Do you know a girl who made a HS volleyball team after not making freshman team?

[Anonymous]

Is this possible, at all? Does it ever happen?

[Anonymous]

We can’t answer that. Posters can give you all sorts of stories but it will depend on the school and the competition. Is your daughter playing club now? Is she enjoying her season?

Hopefully she is playing and having fun. There is so much more to volleyball than the short HS season.

My daughter was on the HS freshman team and doesn’t even know if she wants to try out for JV next year, since it will be the same girls. The girls were not friendly and the coaching wasn’t good. All of did was take up a lot of time.

[Anonymous]

Which high school? To be honest, this will impact the answer a lot!

[Anonymous]

Should we assume that this question is about a private school? The public schools in Montgomery County only have JV and Varsity (no freshman team).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Should we assume that this question is about a private school? The public schools in Montgomery County only have JV and Varsity (no freshman team).

It could be any school in VA. All of FCPS or Loudoun have freshman teams and OP hasn’t returned.

[Anonymous]

Howard County high schools have freshmen teams too.

[Anonymous]

No. HS teams are profoundly political. She will never break in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No. HS teams are profoundly political. She will never break in.

There was a recent post suggesting the same: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1289707.page - maybe it's about who you know and the OP might know someone.

[Anonymous]

I could see it happen if they were taller than 6ft and played club in between freshman tryouts and next season. Otherwise, they are competing for very few roster spots.

[Anonymous]

To say HS teams are political is like what the initial commenter stated. “You will get a bunch of” essentially painting with a broad brush when it’s completely specific to each school. Our JV and Varsity teams are made up of players who didn’t make the freshman team or didn’t play on it. In our case there are pre-season practices with coaches called green days to get in front of coaches and practice with existing players. Yes there will always be some politics but coaches also want to win.

[Anonymous]

Of course. Kids lose interest or graduate. Kids also get better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is this possible, at all? Does it ever happen?

I have seen this happen only rarely.

Every coach wants to win so if your kid is good enough to start for their squad, then they will make they team (there's a bit of politics in who gets court time but once again, coaches wants to win, so unless it's close, the coach will play the better player). The politics for making the team doesn't come into play until you get towards the end of the bench where you might pick the kid who has a lot of friends on the team or is "good in the dugout" or the more active parents.

The sophomores on the JV team that were not on the freshman team are usually transfers because a lot of freshman girls do not make JV and if you cannot make the cut for the freshman squad, then the chances that you improve enough to leapfrog the freshman girls is not high. Once again, politics is not as big a deal as people make it out to be on public high school teams like it is for club teams.

Club teams are much more political because the players parents are paying thousands of dollars out of pocket, in some cases tens of thousands of dollars including travel costs. They have to be more political than the high school coaches making $5000/season that usually aren't doing it for the money.

[Anonymous]

OP back. It’s FCPS but not Madison or anywhere very competitive in sports overall.

Most Club fees were like 7k so we did not do try out for those.
She tried out for a less expensive program but did not make it- turns out there were a lot of girls trying out for spots on a team that was like 3-4k for the season.
She is doing another winter sport now but will resume volleyball league at another club in a few weeks.
She was discouraged when she didn’t make the competitive club team but between the winter and spring league and Green Days over the summer I hope she will keep trying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP back. It’s FCPS but not Madison or anywhere very competitive in sports overall.

Most Club fees were like 7k so we did not do try out for those.
She tried out for a less expensive program but did not make it- turns out there were a lot of girls trying out for spots on a team that was like 3-4k for the season.
She is doing another winter sport now but will resume volleyball league at another club in a few weeks.
She was discouraged when she didn’t make the competitive club team but between the winter and spring league and Green Days over the summer I hope she will keep trying.

The less expensive clubs are extremely competitive this year.
For us it was a low cost holding pattern while the dust settles from all the chaos in the local economy from things happening in the federal government.
Unless you are on track to be recruited or something...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: For us it was a low cost holding pattern while the dust settles from all the chaos in the local economy from things happening in the federal government.

How do you see this impacting club volleyball? I am not trying to start something. This is a genuine question because I have never thought about that.