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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I do think DMV volleyball is missing something here, but this is about the clubs, not the players and parents. Most people in the area don't care about their kids playing volleyball in college. Let me rephrase that. Most people don't want their kids to play volleyball in college. They want their kids to go to college and focus on their studies, gain expertise and get a good job. It is very difficult to do that while playing college volleyball (or any other sport). You either let your grades slip (you don't gain expertise) or you let volleyball slip (and you lose your place on the roster along with your scholarship). Kudos to those who can handle both, but I doubt there's many of them.

With a few exceptions, the clubs should stop pretending that this is the end goal. Let's play locally and avoid travel for the sake of travel. You can find local clubs to kick your behind, you don't need to travel overnight to get your behind kicked.[/quote]

There are lots of players in the DMV playing in college. [b]Last count the 2025 class had 70+ commits, from D1-D3[/b].  The actual number is probably higher, haven’t seen a recent count as final decisions happened this year.  They do tend to come from a small number of clubs though, generally those that have teams competing at CHRVA bids/qualifiers and traveling.  Last check there were 10-12 clubs with at least 3 commits on their 18s teams.[/quote]

I will not dispute the number because I don't really care. 70+ players from the DMV area is what? 5% of the total number of players? 10%? How does that affect what I just said about the clubs missing the point? [/quote]

Well, you’d need to know how many 18s teams there are in CHRVA (62), and roughly how many of those are in the DMV (~30).  70+ commits is 20%, the final number is probably somewhere around 30%-40%, its higher if you add in players playing club volleyball in college.  30% is plenty for some clubs to focus on college recruiting as a primary marketing tactic.  While I don’t agree with never ending stream of social media posts about it—especially when a player played for other clubs for the vast majority of their club career—it is a business and there are enough players/families that want to pursue college volleyball in the region to make it possible to focus a club on it.

[quote][b]Most people don't want their kids to play volleyball in college. They want their kids to go to college and focus on their studies, gain expertise and get a good job. It is very difficult to do that while playing college volleyball (or any other sport). You either let your grades slip (you don't gain expertise) or you let volleyball slip (and you lose your place on the roster along with your scholarship). Kudos to those who can handle both, but I doubt there's many of them.[/b] [/quote]

If you truly believe those that are committing to play in college are likely to “let their grades slip or let volleyball slip”, then it’s ok not to pursue it.  Find a club that doesn’t prioritize and/or demand college recruiting to play on their teams like Metro Travel, VA elite, Paramount, etc. do.

But consider that these days the old stereotypes about college athletes generally don’t hold true anymore.  In fact, GPA and graduation rates for athletes in sports like volleyball are actually higher than in the general student body.  If you’d like to read more on the topic, there’s a great article at [url]https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/socf.12967[/url][/quote]

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