“Why We Win” (A curiosity of AVCA seminars)

A disclaimer right off the bat–this isn’t criticism of the AVCA, the U.S. organization of volleyball coaches.  That needs to be clear since what I’m going to discuss involves seminars held at their convention in Pittsburgh in conjunction with the Women’s Final Four. It’s about mindset.

Quite a while back, the AVCA started a panel called “Why We Win” which allowed attendees to ask questions of and get answers from top coaches. Initially, these seminars were with NCAA D1 coaches from the previous year’s Final Four or who’d been close several times.  I went to one, but I didn’t find anything useful–set your best hitter as much as possible, that sort of stuff.  As I’ve noted several times on the blog, women’s coaches are often secretive and share very little. If you want to hear top coaches give you the scoop, go to the men’s Final Four/AVCA Spring Convention. Men’s coaches there will talk to you about any/everything from mental toughness to optimal spin rate on a jump serve. To be fair though to the presenters of those first massive ‘Why We Win’ sessions, it’s definitely difficult as a coach to address an audience with coaches of all different skill levels and age-groups coached.

The panel proved popular enough that the AVCA decided to create multiples of this ‘Why We Win’ panel.  The logic is great–there are great coaches at the D2/D3/NAIA/NJCAA levels who would be happy to share what gives them the edge in creating successful programs.

That was an important change because I’m convinced there are D1 coaches who would flounder if forced to recruit at my level (while also doing fundraising, acting as conditioning coach, etc, etc…D3/NAIA coaches know what I’m talking about!).  It’s a different world.  High school, too.  There’s a ton different between coaching at a small rural school and a 3,000 student city school, right? (The opposite is also true–there are coaches who excel at other levels who would be unable to handle what comes with a NCAA D1 program.)

So here’s the question…coaches are like moths.  They don’t necessarily go where they should; they are drawn to the brightest lights.  If I ask a generic question, “Who know more, a high school coach or a NCAA D1 coach?” your reflex answer will naturally be ‘the college coach’, but is that automatically true?  Even if it is, is their knowledge transferable for your level?  I think there’s a good argument can be made for a skilled high school coach being in a better position to help with a quick skill evaluation and judgment of maturity levels than a college coach.

So anecdotally, I only know the rough attendance of two of the ‘Why We Win’ sessions out in Pittsburgh.  The first is the D1 coaching panel which was apparently quite full (I was told 85-90%…but I wasn’t in there, I relate this for comparison purposes and if I’m in error, please note it in the comments!).  The other was the two-year college panel where I was one of the panelists.  200 seats in the room.  How many attendees were in it?

Nope.

Lower that guess.

The answer?  12.

All twelve of the attendees were two-year college coaches already.  I don’t know the D3 attendance, but I was told that there was ‘no one’ there other than D3 coaches.

To me, that’s a problem.  If I was going to be in a session, it wouldn’t have been the NJCAA one; I’m already familiar with two-year colleges and honestly, I’ve got a successful program.  The one I wanted to go to was the D3 session–I want to know how those top teams convince kids to come while paying a lot of tuition money.  How do they emphasize the values of D3 as a level (maximizing the college ‘experience’ over just being an athlete)?  Are they recruiting nationally?  How do they work in conjunction with the admissions departments?  –I mean, I have a LOT of questions I’d like to ask because those are things I think would help me refine my own recruiting message. I want to ask questions about practice–they get less time than we do, so how do they maximize efficiency in training?

Which one would you have gone to?  Why?

It’s important to not prejudge the source of information when you are learning.  My guess as I write this is that it’ll get a ton of views/reads, not because of the content, but because coaches saw “Why We Win” and immediately started reading, looking for shortcuts to winning (spoiler–there are no legal shortcuts).  If it had not said “Why We Win”, would you have clicked on it? Did you click it because it mentions the AVCA in the title?

Another one…if you are a coach and you see a book titled, “50 Drills for Winning Volleyball”, are you more likely to buy that–or one titled something bland like “Power Volleyball”? (Choose wisely….)

A different possibility–how many people see the link on a place like Facebook and give it a thumb’s up without reading it (more than you may realize–I get to see all the click-thru data, average time spent on a post, etc on my dashboard)?

In any event–don’t get caught swarming the light like a moth.  That’s how you get bug-zapped.  Find the advantages no one else is seeking.  Find advantages you can use for the level YOU coach at–because it’s unlikely you’re coaching Dana Rettke, Kathryn Plummer, or a ‘shorty’ like Mikaela Foecke.

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And seriously, consider attending the AVCA’s spring convention if possible.   It has smaller attendance and you get a chance to talk with coaches quite a bit more and in smaller groups.  The presenters are high-quality, too.  When I went it included John Speraw, Pete Hansen, Kevin Hambly, and Charlie Sullivan, and they were able to ‘translate’ their ideas to all levels–whether that was high school boys, college women, or developing youth volleyball.

There you go.  Go out, absorb like a sponge, so you can go grow the game!

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And–I haven’t mentioned this in a while, but have you considered purchasing Like Heck She Isn’t a Volleyball Player?  It’s under $5 and supports all the free stuff on here.  Give up one Wendy’s 4-for-$4 and you get a ton of stuff to make you think!