Let us pick a volleyball club for you
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Anonymous
Where do you live? |
Anonymous
| ISO recommendations for a NoVA club that’s more competitive than MetroSouth/VaVa/NoPanic/Monument/vienna but less intense than paramount and metro travel. DD is 15 and interested in college recruiting. Not a fan of Mojo. But if we have to travel and play in multi day tournaments in PA, FL, GA, etc it’d be nice to win a few medals. |
Anonymous
Check out Academy (its a fairly new club -- I think just a year or two old). Practices have been at North Chevy Chase ES. |
FPYCparent
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For NoVA (RE: 09/23/2024 13:55), would you consider Blue Ridge, VA Juniors, The St. James, BRYC, the new Legacy VBA, or American? Check out their proposed schedules to understand the potential travel commitments ... as well as their practice locations. I cannot speak for winning, but they all could potentially be more competitive than the clubs you listed. I also do not know if Paramount will have a second team in some age groups as they had last year.
FWIW, look at the 2023-24 rankings from last season: https://advancedeventsystems.com/rankings/Female/U14/aes (have to change the season). Should give you a sense of how last year's 14s teams performed. |
Anonymous
If you are interested in recruiting, also switch the AES rankings to national ranks. That's a better indication of how the team does at travel and large tournaments, which is where the college coaches usually are. The rankings aren't prefect--its still possible to be ranked well nationally and only compete in local tournaments. For example, there are teams that win most of their local matches and lose most of their non-region matches. That's usually because they aren't playing the top CHRVA teams in the region. Its also possible for a very good team that competes in upper levels of competition to rank lower than a team that usually competes in club, even if they both do a lot of travel tournaments. If you want to balance winning, recruiting and intensity, then look for teams that have a decent record nationally and good locally. Another club to consider in NOVA that may meet your criteria is Libero. Unfortunately, in NOVA there aren't a lot of clubs that have second teams that meet your criteria, so maybe think about clubs where you have a chance to make their top team. |
Anonymous
The two that come to mind are VA Elite and Virginia Juniors. Both have a good track record of some players going on to play in college, but both of them are known to be slightly less intense than Metro or Paramount. The St James Navy teams go to a lot of big tournaments but haven't had as many players commit to play in college. A lot of the work required to play in college needs to be done by the player/parents. Playing for a club with a reputation for/experience in getting girls recruited helps but is not required. At the end of the day it's up to the individual player so pick a club that fits for your DD needs today. There is lots of good advice online about helping to get recruited. I don't think it's necessary to pay for a recruiting service either. I've heard from more than one college coach that they much prefer to hear directly from players than through some third party. |
Anonymous
Has she played club in prior seasons? While there are plenty of girls who start playing club at 15s (often after playing on a HS team and the coach tells them they should be playing club), breaking into a more competitive team at 15s can be tough. Unless she's really tall or can touch over 10' - then ignore everything I said. |
Anonymous
15:33 here. Thank you! This is exactly what we were looking for. VA Jrs will only run one team. Same with VA Elite and rumor is those rosters are full already before tryouts with return players. Blue ridge is too far for us sadly. Will definitely look at BYRC, St. James. DD did a clinic at Legacy and was impressed. |
Anonymous
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If you are interested in recruiting, also switch the AES rankings to national ranks. That's a better indication of how the team does at travel and large tournaments, which is where the college coaches usually are. The rankings aren't prefect--its still possible to be ranked well nationally and only compete in local tournaments. For example, there are teams that win most of their local matches and lose most of their non-region matches. That's usually because they aren't playing the top CHRVA teams in the region. Its also possible for a very good team that competes in upper levels of competition to rank lower than a team that usually competes in club, even if they both do a lot of travel tournaments. If you want to balance winning, recruiting and intensity, then look for teams that have a decent record nationally and good locally. Another club to consider in NOVA that may meet your criteria is Libero. Unfortunately, in NOVA there aren't a lot of clubs that have second teams that meet your criteria, so maybe think about clubs where you have a chance to make their top team. Thank you this is helpful. We were looking at rankings thanks to the previous poster and it looks like several metro regional teams are ranked pretty high so maybe those are worth another look. The national rankings weren’t pulling up but will keep trying. My DD team won over Libero last year so I think she wants something a notch up. But again it might depend on the age group. |
Anonymous
Thank you. DD definitely looked at the two clubs mentioned. But both only run one team per age group and both are pretty preordained by U15-U16 from what we have heard. She’s been to some VA elite clinics and stopped going bc the coaches seemed to focus just on the girls there in the VA elite club shirts and didn’t really give anyone else a look. I appreciate the info. |
Anonymous
15:33. Thank you for the solid feedback. Yes DD has played HS and played club for two seasons in one of the clubs mentioned in the original post. Since she’s played for the same club (we chose it based on location convenience and familiarity) she has not considered others until now. Current club doesn’t focus on coaching the girls with advanced technique and strategies to improve to next level- many of the coaches have never played themselves. DD recently attended a clinic at another club and it was completely different experience from her entire season - the coaches were actually forcing the girls to work hard, showing them what to do with demos, had them getting on the floor to pass and jump up, created a serving box with rope over the net for the girls to hit the sweet spot for serves, specifically training them on top spin serving, float serves, etc, timing the speed of their serves with a speed gun. It was a totally different experience rather than “let’s see who can reliably get their serve over the net.” Make sense? She likely has a roster spot in the current club (nothing is ever guaranteed!) but she’s looking to step up to a more competitive experience. It was frustrating for her (and us!) to travel to multi-day tournaments over long holiday weekends, miss school and work, only to have teammates repeatedly serving into the net and making error after error bc some had never played volleyball before and weren’t learning or being coached. And this was supposed to be the 1s team. So, I guess if she wants to commit to the experience again, she wants it to be more worthwhile and feel like she’s playing at the same level. |
Anonymous
I would not suggest Academy except as a backup. With a good overhand serve and knowing the basics of passing and hitting she can make at least the second team at Platform or MEVC. Top team might be tricky, but not impossible - it all depends who shows up at the tryouts and who finds better options this season. Go to a few clinics to check them out. Once you are there, try talking to club parents. Opinions might be biased because you will likely meet the parents who want to bring their players back and you will likely not meet the parents who decided to move on to a different club. |
Anonymous
Are you willing to share the name of this new club? |
Anonymous
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What do you recommend for a 10 year old boy with no formal training but lots of casual play (he has done a 6 week session with i9 and played at summer camp) who is tall and athletic and interested in playing on a team? Location is Fairfax.
He plays soccer year round, so is looking for something with only 1x week practice initially, as a secondary sport if that exists. I've been looking at BRYC rec as a start but interested in other options. Im still learning the timing of seasons and when teams form too. |
Anonymous
Boys volleyball for boys is different than girls in terms of starting age and conflicts with other sports, at least here in the DMV. Its not unusual for boys to come into volleyball later, and its also common for them to play multiple sports. Once you get to HS specialization starts to happen, but usually because of schedule conflicts. For example, if you play HS volleyball and club volleyball, both run at roughly the same time so you don't have room for another spring sport. Soccer pairs very well with volleyball because of the Summer/Fall soccer schedule and the Winter/Spring volleyball schedule. Club clinics may be the best to place to start, rather than rec. If he's athletic and tall he'll probably find that rec leagues are too easy for him, especially at that age. Clinics usually are once a week and can be done for 3-6 weeks, letting you choose after the first round of clinics if he like the sport. At 10, mixed clinics (boys and girls) are the norm so make sure he's OK with that. Clinics teach skills much faster and a good foundation of skills is a huge boost in boys volleyball, where sometimes those skills aren't really refined until U13/U14. For example, in CHRVA boys teams can play girls teams up through U13. A lot of the time the girls will win the matches, solely from better fundamentals. |