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Tip by Tim Eyre, Ogden, Utah.  We do a drill called 1:2:1 to help teach mental toughness in stringing points together. Team A serves to team B. If team A wins the rally they are given a free ball. If team A wins that rally they are given another free ball to play out, again if they win that rally they now have the chance to serve for a point. if at any time team B wins any of the rallies, the ball switches sides and team B becomes the serving team. One team must score four times in a...

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".

Tip by Sue Leonard, Fort Defiance, VA. 5-Minute Serve Receive Drill with Middles One side of the net has 3 passers, 1 setter and 1 middle. The other side has servers. In five minutes the team needs (depends on the level of your team) anywhere between 35-50 good passes. The middles are set off of every pass. We alternate middles and setters after 5 swings each. Team rotates from servers to passers. Passers rotates from position 5 to 6 to 1 and to server. Great drill for endurance, especially working the middle hitters. There is always some kind of penalty...

Tip by Karan Price, Altoona Area, PA. To help players who struggle serving right after a timeout in a match, we have now started randomly picking players to go to the service line after a drink break at practice. We put a "consequence" on the line for the entire team if they error. In our recent winter junior high league playoffs, we had two players go to the line after timeouts and serve with confidence because they had already felt the pressure and been successful in practice.