).

• A new authorization port consulted before every tool dispatch, backed by an adapter that calls authorization-policy-service with {actor_type, agent_id, tool_name, args}.

• Tool annotations extend to sensitivity, cost_class, rate_limit_class.

• Per-call audit events emitted using the schema proposed in identity-platform-go ADR-0018.

The plan mirrors jk-mcp-nwsl — both servers share the template, so changes will land in lockstep.

Requirements

• Python 3.13+

• uv

Only needed to run the server locally — the hosted instance requires neither.

Quickstart

git clone https://github.com/jedi-knights/jk-mcp-ecnl.git
cd jk-mcp-ecnl
uv sync

Run the server in stdio mode (the default — used by Claude Code and Claude Desktop):

uv run python -m ecnl.server

Run in HTTP mode (for networked or deployed access):

MCP_TRANSPORT=streamable-http uv run python -m ecnl.server

The installed entry point jk-mcp-ecnl is equivalent to python -m ecnl.server.

Configuration

All configuration is via environment variables. None are required for local use.

Claude Code

Prefer the hosted server? See Production → Claude Code above — it's a single command and requires no clone.

To run the server from your local clone instead, install it globally:

claude mcp add --scope user ecnl -- uv run --directory /path/to/jk-mcp-ecnl python -m ecnl.server

Replace /path/to/jk-mcp-ecnl with the absolute path to your clone. Verify with claude mcp list.

Other scopes:

• Drop --scope user to register only for the current project.

• Or commit a .mcp.json to the repo root for collaborators:

  {
    "mcpServers": {
      "ecnl": {
        "command": "uv",
        "args": ["run", "--directory", "/path/to/jk-mcp-ecnl", "python", "-m", "ecnl.server"]
      }
    }
  }

See Example prompts for ideas on what to ask.

Claude Desktop

Install Claude Desktop

With Homebrew (macOS):

brew install --cask claude

Without Homebrew:

Download the installer for your platform from claude.ai/download and follow the on-screen instructions:

• macOS: open the downloaded .dmg and drag Claude into /Applications

• Windows: run the downloaded .exe installer

Launch Claude Desktop once and sign in before continuing — this creates the configuration directory referenced below.

Configure Claude Desktop to use this MCP server

Pick the option that matches how you want to run the server: hosted (no install), uv (local clone), or Docker (containerized). Then follow the four steps below.

1. Open the Claude Desktop config file

The fastest way is from inside Claude Desktop: Settings → Developer → Edit Config. This opens (and creates, if needed) the file in your default editor.

You can also open it directly:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

If the file does not exist yet, create it with {} as its contents.

2. Add the ecnl server entry

Merge one of the following snippets into the top-level mcpServers object. If mcpServers does not exist, add the whole block as shown.

Option A — Hosted (easiest, no install):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ecnl": {
      "type": "streamable-http",
      "url": "https://jk-api-gateway.fly.dev/mcp/ecnl"
    }
  }
}

Option B — Local clone with uv:

Replace /path/to/jk-mcp-ecnl with the absolute path to your clone. If uv is not on Claude Desktop's PATH, use the absolute path to the binary (which uv will show it — typically /opt/homebrew/bin/uv on Apple Silicon or /usr/local/bin/uv on Intel Macs).

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ecnl": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "--directory", "/path/to/jk-mcp-ecnl",
        "python", "-m", "ecnl.server"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Option C — Docker:

Build the image first (see Docker), then:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ecnl": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": ["run", "-i", "--rm", "jk-mcp-ecnl:latest"]
    }
  }
}

3. Save and fully restart Claude Desktop

Quit Claude Desktop completely (⌘Q on macOS, or right-click the tray icon → Quit on Windows) and relaunch it. A simple window close is not enough — the MCP servers are only loaded on launch.

4. Verify the connection

Open a new chat and click the tools / plug icon in the message bar. You should see ecnl listed with its tools (find_events, get_standings, get_schedule, get_rpi, and more). Try a prompt from Example prompts to confirm it works end-to-end.

If the server does not appear, check the Claude Desktop logs:

• macOS: ~/Library/Logs/Claude/mcp*.log

• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\logs\mcp*.log

Docker

Build the image:

docker build -t jk-mcp-ecnl:latest .

Run in stdio mode (for MCP clients that spawn a subprocess):

docker run -i --rm jk-mcp-ecnl:latest

Run in HTTP mode:

docker run --rm -p 8000:8000 \
  -e MCP_TRANSPORT=streamable-http \
  jk-mcp-ecnl:latest

Development

Install dependencies

uv sync

Invoke tasks

All common development workflows are available as invoke tasks. Run uv run inv --list to see all tasks.

Workflow

# Make changes, then verify everything passes before committing
uv run inv lint
uv run inv check-complexity
uv run inv coverage

Project structure

src/ecnl/
├── server.py                       # entry point, transport selection, logging
├── adapters/
│   ├── inbound/
│   │   ├── mcp_adapter.py          # FastMCP server wiring + health routes
│   │   ├── formatters.py           # domain models → text output
│   │   └── tools/                  # tool groups: events, standings, schedule, teams, matches, analytics
│   └── outbound/
│       ├── athleteone_adapter.py   # AthleteOne (TGS) HTTP client
│       ├── athleteone_parsers.py   # wire JSON → domain models
│       ├── discovery.py            # org-walk event discovery
│       ├── retry_adapter.py        # retry decorator for transient failures
│       └── caching_adapter.py      # in-process TTL cache
├── application/
│   ├── service.py                  # use cases, orchestration, RPI table memo
│   └── _rpi.py                     # pure RPI engine (WP / OWP / OOWP)
├── domain/
│   ├── models.py                   # Event, Division, Flight, Standings, Match, TeamRPI, …
│   ├── classification.py           # event name → league / gender / conference / season
│   └── exceptions.py               # ECNLNotFoundError, UpstreamAPIError
└── ports/
    └── outbound.py                 # ECNLAPIPort, DiscoveryPort protocols

The dependency direction flows inward: adapters → ports → domain. Nothing in domain/ imports from adapters or the framework. See docs/decisions/0001-data-source-athleteone-api.md for how the data source and event discovery work.

Contributing

1. Fork the repository and clone your fork

2. Create a feature branch: git checkout -b feature/your-feature

3. Make your changes following the existing patterns (hexagonal architecture, TDD, conventional commits)

4. Verify the full check suite passes: uv run inv lint && uv run inv check-complexity && uv run inv coverage

5. Open a pull request against main

All CI checks (lint, complexity, tests, coverage ≥ 90%) must pass before merge.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.