What drives the decision to start in a certain rotation? That is the question addressed by Mark in this clip excerpted from his interview. Ideas such as matching up on the basis of serve reception and other factors, and starting with the strongest rotation are discussed.
Tag: volleyball coaching strategy
Expectations and playing time
In this excerpt from his Volleyball Coaching Wizards interview, Vital Heynen talks about how he develops and manages expectations both internally with the team and externally with management. He also shares his philosophy on distributing playing time among his players.
Vital led the German National Team to a bronze medal at the 2014 World Championships, then Poland to gold in 2018. He won numerous league and cup titles coaching in his native Belgium, and has also coached professionally in Germany, Poland and Turkey.
Note, John & Mark expand on Vitals comments in Episode 29 of the Podcast.
Things not working quite as expected
In this excerpt from his Volleyball Coaching WIzards interview, Vital Heynen talks how sometimes the things you try in your coaching can have unanticipated effects.
Vital led the German National Team to a bronze medal at the 2014 World Championships, then Poland to gold in 2018. He won numerous league and cup titles coaching in his native Belgium, and has also coached professionally in Germany, Poland and Turkey.
Post-Match Team Talks
In this excerpt from his Volleyball Coaching Wizards interview, US high school coach Tom Turco shares his approach to speaking with his teams after the match.
Tom Turco has won 18 state high school championships in Massachusetts, where he has coached for over 30 years. His teams won a record 110 straight matches between 2003 and 2007. Tom was selected as the AVCA National Coach of the Year in 2008 and the NHSCA National Volleyball Coach of the Year in 2012.
You can hear more on this subject from John & Mark in Episode 14 of the Podcast.
Breaking the game down in to manageable chunks
In this excerpt from his Volleyball Coaching Wizards interview, Mike Lingenfelter talks about breaking games down into sub-games to give players more immediate goals. He shares what he calls his “high five” of team objectives for each set.
Mike Lingenfelter is co-director and 18s Samaurai coach for the Munciana Juniors volleyball club. His teams have won four national Juniors championships, reached the finals four other times, and finished third on three occasions. As a high school coach he won three Indiana state titles and was select Coach of the Year three times. Mike started his coaching career in NCAA Division I volleyball. He is a frequent coaching clinic presenter.
You can hear more on this topic in Episode 13 of the Podcast.
Coaching to the performance not the score
In this excerpt from his Volleyball Coaching Wizards interview, US college coach Joel Dearing shares his approach to coaching during a match. In particular, he discusses the importance of focusing on the team’s performance more than paying attention to the score.
Joel Dearing coached a total of 40 seasons of collegiate volleyball – mainly on the women’s side, and mostly at Springfield College. He recorded over 700 NCAA Division III victories, putting him in the Top 10 all-time. He head to Springfield men to a final #1 ranking in his final season coaching them. He was the AVCA Regional Coach of the Year 5 times. Joel coached 10 All-Americans. He is the author of two volleyball books, is on the board of the Volleyball Hall of Fame, and is a long-time member of the USA Volleyball CAP cadre. In 2019 he was inducted in to the AVCA Hall of Fame.
John & Mark expand on this topic in Episode 12 of the Podcast. More from Joel’s interview also comes up in Episode 15.
Avoiding specializing players early
In this excerpt from her Volleyball Coaching Wizards interview, Ruth Nelson talks about the disadvantages of early specialization in players. In particular, she brings up not just developing a more well-rounded sense of the game, but also suggests it increases one’s enjoyment of the sport.
Ruth Nelson is a member of the AVCA Hall of Fame. She won over 500 matches in 16 years coaching NCAA Division I volleyball. She was an assistant coach for the USA Women’s National team under legendary coach Arie Selinger and was head coach for the US Junior National Team. Ruth also coached professional volleyball and ran volleyball for the Special Olympics for many years. She currently runs a youth volleyball program called Bring Your Own Parent (BYOP).
Respect and playing weaker teams
In this excerpt from his Volleyball Coaching Wizards interview, Simon Loftus talks about the value of respecting the opposition and having objectives for matches against weaker opposition other than simply winning.
Simon became the first coach of a Scottish national volleyball team to win a championship when he led the Scotland men to the 2012 Novatel Cup title. As coach of the men’s and women’s program at Leeds Met University in England, his teams won 6 U.K. university (BUCS) championships and 5 Volleyball England Student Cups. He has also coached professionally in Sweden and has NCAA coaching experience.