Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Training is important, but playing time is just as important so you can practice what you trained in real game setting. You can’t sacrifice one for the other.

It is very difficult to find a club to provide both good training and adequate playing time for all players to develop though.

Valid points, but as you note finding a club/team that checks all those boxes is challenging. Obviously, we all want our kids to get good training and to play and improve as much as possible, but what that looks like can vary drastically depending on the level of team, cost, and the abilities of the player. If your DD isn't athletically gifted (or really tall), and club volleyball is for fun, fitness, recreation, etc., your expectations should be different than someone who's DD is expecting to be recruited to play D1 volleyball.

As to how to what CHRVA might be able to do to elevate the level of play within the region, that's a tough question. In regions like North Texas there are multiple clubs that are qualifying teams for nationals in the open division every year (clubs like TAV, Drive Nation, Excel, Mad Frog, Skyline, etc). A talented player has multiple choices of clubs that are competing at highest level so they don't need to settle for being the the 14th or 15th girl on the bench to be on a high level team. In CHRVA on the other hand, outside of Metro and Paramount, there are no clubs with a realistic shot of getting an open bid in most years, so a high level player has to choose between possibly not playing as much on a team from one of these clubs or playing on a lower level team. It's not clear right now whether there are any other CHRVA clubs ready to step up to that next level as the number of players increases. There are of course great individual teams at other CHRVA clubs, but there isn't a club that is consistently fielding strong teams at most age groups year after year. Building a club to compete at that level requires assembling the right coaches and facilities and aggressively going after the best players in the off season. Paramount in particular actively recruits high potential players which is one of the reasons they've been able to have success in a relatively short time since the club was started.

The strategy that many clubs seem to be taking right now is to just go to more qualifiers and other travel tournaments and market themselves as being a club that competes against high level teams from across the country. Unfortunately, in many cases that is just costing families a lot of money to travel all over the country to not do particularly well in these tournaments.

Anonymous wrote:Training is important, but playing time is just as important so you can practice what you trained in real game setting. You can’t sacrifice one for the other.

It is very difficult to find a club to provide both good training and adequate playing time for all players to develop though.

Anonymous wrote:Spending thousands of dollars on club fees and thousands more on airfare and hotels just to watch their children stand on the sidelines at tournaments across the country is so worthwhile—because the training is superb...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:12:15 PP, I don’t see how good training can be if you don’t get to apply that training in a real game, as opposed to just scrimmaging with the same people.

Also, what is training anyway? You describe it like it’s in a vacuum, but the reality is that not all players are trained by elite clubs at the outset. A lot of you get kids come from rec and then realize that club is the natural progression of things. Bad habits are bad but truly sporty people are coachable and coordinated and can correct those bad habits.

If that play time is on an average team playing in lower divisions and not being exposed to high level teammates and opponents, is that “real game” experience really that valuable? If fun and recreation are the objective, then that makes sense, but if a player aspires to be recruited for college volleyball they need to play against high level teams and there are only a handful of CHRVA clubs that has teams playing in the highest division at most tournaments.

Anonymous wrote:12:15 PP, I don’t see how good training can be if you don’t get to apply that training in a real game, as opposed to just scrimmaging with the same people.

Also, what is training anyway? You describe it like it’s in a vacuum, but the reality is that not all players are trained by elite clubs at the outset. A lot of you get kids come from rec and then realize that club is the natural progression of things. Bad habits are bad but truly sporty people are coachable and coordinated and can correct those bad habits.

Anonymous wrote:I think many of these comments are really underestimating the importance of training in a pretty ignorant way. In other regions of the US where volleyball is more established there are many clubs with excellent coaches and multiple teams per age group. That is not the case in the DC area and training, particularly at the younger level, is a gap. I would far rather my middle schooler play for a team with 15 kids and excellent coaching, with more limited game experience, than a team with 10 kids, marginal coaching, and lots of game experience. In such a technical sport like volleyball that's how bad habits develop that are really hard to break. Our goal in this region should be to have more clubs with excellent and rigorous training. The success and opportunity will come.

Anonymous wrote:The best players in the region want to join Metro or Paramount because these clubs have the strongest college recruiting records. As a result, Metro and Paramount are essentially the region's all-star teams, and they dominate other teams most of the time. Now, Metro has swept the 12-17 regionals, and someone on this board is reporting that a team may have tried to throw a game to avoid playing Metro. At the same time, a number of players on these top two teams don't get enough playing time, but they accept this as a tradeoff.

Many smaller clubs lack the resources or connections for college recruiting. Perhaps CHRVA could step up and establish a more robust, region-wide college recruiting effort to showcase top players from smaller clubs. One idea could be for the region to select all-star teams—first, second, and third regional teams—and have them train and compete together for a week or two in the summer in front of college coaches and recruiters. (At last weekend’s regionals, I noticed recruiters taking notes, mostly following Metro Travel.) The region could also organize a tournament featuring MD/DE all-stars, VA/DC all-stars, Metro Travel, and Paramount 1 competing against each other. These events will put the best players from all the clubs in front of college coaches and recruiters.

If, instead of sitting on the bench for Metro, some of the best players joined other strong clubs in the region, it would elevate competition across the board. Metro and Paramount would benefit from more competitive local matches, and CHRVA teams could secure additional bids through other qualifiers.

I believe Blue Ridge is a great example. It has highly competitive teams across all age groups, and its smaller roster sizes ensure players get ample playing time. Its location in Winchester also plays a role, as players there don’t have easy access to Metro or Paramount.

Overall, I believe the region would be better off with more competitive teams like Blue Ridge rather than concentrating all the top talent into just two teams—especially when some of the region’s best players are stuck on the sidelines during tournaments.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I'm only talking about the 14U teams at the regionals, and Paramount 14-1 is I believe the only one with 15 players. Metro 14 Travel and MD Juniors 14 Black have 13 each. I understand players at 17 or 18 may choose to sit on the bench at Metro or Paramount in order to go to a D1 college. But at 14, they are still young and developing, and not playing in games is in my opinion a big loss.

13 v 15 is not a difference. A number of kids are still not playing in a given game/match. So seems like the top 3 14s teams all have 13-15 kids on their roster which means 7-9 kids on the bench at any given time. Perhaps the training these kids are receiving in the 6+ hours a week they are practicing still gives them a net benefit? There's a HUGE range of coaching talent in this region. In any event like others said roster size is well known at the start of a season and I would expect people going to these clubs in particular are making informed decisions.

I think 13 vs 15 still make a difference. I get older age group taking more on their roster due to possible injury, but at 11-14, I feel everyone including players and clubs will benefit from smaller roster. More reps during practice could help. Top national clubs like circle city carry only 10-11 players and all of them are good. I wonder if smaller roster contribute to developing these girls.

Just a thought.

This weekend, I observed MDJRS 16 Elite Black team intentionally throw a match, without even trying to hide what they were doing. With how the pools at Regionals worked, the team that finished 3d (of 3) in their opening pool would have avoided Metro and VAJRS until the semifinals, whereas the team that finished 2nd in the pool would have to play one of these two teams in the quarterfinals (i.e., the game before earning a bid). The MDJRS coaches instructed the players to intentionally lose the match. The players intentionally served the ball under the net or would foot fault on their serves, and whenever the other team served they would stand there and watch the ball hit the ground. MDJRS should be ashamed of this behavior, and their teams should be banned from participating in CHRVA Bid Regionals for at least one season. There were plenty of U16 teams that wanted to participate in Regionals that did not get accepted. I'm sure they would have liked to play.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I'm only talking about the 14U teams at the regionals, and Paramount 14-1 is I believe the only one with 15 players. Metro 14 Travel and MD Juniors 14 Black have 13 each. I understand players at 17 or 18 may choose to sit on the bench at Metro or Paramount in order to go to a D1 college. But at 14, they are still young and developing, and not playing in games is in my opinion a big loss.

13 v 15 is not a difference. A number of kids are still not playing in a given game/match. So seems like the top 3 14s teams all have 13-15 kids on their roster which means 7-9 kids on the bench at any given time. Perhaps the training these kids are receiving in the 6+ hours a week they are practicing still gives them a net benefit? There's a HUGE range of coaching talent in this region. In any event like others said roster size is well known at the start of a season and I would expect people going to these clubs in particular are making informed decisions.

I think 13 vs 15 still make a difference. I get older age group taking more on their roster due to possible injury, but at 11-14, I feel everyone including players and clubs will benefit from smaller roster. More reps during practice could help. Top national clubs like circle city carry only 10-11 players and all of them are good. I wonder if smaller roster contribute to developing these girls.

Just a thought.