After watching the incredible National Championship Match again last night (some incredible offense and defense!!!), I believe the box score tells us why Penn State beat Texas and won an unprecedented third National Championship – in a row!  As with most sports, it comes down to errors.  Texas, especially Destinee Hooker, showcased spectacular kills, but Texas committed the most errors.  Penn State kept the ball in play more (Team IPE).  As is said in the volleyball world, “Teams that win the serving and passing battle, win the match”.  Thus is true in the National Championship.

Following are statistics from the box score:

Team IPE or In Play Efficiency accounts for total points in the match divided by a team’s errors.  Its not an exact figure, but I have been using Team IPE throughout my Winthrop season as well as my juniors season and have found that a team that keeps the ball in play at least 80% of the time wins the match.  Penn State’s Team IPE was 83%, Texas’ Team IPE was 76%.

Penn State did all the little things better.  They served in, made clean ball contacts (Texas had 5 BHE’s – Ball Handling Errors), only had 1 blocking error, and less hitting errors.  Golf has a saying, “Drive for dough, putt for dough”.  Penn State putted better;  Russ Rose made the dough.

***As a side note, Alan Reifman, a professor at Texas Tech University has a great blog on volleyball and statistics.  He has an interesting analysis on the match too.  Visit his blog at: http://volleymetrics.blogspot.com/

NCAA Volleyball – ESPNU will be re-airing the 2010 NCAA Women’s Volleyball Championship tonight, April 13th beginning at 9:30 p.m. EST. Relive the excitement as Penn State and Texas clash in one of the most thrilling matches in recent history!

I was looking through some of my old files from some of my old club teams and came across this piece on Blocking.  Ironically, the premise of the piece was written by Bond Shymansky, who at the time was Head Coach at Georgia Tech (he’s now Head Coach at Marquette).  The current Winthrop Head Coach, Sally Polhamus, was an Assistant under Bond at that time.  Sally is now the Head Coach that I work under.  The volleyball world is a small world.

Keys to Blocking Effectively
By Head Coach Bond Shymansky and coaching staff, Georgia Tech
November 16, 2005

•  Blocking is 95% work, 5% natural ability
•  Blocking can control and win matches through these methods
•  Raise intimidation
•  Stuff for points
•  Take away favorite shots
•  Force unforced errors
•  Take opponent out of their game plan
•  Remember the last shot your opponent hit
•  Block the low hard hit balls. Dig the balls over and around the block
•  When alone, block cross court
•  Most hitters hit where they face
•  Time your jump to your opponent, not the ball
•  Seal and penetrate — control the net
•  Block from a stationary position
•  Block aggressively, not randomly
•  Blocks often come in bunches — be patient
•  Get touches, touches, touches — control and stuff
•  Never give up a straight down hit

A girl on the Low Country Club Team that I coached asked for my advice, “What tip do you find most helpful?”

Here is my answer:

To me they are all helpful tips, but it is almost impossible to think through all these tips in the middle of a set when you are about to block.  That is why repetition in practice is key.  Repetition builds each one of these steps into a habit so you don’t have to think about these tips.  They will come automatically.  Blocking is 95% work and 5% natural ability.  It is about timing and attitude.  If you WANT to block (and dig for that matter) you will be more successful because of this innate WANT.

But if I have to pick one tip, my favorite is “Remember the last shot your opponent hit”.  After you become physically and fundamentally sound in volleyball, strategy and the mental part of the game becomes a greater factor.  If an opponent hits an angle shot successfully straight down, that opponent will likely try to hit that same shot again because it was successful.  Your opponent is building confidence in themselves…and their entire team builds confidence.  On the flip-side, if the opponent tries to hit angle and we stuff them.  They will likely change their hit for the next swing and their confidence is deflated and so is the teams.

If an opponent has a successful hit, our goal is to take that shot away from them on the next hit.  So if they hit angle, let’s block a bigger or more angle.  Now if we successfully block a swing, our opponent will likely change to another shot.  They might try to swing line or tip the ball.  If we block them angle, let’s switch to line on the next swing.  If we can block an opponent twice in a row, on two different shots, the entire team’s confidence is really deflated and we can win that match!

As a hitter, what can we learn from this?  Find your favorite swing (line or angle) and don’t give up on it if you are blocked once.  Unfortunately, we all get blocked (many times a hitter gets blocked not because of poor execution, but a tight or ‘trap’ set), don’t give up on your favorite swing.  It’s worked for you in the past, and it will work for you again.  It’s not the hardest hitters that win games, its the SMARTEST hitters.

There was some great volleyball on TV today.  Back-to-back-to-back matches on ESPN-2 and ESPN-U.  I was able to watch Illinois beat Purdue in five at Huff Hall (unfortunately, I already received the results from Rich Kern before the match), Notre Dame over Louisville in four sets, and then LSU dominate Florida 3 – 0…awesome!

I wish I could have found the Minnesota/Penn State match online, but the Big Ten Network wasn’t showing it.  I did watch the blog update, which was interesting in itself.  It sounds as if Minnesota made a legitimate run at Penn State in sets 1 and 2, before getting pounced on by the Nittany Lions in the third set.  It doesn’t look as if Penn State is as strong this season as last and I was going to give Washington a nod as a top contender, but Washington fell to Stanford in five at Stanford.  Is Klineman and company revving up?  If I’m not mistaken, Stanford does not play a spring season and it takes the players a little extra time to get up to speed in comparison to Washington who won at Adult Open Nationals in Minneapolis this past spring.

It should be a great Final Four this year!  I hope the Gophers can find their way there

In my previous blog, I mentioned Low Country Volleyball Club’s 18s Team winning the 18 Open Division of the USAV Palmetto Region to qualify the team for Nationals in Miami. I received the stats from the team’s championship weekend (we have a parent keep stats), and just for fun compared them with the offensive stats of the 2008 Final Four Teams: Penn State, Stanford, Nebraska, and Texas. I was testing a coaching theory of IPE (read my What is IPE blog if you are unfamiliar with this concept). Here are my findings:

• Final Four IPE average was .875, LC’s IPEwas .872 (better than Nebraska and almost as good as Penn State)
• Kill eff – LC’s was .433 (better than Nebraska and Stanford)
• Hitting % – LC was .310 (Nebraska was .270, Stanford .314, Texas .335, PSU .380)

I think at any level, the game comes down to efficiency and execution. Low Country proved to be efficient and executed at a championship level.

The next step is to take your data and create awareness drills around IPE. Start with simple hitting lines. Give players 10 opportunities each to pass a free ball and take a swing into an open court off a set. Can they keep 9 out of 10 balls In Play? Add a blocker or two. Enter a ball with a serve instead of a free ball. Add in another passer. Or even keep IPE for a wash drill or a scrimmage. Keep stats to keep players aware. Are they still keeping 9 out of 10 balls in play?

To put things in perspective, the USA Women’s National Team Hitting IPE for the 2008 season was .860. Why did I now refer to it as “Hitting IPE”? Read on…

IPE started as a concept for hitting and has migrated to a Team IPE. Team IPE is based on all team errors committed (blocks errors, hitting errors, service errors, ball handling errors, passing errors) for a match (or even a season). Penn State’s Team IPE for the 2008 Final Four was .743 or for every 10 balls played 7.4 were kept in play. This also recognizes that Penn State gave up approximately 25% of their points on an error. Broken-down even further, this means that Penn State gave up roughly 6 points a match on their errors. If you recall Mick Haley’s point breakdown in a recent Coaching Volleyball Magazine article by the AVCA, the number of points he expected a good team to give up was 6. (Team IPE does not include points given up via a violation).

Keep in mind, one stat, or any stat for that matter, is an ultimate predictor or determinant of success. Stats are used to provide trends of players and teams as a guide of strengths and weaknesses. The Hitting IPE stat is one stat of many that breaks down hitting percentage. Hitting percentage is a combination of error % and kill %. Both parts are essential to a hitter and a team’s success. For example, the average Hitting IPE of the four final four teams was .875. This number can become a team’s season goal. In addition to this goal, the average kill percentage of the final four teams was 0.455, with one team far exceeding this average of 0.529 – care to guess which team?
A combination of IPE and Kill % can be used as a guide for players and teams to measure their level of success versus the competition. If a team has an IPE of 0.875 or a goal of 9 out of 10 attempts in play, PLUS has a kill % of .455 or 5 balls out of 10 attacks as kills, the team has a greater chance for offensive success.