Volleyball club- recap and thoughts

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to think like you, and to some extent I still do (re: Metro does not improve the CHRVA region). However, if players want to play D1, especially in a power 4 league, a lot of these other clubs just don’t have the college recruitment infrastructure. You may say it’s because of the poaching but some don’t even have a point person that families can strategize with about recruitment. If you are interested in playing in college and you visit a clubs website and go to the college commitment page and you start comparing Metro sells itself, it doesn’t even have to poach players. Anybody who is playing on Metro travel 16 and older want to get recruited.

I have noticed that some players get recruited when they are with other clubs but for their 18U year they play with Metro. I’ve wondered if Metro have some kind of arrangement to provide training and conditioning before some players arrive on campus.

I think you're right the most direct path to D1 is the reason Metro Travel teams continue to attract many of the best players in the region, despite the fact that there are probably 4 or 5 players on every Metro Travel team that don't get to play in tournaments as much as they would if they played for another club. I think most of these players know that when they accept the offer, but believe that being on Metro Travel, even as a reserve player, will be better for recruiting purposes. With 15 players on many of the Metro Travel rosters, there is no question that some really great players are standing on the sidelines. This obviously weakens other teams to certain extent, but I'm not sure whether that is the reason that Metro takes so many on each team. Having a deep bench is helpful when players get hurt or have to miss a tournament for some reason and also allows for really competitive practices.

I have also heard that some college coaches encourage their local commits to switch to Metro for their last year (or two) of club volleyball because of the level of competition, both in practice and at tournaments.

This has been one of my gripes with Metro. I must say that I watched one of the matches Metro 18 Travel played at Capitol Hill on Monday and every player, except 1 that appeared injured, got playing time. I was pleasantly surprised.

It makes sense that some college coaches ask their commits to switch to Metro.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Totally new to volleyball- been playing Rec in Montgomery County. The club that is closest to me is MoCo. Can anyone share their experience with this club? Clinics seem good, but would be interested in hearing from parents of teens who play for their teams. TIA.

We recently played against their top 13 team (Motion) and it was a lot of fun. I liked the atmosphere their players created: they were chanting the whole time and encouraged the players on the court. The coaches seemed nice and supportive of the players. I wish our players came up with similar chants to pump up those on the court. Coming November we will also try for one of their teams to explore our options. You may want to consider other clubs for your player to get some club experience (in case MOCO doesn't work out for the first time). It might be difficult to make a MOCO team with Rec League experience only (and it gets harder and harder with increasing player age).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Totally new to volleyball- been playing Rec in Montgomery County. The club that is closest to me is MoCo. Can anyone share their experience with this club? Clinics seem good, but would be interested in hearing from parents of teens who play for their teams. TIA.

We recently played against their top 13 team (Motion) and it was a lot of fun. I liked the atmosphere their players created: they were chanting the whole time and encouraged the players on the court. The coaches seemed nice and supportive of the players. I wish our players came up with similar chants to pump up those on the court. Coming November we will also try for one of their teams to explore our options. You may want to consider other clubs for your player to get some club experience (in case MOCO doesn't work out for the first time). It might be difficult to make a MOCO team with Rec League experience only (and it gets harder and harder with increasing player age).

MOCO is a decent club - my DDs played there a few years back and generally had positive experiences. The club director spent many years with MVSA before founding MOCO in 2015 so it's somewhat modeled after MVSA, meaning the fees are on the lower side and parental involvement (including as coaches) is encouraged. In terms of competitiveness, some of their teams are pretty good but most are mid-level club division teams. As with any club, the quality of coaching differs from team to team, but if your DD is looking to break into volleyball and maybe get enough training to make their HS varsity team, MOCO is a good option. Many MOCO teams participated at the Capitol Hill Classic which was President's Day weekend so those results might give you a sense of how they do at tournaments. https://events.sportwrench.com/#/events/cf57945b1/clubs/33338

If you're totally new to volleyball, you might not know how club volleyball tryouts work - for the local Chesapeake Region (CHRVA) all tryouts are in early November so getting on a club team now isn't possible for this year, but it's not too early to start thinking about the fall. As has been discussed at length in this thread, tryouts are very competitive so making a club team isn't guaranteed. Attending clinics, camps, and rec leagues put on by different clubs is good for both developing skills and getting exposure to the clubs. If MOCO is convenient for you, you might also looks at Metro Central teams, DMV Elite, and possibly MVSA depending on exactly where you are located.

[FPYCparent]

Thanks for the historical perspective offered in this thread. I've learned quite a bit.

So, what can CHRVA do to raise its profile (and the profile of its member clubs) at a national level? (I think there may be some agreement that CHRVA's national profile is ... lacking.)

It seems that Metro and Paramount are capable of representing CHRVA well in most cases, but does either club stand to gain anything if CHRVA wants to have a more prominent presence? Could the two even agree to collaborate to push the region forward?

I think I understand that teams have to compete in two "local" tournaments to qualify for CHRVA Bid Regionals. Capital Hill counts as one ... and Metro seems to be tied to the hip of that one. Do any of the other large-ish events also count like the one at National Harbor and Charm City? Do other regions have similar requirements for competing in "local" tournaments? What if clubs could earn a "local event credit" for competing in an out-of-region event that fields Open level pools of 40 or 50+ teams (e.g., Volley by the James) or one of the M-APLs? I'm thinking that CHRVA teams at those events are extending the reach of the region and could be deserving of something like a local event credit to CHRVA Bid Regionals.

I wonder if these one-day tourneys hosted by MVSA/MDJRS/Vienna Elite/etc. are really doing a service for the region as a whole (at the Open level, at least). On the other hand, would these one-days go away if that "local" event requirement is loosened ... and would the host clubs ultimately lose out on a significant income generator?

[Anonymous]

FPYCparent wrote:Thanks for the historical perspective offered in this thread. I've learned quite a bit.

So, what can CHRVA do to raise its profile (and the profile of its member clubs) at a national level? (I think there may be some agreement that CHRVA's national profile is ... lacking.)

It seems that Metro and Paramount are capable of representing CHRVA well in most cases, but does either club stand to gain anything if CHRVA wants to have a more prominent presence? Could the two even agree to collaborate to push the region forward?

I think I understand that teams have to compete in two "local" tournaments to qualify for CHRVA Bid Regionals. Capital Hill counts as one ... and Metro seems to be tied to the hip of that one. Do any of the other large-ish events also count like the one at National Harbor and Charm City? Do other regions have similar requirements for competing in "local" tournaments? What if clubs could earn a "local event credit" for competing in an out-of-region event that fields Open level pools of 40 or 50+ teams (e.g., Volley by the James) or one of the M-APLs? I'm thinking that CHRVA teams at those events are extending the reach of the region and could be deserving of something like a local event credit to CHRVA Bid Regionals.

I wonder if these one-day tourneys hosted by MVSA/MDJRS/Vienna Elite/etc. are really doing a service for the region as a whole (at the Open level, at least). On the other hand, would these one-days go away if that "local" event requirement is loosened ... and would the host clubs ultimately lose out on a significant income generator?

I think both Metro and Paramount would benefit from CHRVA being more competitive. The more difficult matches that can be played locally, the better prepared teams will be when they get to Open level qualifiers and nationals. That said, a lot of clubs have set out to build a program to compete at the open level nationally but have not succeeded. I understand that was EC Power's intent when they established the Chesapeake program a few years ago, but they were not very successful and that ultimately fell apart. VA Elite has been pretty consistently entering the open division at national qualifiers without much success - they generally end up going to AAU Nationals and playing in open which does not require earning a bid. I think the real challenge is in recruiting the players needed to compete at that level. There are many CHRVA clubs that do a great job of training volleyball and helping their teams get better, but to compete at the highest levels you need tall and/or exceptionally athletic girls and those players seem to mostly end up at Metro or Paramount. I assume that is because those are the clubs that have the most demonstrated success, both in the performance of the club at a national level and in helping girls to get recruited for college.

That said, as the popularity of volleyball continues to grow it seems like there will be too many talented players in an area as large as the DMV for Metro and Paramount to have all the best players. Paramount has added second teams at some age groups as well as started teams at younger age groups which may help them keep some players that used to switch to Metro Travel at a certain age. Beyond that, it isn't clear who the next club will be to rise to the top tier. VA Elite has some of the infrastructure in place, but it is really expensive and with 13s being the youngest team relies on recruiting players who started playing elsewhere. VA Juniors has some good teams but there seems to be a lot of drama there that leads to players moving to other clubs. MDJRs also has some good teams but their location isn't great for attracting players from all over the region. MVSA has a reputation for being really great at training younger players, but most of the really talented ones leave to go to other clubs between 13s and 15s. MOCO, Columbia, MOJO, etc have some teams that are pretty good but not truly open level teams at the national level.

I am not really sure what CHRVA can do to help advance the level of local clubs. The two tournament rule applies for teams wanting to play in bid regionals. As noted, Capitol Hill does count as one of those meaning most teams only have to go to one local tournament to fulfill that requirement. The National Harbor tournament does count as a CHRVA open tournament, but Charm City does not because it is a JVA tournament. The National Harbor tournament as well as the 2-day St Patricks Day tournament at the St James and and the 2-day tournaments that MVSA hosts later in the spring were started coming out of the pandemic to create an opportunity for CHRVA teams to compete in larger tournaments in a multi-day format without having to travel (https://www.chrva.org/page/show/6330580-chesapeake-power-league). I think these have been somewhat successful and some of the better regional teams do attend these tournaments.

Looking at the AES rankings, there are around 130 CHRVA teams in each of the 14s, 15s, and 16s age groups. That is a whole lot of girls playing volleyball. I would think supply and demand would result in there being more local teams that can compete nationally at a high level. That said, despite all of the complaining about club volleyball being a money grab, starting or growing a club is hard. Finding gym time, qualified coaches, and coordinating everything is a huge task. Figuring out the secret sauce needed to compete with Metro Travel or Paramount is even harder.

[Anonymous]

I'm the complete newbie who asked about volleyball - thanks for all the info/advice!

[FPYCparent]

Agreed. Thanks for the insightful contributions.

I'm going through the 2023 USAV spreadsheets for to see what CHRVA teams participated.

Open: Metro 15 Travel, Metro 17 Travel, Metro 18 Travel, Paramount VBC 18s
National: Blue Ridge 14 Blue, Paramount VBC 14, Paramount VBC 15, Metro 16 Travel, Blue Ridge 17 Blue, VA Juniors 18 Elite
USA: Paramount VBC 16s
Liberty: MD Jrs 14 Elite Black
American: Metro 14 Travel, VA Juniors 14 Elite, Blue Ridge 15 Blue, EC Power CH 15-Shock DC, MVSA 15 Charge, Blue Ridge 16 Blue, MVSA 16 Sparks, MD Jrs 17 Elite Black, Paramount VBC 17, EC Power Chesapeake 18 DE
Freedom: LEVBC U14 National, MVSA 14 Force, LEVBC U15 National, Premier Edge 16, VA Juniors 16 Elite, EC Power Chesapeake 17 DE, VA Juniors 17 Elite, Vienna Elite 18 Blue, Columbia 18 Black

Hopefully, I didn't miss any teams ... but that looks to be about 12 CHRVA clubs that earned a total of 31 bids to Nationals. There are about 9 more bids for CHRVA in the 11s-13s groups.

UPDATE: Added "Liberty: MD Jrs 14 Elite Black" ... Team is mislabeled in the "IA" region on the USAV spreadsheet 14 Liberty tab.

[Anonymous]

FPYCparent wrote:Agreed. Thanks for the insightful contributions.

I'm going through the 2023 USAV spreadsheets for to see what CHRVA teams participated.

Open: Metro 15 Travel, Metro 17 Travel, Metro 18 Travel, Paramount VBC 18s
National: Blue Ridge 14 Blue, Paramount VBC 14, Paramount VBC 15, Metro 16 Travel, Blue Ridge 17 Blue, VA Juniors 18 Elite
USA: Paramount VBC 16s
Liberty: (None)
American: Metro 14 Travel, VA Juniors 14 Elite, Blue Ridge 15 Blue, EC Power CH 15-Shock DC, MVSA 15 Charge, Blue Ridge 16 Blue, MVSA 16 Sparks, MD Jrs 17 Elite Black, Paramount VBC 17, EC Power Chesapeake 18 DE
Freedom: LEVBC U14 National, MVSA 14 Force, LEVBC U15 National, Premier Edge 16, VA Juniors 16 Elite, EC Power Chesapeake 17 DE, VA Juniors 17 Elite, Vienna Elite 18 Blue, Columbia 18 Black

Hopefully, I didn't miss any teams ... but that looks to be about 12 CHRVA clubs that earned a total of 30 bids to Nationals. There are about 9 more bids for CHRVA in the 11s-13s groups.

That's an interesting analysis, thank you.

Another aspect to look at is where the bids come from. Open, USA, and Liberty bids can only be earned at a National Qualifier tournament. National and Freedom bids are only given through a region. American bids can be earned at a qualifier or given by a region.

For example, looking at last year's CHRVA 16s teams who got bids, here's the breakdown:

Metro 16 Travel got their National bid by winning the bid regional tournament

Paramount 16s came in second at bid regionals which would have given them an American bid but they already had a USA bid from placing 2nd in the USA Division at the Sunshine Qualifier in Orlando. USAV requires a team to take the highest bid they earn so they took their USA bid

Blue Ridge 16s came in 3rd at bid regionals which would normally get them a Freedom bid, but since Paramount had the USA bid they got the American bid.

MVSA 16 Sparks originally got a Freedom bid based on their 4th place finish at bid regionals (and the American bid being passed down to Blue Ridge), but then USAV allocated an additional 16 American bid to CHRVA which MVSA was next in line for

VA Juniors got 5th at bid regionals and were given MVSA's Freedom bid when MVSA was bumped up to American

Fairly often, CHRVA will also be given additional National bids to distribute (hence the two teams in the National division at 14s in your list), but didn't get one for 16s last year. Also, because of the rule regarding taking the highest bid earned, teams that get an Open bid before bid regionals are not allowed to participate in regionals.

[Anonymous]

The last couple of posters have really done a fantastic job explaining the DMV volleyball landscape.

[Anonymous]

FPYCparent wrote:Agreed. Thanks for the insightful contributions.

I'm going through the 2023 USAV spreadsheets for to see what CHRVA teams participated.

Open: Metro 15 Travel, Metro 17 Travel, Metro 18 Travel, Paramount VBC 18s
National: Blue Ridge 14 Blue, Paramount VBC 14, Paramount VBC 15, Metro 16 Travel, Blue Ridge 17 Blue, VA Juniors 18 Elite
USA: Paramount VBC 16s
Liberty: (None)
American: Metro 14 Travel, VA Juniors 14 Elite, Blue Ridge 15 Blue, EC Power CH 15-Shock DC, MVSA 15 Charge, Blue Ridge 16 Blue, MVSA 16 Sparks, MD Jrs 17 Elite Black, Paramount VBC 17, EC Power Chesapeake 18 DE
Freedom: LEVBC U14 National, MVSA 14 Force, LEVBC U15 National, Premier Edge 16, VA Juniors 16 Elite, EC Power Chesapeake 17 DE, VA Juniors 17 Elite, Vienna Elite 18 Blue, Columbia 18 Black

Hopefully, I didn't miss any teams ... but that looks to be about 12 CHRVA clubs that earned a total of 30 bids to Nationals. There are about 9 more bids for CHRVA in the 11s-13s groups.

Not sure why you missed. I remember Mdjrs 14 earned 14 liberty bid in 2023 neq

[FPYCparent]

Good catch! I see it now. The spreadsheet lists that MDJRS team in the "IA" region on the 14 Liberty tab. I was only looking at the region column for "CH" and then grabbing the corresponding team.

Let me see if I can update my post.

[Anonymous]

CHRVA 18 Bid Regionals were last Sunday. The top 3 finishers were:

1st Columbia 18 Black

2nd MDJRS 18 Elite

3rd VA Elite 18's

Congrats to these teams for earning a bid to USAV 18 Nationals.

Perhaps the most interesting thing is that Paramount chose not to attend. The Paramount 18s do not yet have an open bid, so regionals was probably the best opportunity for them to secure at least a bid in another division. They are playing at NEQ this weekend but I don't see that they are playing in any qualifiers after that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:CHRVA 18 Bid Regionals were last Sunday. The top 3 finishers were:

1st Columbia 18 Black

2nd MDJRS 18 Elite

3rd VA Elite 18's

Congrats to these teams for earning a bid to USAV 18 Nationals.

Perhaps the most interesting thing is that Paramount chose not to attend. The Paramount 18s do not yet have an open bid, so regionals was probably the best opportunity for them to secure at least a bid in another division. They are playing at NEQ this weekend but I don't see that they are playing in any qualifiers after that.

Is that the first time in ages VAE have played regionals? I thought they were only in the market for open bids? Did something change?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CHRVA 18 Bid Regionals were last Sunday. The top 3 finishers were:

1st Columbia 18 Black

2nd MDJRS 18 Elite

3rd VA Elite 18's

Congrats to these teams for earning a bid to USAV 18 Nationals.

Perhaps the most interesting thing is that Paramount chose not to attend. The Paramount 18s do not yet have an open bid, so regionals was probably the best opportunity for them to secure at least a bid in another division. They are playing at NEQ this weekend but I don't see that they are playing in any qualifiers after that.

Is that the first time in ages VAE have played regionals? I thought they were only in the market for open bids? Did something change?

It's the first time I am aware of VAE playing regionals, and we've been around CHRVA club volleyball since 2017. Looks like they have all the rest of their teams registered for bid regionals which is on 3/23.

[Anonymous]

Yes - looks like VAE finally broke down and realized there would be better success to get to USAV via regionals AND they registered their teams in lower divisions (eg USA) instead of Open at national qualifiers. Gives a better competitive experience and opportunity to grow as well vs just slaughterfest in open at qualifiers.