News

Tip by Paul Oakes from Akron, Ohio. KNOCKOUTThis drill is used to work on keeping serves in, especially at critical moments at the end of a game/match. 2 teams. There will be a "serving team" and a "target team"(this can be done dividing the team by grade levels, or Varsity and J.V., or however you want them divided. Serving team only serves(one ball at a time). Players alternate through their selected rotation. Next serve cannot be contacted until the last serve is completed on opponents side. Non-servers(targets) stand on the other side of the net, between the 3-meter line and...

Drill by Taylor Stallman from Phoenix, AZ. A drill to emphasize 1st Ball Side Out (FBSO), and minimizing errors.One side serves 5 balls in each rotation. The other side receives the entire drill (or you can modify to alternate who serves and receives), and are the only team scoring. So if you go through all 6 rotations, there are a total of 30 balls served. After those 6 rotations you should have a point total, which the other team then tries to beat. The scoring works this way:3 points- First Ball Side Out2 points- Missed Serve by opponent1 point- Any...

Tip by Paul Dill, MIT in Cambridge, MA.   Dig To Self Triples:This is done in a Queen of the Court style with a coach feeding in a down ball to the winning side and losing team shagging and getting back in line. Coach feeds in down ball and a player must dig the ball to her/himself and then set a teammate either front or back row. The rally continues with the same dig to self rule in effect throughout. This teaches players to be accountable for a quality first touch since they must set the second touch. They also...

Tip by Craig Cummings in Jonesboro, AR. A 6v6 team defense drill I like to use early in our season to reinforce positive performance execution is Nev's for Points: The defensive side is in a specific rotation, and their goal is to earn 15 points from 20 balls. The offense side must run basic 4-1-c attack for the first 10 balls, after that they can run anything. Coach tosses to any of the five players on the offense side (setter has released). The defense can score a point from a: block, dig that the setter can use their hands on,...

Tip by Daniel Hart, Pulse Athletics VBC in Yorba Linda, CA. When coaching athletes on passing I use 3 basic questions to get them to understand what they are doing! Questions 1: Did the ball hit your "sweet spot"? The "sweet spot" is when the ball hits both of your arms evenly at the proper place. Most athletes tend to have the ball only hit one arm, hit their thumbs, or the ball hits the arm to high. We encourage the athletes to track the ball to their platform and this will help with having the ball consistently hitting the...