Volleyball club- recap and thoughts
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Anonymous
Have you considered Go Volley? https://www.govolley.biz/ |
Anonymous
I think High Academic is a moving target - increasingly in the eye of the beholder, often tracking to USNews Ranking. But historically High Academic leagues = D1: Ivies, Patriot League D3: NESCAC, UAA (e.g. schools that used Ivy Index and/or shared agreements re acceptable metrics/timeliness for athletic recruiting). |
Anonymous
Historically, that was the list. Now there are a lot more. In D1, schools like Michigan, Duke, Northwestern, Stanford, UC Berkeley, etc are generally considered high academic and tough to get into. There are a dozen more (or several dozen more depending on how you measure). In D3, MIT (in NEWMAC, along with multiple other high academics), John’s Hopkins (Centennial), Caltech (SCIAC), etc. There are easily a couple dozen more D3 that have high academic performance overall and equivalently high admission standards for volleyball recruiting. |
Anonymous
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It’s been just about a week since the last age groups finished at USAV Girls Junior Nationals. Below are the results for the 43 CHRVA teams that participated in divisions requiring a bid. They are grouped by age, division, team, and placing out of total number of teams in the division.
Metro had a particularly good year, with 15 Travel winning the National Championship in 15 National, 16 Travel coming in 2nd in 16 National, and 17 Travel finishing 3rd in 17 Open. Also, Metro 18 Travel and 14 Travel both finished 13th in Open for their age groups. Paramount also had some decent results, especially in the younger age groups with 12s and 13s both finishing in the top half of their divisions. The MDJRs 11s and MVSA 14s coming in 11th in their divisions are excellent results. A few observations about the state of CHRVA clubs based on which teams got bids and how they did at Nationals. Metro travel teams are still tops. Paramount is clearly next best and continues to grow and improve and will likely continue to close the gap, particularly with their investment in developing younger teams. The next tier would seem to be VA Juniors and MDJRs. (and probably Blue Ridge but they choose mostly not to participate in USAV nationals) The next group would be MVSA, Columbia, Liberty Elite, Loudoun Elite, and Premier Edge (out of Delaware) all of which had multiple teams compete. One club that is sometimes included in the discussion of the top CHRVA clubs is VA Elite, but I’d have to say based on only a single team earning a bid that they are probably more of a mid tier club at this point. Of course these observations are based on USAV nationals participation for a single season and a look at a longer period of time might lead to slightly different conclusions, but it’s seems like a reasonable reflection of the current state of the more competitive CHRVA clubs. 18s Open, Metro 18 Travel, 13 of 48 National, Liberty Elite 18 National, 37 of 48 National, Paramount 18 Walter, 27 of 48 American, MVSA 18 Chaos, 31 of 64 Freedom, MDJRs 18 Elite Black, 37 of 48 Freedom, VA Juniors 18 Elite, 21 of 48 17s Open, Metro 17 Travel, 3 of 36 National, Paramount 17 Nick, 34 of 48 American, VA Juniors 17 Elite, 17 of 64 American, Premier Edge 17, 35 of 64 Freedom, Loudoun Elite 17 Marissa, 31 of 48 Freedom, VA Elite 17s, 23 of 48 16s Open, Paramount 16 Nick, 33 of 36 National, Metro 16 Travel, 2 of 48 USA, MVSA 16 Sparks, 35 of 36 American, VA Juniors 16 Elite, 26 of 64 American, Premier Edge 16, 53 of 64 Freedom, Columbia 16 Black, 22 of 48 Freedom, Loudoun Elite 16 Josi, 29 of 48 15s Open, Paramount 15 Maureen, 29 of 36 National, Metro 15 Travel, 1 of 48 National, Paramount 15 Cruz, 37 of 48 American, Columbia 15 Red, 51 of 64 American, MDJRs 15 Elite Black,55 of 64 Freedom, VA Juniors 15 Elite, 34 of 48 Freedom, MVSA 15 Charge, 23 of 48 14s Open, Metro 14 Travel, 13 of 36 Open, MDJRs 14 Elite Black, 18 of 36 National, Paramount 14 Cozad, 33 of 48 USA, VA Juniors 14 Elite, 35 of 36 American, BAVA 14 Waves, 51 of 64 American, Liberty Elite 14 National, 55 of 64 Freedom, MVSA 14 Force, 11 of 48 Freedom, Paramount 14 Anderson, 29 of 48 13s Open, Blue Ridge 13 Blue, 23 of 24 National, Metro 13 Travel, 27 of 48 National, Paramount 13 Jaz, 17 of 48 American, American 13 Red, 31 of 64 American, MOCO Motion, 55 of 64 12s National, Metro 12 Travel, 31 of 48 American, Paramount 12 Jaz, 26 of 64 American, MVSA 12 Vortex, 33 of 64 11s National, MDJRs 11 Elite, 11 of 48 |
Anonymous
Thank you for summarizing this data. I am wondering what is the reason why you placed MVSA (with 5 bids) at the same level as Columbia (2 bids), Liberty Elite (2 bids), Loudoun Elite (2 bids), and Premier Edge (2 bids) and not with VA Juniors (5 bids) and MDJRs (4 bids)? |
Anonymous
| I’ve always considered VA Elite to be more focused on college recruiting than results. If you take a look at their recent recruits, they seem to be quite successful with high academic D3s. |
Anonymous
That’s a good point. It would be more correct to group MVSA in that second tier. I think I didn’t realize the overall number of their teams that got bids, and had more noticed that they had teams in lower divisions. As an aside, my sense for years has been that MVSA was better at younger age groups (13s and younger) and then the competitiveness declines in the older age groups. Until a few years ago, MVSA Vortex was always the favorite to get the CHRVA 12 National bid, the 13s were typically strong, and they were one of the only 11s teams in the region. This year doesn’t align with that pattern. The highest division that an MVSA team got a bid for was 16 USA and they had bids at 14s, 15s, and 18s, but not 11s or 13s. Some of that is likely due to Paramount adding more teams in the younger age groups in the last few years and Metro following suit with a 12 Travel team this year. It’ll be interesting to see if clubs continue to add 11s or even younger teams. |
Anonymous
According to the data you posted, MVSA was in higher division than VA Juniors for 16s and 18s, so they must be doing something right in higher age groups as well. On top of that, Richard Montgomery HS won the state title with most of the players from MVSA rosters. It is true that MVSA tends to lose players to Metro in higher age groups - mostly those who are interested to play in college. Those who are mostly interested in academics tend to stick with MVSA. |
Anonymous
I think that’s generally true. Interestingly, the VA Elite 18s team that just graduated had 6 D1 commits and 5 D3. I believe other than Metro 18 Travel, they had the most D1 commits from a CHRVA team in 2025. I think that team was a bit of an outlier for VA Elite though. |
Anonymous
I was trying to make the point that my perception of MVSA as only being strong in younger age groups was no longer correct, if it ever was. That RM team had some great success and you’re right that there were many MVSA players on that team, but many (if not most) MCPS HS teams are full of MVSA players so I think that’s more of a correlation rather than causation situation. |
Anonymous
Looking at their recruiting page, this year seems to be pretty consistent with other years - mix of D1 and high academic D3. |
Anonymous
I don't see any lists of commitments for prior years, but I do see they boast a "100% placement rate". If it really is true that they are sending +/-6 players to D1 programs every year, I do wonder why they aren't more competitive? |
Anonymous
Thanks for the hard work pulling this all together. One note is that more clubs are opting to attend AAU nationals these days, including some very good teams that generally outperformed some of the teams on the USAV nationals lists over the course of the season. It varies by age group but there is a growing trend for the younger teams in particular to choose AAU because it’s earlier in the summer and teams know at the start of the season that they are going. USAV has finally realized this trend is working against them and announced recently that they are adding a non-bid nationals option earlier in June to try and stay relevant. |
Anonymous
Consider that it’s much, much harder to get a bid in the qualifier divisions (Open, USA, Liberty and a qualifier American bid) than it is to get a regional bid allocation from the bid tournament. I didn’t have time to check all of the age groups, but the ones I did check pretty much had the USA division winner with a higher national rank than the the National division winner, and the same for Liberty vs. American. Also, MVSAs performance this year isn’t really different from prior years at the older age groups. They’ve generally had a team or two qualify at those age groups. The younger age groups for MVSA are the start of a much larger trend though. Historically, their low cost and good coaching at U12-U14 enabled them to attract a lot of talented young players. But over the last few years thats started to change. It’s not just Paramount’s impact. In general the younger ages groups are much more competitive now. Other clubs in the region are putting effort into developing the younger ages and you’re seeing a diversification of performance as a result. I’d expect the trend to continue over the coming years. |
Anonymous
Look on their recruiting tab on their website, yes generally 6+ go D1. I think they take a lot of kids with height so they get recruited with potential in mind. Last I heard, most of their kids generally play in college vs riding the pine. Maybe their technical training is good. No idea |