Today, I listened to an audio recording of USA Volleyball’s Head Coach Hugh McCutcheon’s Q & A presentation at last December’s AVCA Convention in Kansas City.  A question raised to Hugh was, “How does the world perceive the success of USA Volleyball when it does not have a professional league?”.  Hugh’s response was based on the United States’ culture of “fighting until the end”, competitive advantages, and coaching methodologies.  Of which I agree, but these are small pieces of a larger puzzle.  An Open Source puzzle. Continue Reading

The USAV Palmetto Region is where I started coaching many years ago (although I did have a year stint in Cactus Region, but I wasn’t ready to coach way way back then). I appreciate the opportunity to give back to a region that has helped me to get to where I am today. John Kessel and Palmetto Region Commissioner, Jimmy Peden, invited me to be a panelist on the most recent Impact Clinic for the Palmetto Region. It was a fun opportunity to join two creative thinkers of the game as well as a great opportunity to refresh my mind on the fundamentals of the game. Here are some notes I took throughout the clinic: Continue Reading

This past week in Kansas City at the AVCA Convention and Final Four was thoroughly enjoyable.  It was 24 hours of volleyball.  Blissful.

Even though volleyball is one of the most popular sports in the world, we, in the United States, are fortunate it has not blown-up yet (it will).  It provides us the accessibility for legends Continue Reading

Friday the 13th struck volleyball hard this year. Today, the AVP announced that it is “suspending operations“. In layman’s terms, the season is canceled and there is a good chance the AVP, a public company, may go bankrupt (the stock is currently trading at $0.02 per share).  Hans Stoflus offers some great insight from his perspective: End of Days. Continue Reading

Arie Selinger, Head Coach, 1984 USA Volleyball Women’s Olympic Team, wrote “Setting for the Setter”. He believes the setter is the most important player on the court who’s qualities include: play-maker, architect, decision maker, cooperative, an extension of the coach, perceptive, great mental stamina, leader, hard working, creative, disciplined, crafty, aware, well liked, and inspires trust and confidence. Continue Reading

It’s the little club that could. Low Country Volleyball Club with a total of 3 teams in the entire club, won the 18 Open Division of the USAV Palmetto Region Championship this past weekend in Charlotte. This is the second year in a row the team won the region to advance to the USAV Nationals, held in Miami this July. I’m proud to say I coached at this club a number of years ago and it was a joy watching many of the girls I once coached win the championship…again. A club of three teams. Continue Reading

In the book How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer (recommended by John Kessel), one subject he brings to light is the neurological insight to optimize learning. He studied some of the top athletes, chess grandmasters, backgammon world champions, and even a 30 year veteran soap opera producer to understand how they became great. The common theme with these greats is their constant search for their own errors. Continue Reading