Volleyball invite only clinics - if there aren’t any

[Anonymous]

Hello- this is the first year my daughter has been going to a lot of clinics before tryouts at the end of the month. She will try out for U14 teams, mostly mid range. Some clubs openly state they extend invite only clinic invitations to certain players. Others don’t mention this.

My daughter hasn’t received anything and is still going to the regular clinics that are open to all. Does this mean she has a very small chance at tryouts? Now she’s getting concerned. Even teams she thought were not as competitive only take 12-15 girls.

She played on a club team last year that DCUM would say was not a lower ranked club. She went to one tryout at u13, we were fairly clueless and lucky. Volleyball seems to be more popular this year and clinics and tryouts are filling up.

[Anonymous]

*typo, her club from last year is typically thought of as one of the lower ranked clubs

[Anonymous]

Are you talking about MoCo? Did you try to register for one of their tryout clinics?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are you talking about MoCo? Did you try to register for one of their tryout clinics?

No, we are in VA

[Anonymous]

I’m not an expert at all. I think some clubs have invite clinics some don’t.

At the clubs that have invite only clinics, if your daughter has not been invited and she’s been to their clinics enough that coaches could have seen her and invited her, it’s not likely she’ll get a spot on that team. Nothings impossible though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m not an expert at all. I think some clubs have invite clinics some don’t.

At the clubs that have invite only clinics, if your daughter has not been invited and she’s been to their clinics enough that coaches could have seen her and invited her, it’s not likely she’ll get a spot on that team. Nothings impossible though.

I think this captures the reality. Not every club does invite clinics, but if they do, those are the girls most likely to get offers. So it’s not impossible to get an offer if your DD isn’t invited but it’s not likely. If the club isn’t super competitive, it might happen that they invite girls that ultimately decide to play elsewhere so keep an eye out for make-up or last chance tryouts in a few weeks. That sometimes means girls didn’t accept that the club thought would. And that tends to happen a lot at 14s where girls who have a year or more of club experience start moving to more competitive clubs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not an expert at all. I think some clubs have invite clinics some don’t.

At the clubs that have invite only clinics, if your daughter has not been invited and she’s been to their clinics enough that coaches could have seen her and invited her, it’s not likely she’ll get a spot on that team. Nothings impossible though.

I think this captures the reality. Not every club does invite clinics, but if they do, those are the girls most likely to get offers. So it’s not impossible to get an offer if your DD isn’t invited but it’s not likely. If the club isn’t super competitive, it might happen that they invite girls that ultimately decide to play elsewhere so keep an eye out for make-up or last chance tryouts in a few weeks. That sometimes means girls didn’t accept that the club thought would. And that tends to happen a lot at 14s where girls who have a year or more of club experience start moving to more competitive clubs.

There are two types of invite clinics. Public (published) and private (not published). If a club is doing private clinics that aren't published anywhere, and the info isn't shared by the coaches with your player, our experience is that you aren't really being considered by the club. This is especially true at the top levels of U14, where some of the VA side clubs have invite only sessions.

The clubs that publish schedules usually tell you why they have an invite process. For some its due to court capacity and demand or to get equivalent skill levels in the gym. Our experience with those clubs was dependent on the number of players interested in the club. If demand is high, the club probably limits invites to make sure they see everyone. Last year we tried out at one of the clubs with higher demand. We requested 5 tryout clinics and only got into 2. We still got an offer for that club. But if demand is low and you don't get an invite, then they probably aren't interested in you.

And remember its OK to ask the coach/club if you have a chance of making their team.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not an expert at all. I think some clubs have invite clinics some don’t.

At the clubs that have invite only clinics, if your daughter has not been invited and she’s been to their clinics enough that coaches could have seen her and invited her, it’s not likely she’ll get a spot on that team. Nothings impossible though.

I think this captures the reality. Not every club does invite clinics, but if they do, those are the girls most likely to get offers. So it’s not impossible to get an offer if your DD isn’t invited but it’s not likely. If the club isn’t super competitive, it might happen that they invite girls that ultimately decide to play elsewhere so keep an eye out for make-up or last chance tryouts in a few weeks. That sometimes means girls didn’t accept that the club thought would. And that tends to happen a lot at 14s where girls who have a year or more of club experience start moving to more competitive clubs.

There are two types of invite clinics. Public (published) and private (not published). If a club is doing private clinics that aren't published anywhere, and the info isn't shared by the coaches with your player, our experience is that you aren't really being considered by the club. This is especially true at the top levels of U14, where some of the VA side clubs have invite only sessions.

The clubs that publish schedules usually tell you why they have an invite process. For some its due to court capacity and demand or to get equivalent skill levels in the gym. Our experience with those clubs was dependent on the number of players interested in the club. If demand is high, the club probably limits invites to make sure they see everyone. Last year we tried out at one of the clubs with higher demand. We requested 5 tryout clinics and only got into 2. We still got an offer for that club. But if demand is low and you don't get an invite, then they probably aren't interested in you.

And remember its OK to ask the coach/club if you have a chance of making their team.

OP here and thank you. DD has a couple of clubs that are her top choices. One said that they will have invite clinics but she has no idea when and we have not received any emails. We will email and let them know she’s interested. We didn’t know if that was appropriate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not an expert at all. I think some clubs have invite clinics some don’t.

At the clubs that have invite only clinics, if your daughter has not been invited and she’s been to their clinics enough that coaches could have seen her and invited her, it’s not likely she’ll get a spot on that team. Nothings impossible though.

I think this captures the reality. Not every club does invite clinics, but if they do, those are the girls most likely to get offers. So it’s not impossible to get an offer if your DD isn’t invited but it’s not likely. If the club isn’t super competitive, it might happen that they invite girls that ultimately decide to play elsewhere so keep an eye out for make-up or last chance tryouts in a few weeks. That sometimes means girls didn’t accept that the club thought would. And that tends to happen a lot at 14s where girls who have a year or more of club experience start moving to more competitive clubs.

There are two types of invite clinics. Public (published) and private (not published). If a club is doing private clinics that aren't published anywhere, and the info isn't shared by the coaches with your player, our experience is that you aren't really being considered by the club. This is especially true at the top levels of U14, where some of the VA side clubs have invite only sessions.

The clubs that publish schedules usually tell you why they have an invite process. For some its due to court capacity and demand or to get equivalent skill levels in the gym. Our experience with those clubs was dependent on the number of players interested in the club. If demand is high, the club probably limits invites to make sure they see everyone. Last year we tried out at one of the clubs with higher demand. We requested 5 tryout clinics and only got into 2. We still got an offer for that club. But if demand is low and you don't get an invite, then they probably aren't interested in you.

And remember its OK to ask the coach/club if you have a chance of making their team.

OP here and thank you. DD has a couple of clubs that are her top choices. One said that they will have invite clinics but she has no idea when and we have not received any emails. We will email and let them know she’s interested. We didn’t know if that was appropriate.

Glad it helped. It absolutely is OK to ask about both invite clinics and the clubs level of interest in you. No matter how much you may want to play for a club, its not worth wasting time if they don't want you to play for them. Every time we've asked a club about our chances to make a team we've gotten a reasonable answer, ranging from "we can't wait to see you at tryouts, you are a great player" to "making a team here would be very hard."

Emailing the club is also a good idea. If a coach or club won't give you an answer or give you an invite, you probably have all the info you need.