Secret Goals in a 6x6 Drill
Tip by Terri Neujhar from Waverly, NE.
Playing 6x6 and finding different ways to score it/win it in practice is something we like to do to keep it fresh for the team. We like to play a take-off of the game Xontro, where a team needs to have so many of "X" things to happen to "win".
You can run this out of rotations and S/R, or just out of Freeballs introduced to each side. We also keep regular score in this game as a motivator to not lose track of the score just because you are working on executing a skill. As we are preparing for an opponent (or just working something we need to do for our team), we give each side 2-4 things on a note card they have to accomplish (secretly) from the other side. It may be execute so many short serves to a spot, hit so many slides line, setter dump to a spot, hit so many back row attacks, perfect pass so many balls, do many digs in system, attack so many out of system balls, etc...WHATEVER it is you need to work on for your team.
It doesn't mean you HAVE to kill them, just execute them. We can also give bonus points for "killing" one of their goals. Say your goal was 5 Slides and you kill one. Then that counts for 2, so now you only need 3 to accomplish that goal. First team to get all the goals done is the winner. After a winner is declared the kids try and guess what it was the opponent was trying to accomplish - this makes them more observant, as well, and transfers to matches. This is one of my teams' favorite 6x6 games to play!