Ball, Stanley and Giba...

Russian League Match Comments
Iskra Odintsovo vs. Dynamo Kazan

Dinamo TTG Kazan Roster (wearing Blue)
1 - Lloy Ball (USA)
2 - Pavel Zaytsev
3 - Alexander Kosarev
5 - Alexander Bogomolov
7 - Alexey Bovduy
8 - Sergey Tetyukhin
9 - Artem Ermakov
11 - Nikolay Apalikov
13 - Clayton Stanley (USA)
14 - Andrey Egorchev
15 - Alexander Gerasimov
17 - Vladislav Babichev

Iskra Odintsovo Roster (wearing Red )
1 - Denis Kalinin
2 - Oleg Samsonychev
4 - Sergey Khoroshev
5 - Pavel Abramov
6 - Alexey Kuleshov
7 - Gilberto Godoy Filho (BRA) Giba
8 - Alexander Butko (BLR)
9 - Mikhail Beketov
10 - Jochen Schops (GER)
12 - Taras Khtey
16 - Anton Astashenkov
18 - Alexey Verbov

The Russian national team libero #18-Alexey Verbov and #6-Alexey Kuleshov are on Iskra. I see both teams have Mizuno uniforms. I wonder if all teams in this league are wearing Mizuno?

Set One
Early on, Stanley starts with 3 hard serves followed by Giba returning three hard serves. Stanley and Ball hook up on the right side often. Initially, Stanley looks unstoppable with a mix of line, cross, splitting the blockers or just plain tooling. Giba, too, is unstoppable from both the front row and the pipe set. Iskra Odintsovo wins first set 25-21.

I notice fans have oval wooden paddles with a strap they use for clapping and there are a fair number of troops dressed in fatigues in the stands.

Set Two
Dynamo Kazan goes ahead 19-15 but loses 5 straight points on a combination of hitting errors and getting stuffed. After trading points, Giba serves into the net. By looking at his face, the Iskra Odintsovo coach was not happy! Stanley is serving for Dynamo Kazan but he hits it long making it 22-21 Iskra Odintsovo. The next serve Giba receives it short, backs up and takes a pipe set. Giba’s attack is over passed back over the net after a soft block. Iskra Odintsovo sets a quick middle after the overpass but the middle hits it out wide.

At 23 all and after a short rally, Stanley blasts from the backrow right side but is dug. The dig flies out past the end and side lines but the Iskra libero Alexey Verbov pursued the ball all the way into the Dynamo Kazan bench. Iskra returned a free ball. The free ball was again set by Ball to Stanley on the right side but he was stuffed straight down. 24-23 Iskra Odintsovo. It was tied back up at 24 but two quick points gave Iskra Odintsovo the victory 26-24 putting them up two sets to none.

General Observations
Ball doesn't seem to set the middles very often even on good serve receive. The Dynamo Kazan middle Andrey Egorchev (#14) is tall, has a big frame but is a little slow. Perhaps that is the reason he doesn't get set. The Iskra Odintsovo coach reminds me of Bill Murray, the actor, especially when he makes his funny faces reacting to plays. Russian telecasts do a great job of catching the facial expressions of the players and coaches. They then include these expressions in their time out video highlight medleys.

I wonder how they communicate on these teams? I guess players like Ball and Stanley have picked up enough Russian to get by. I am guessing Rooney (playing on Dinamo-Yantar) as a rookie in Russia, might find it more difficult. Of course, you could put up with the difficult communications for the money they pay! I suppose they have players & coaches that can assist in the translation. There are also many signals and gestures that are common throughout the world, such as out, no touch, touch, the look of frustration....

Set Three
In the third set, Iskra Odintsovo goes ahead early but Dynamo Kazan attempts a comeback with a 4 point run. However, Iskra Odintsovo continues to maintain a 2-3 point lead for the middle point of the match. In one play, Ball backsets Stanley for a Dynamo Kazan BR right side. Stanley slams it home straight down the line. I noticed Stanley looking through the net with a big smile just after the play. I wasn't sure what he was smiling at until I saw the replay. The Iskra Odintsovo libero had read cross and ran from the line to the middle of the court leaving the line shot wide open. As I stated before, the Iskra Odintsovo libero 18 - Alexey Verbov is very animated and must have been the reason for the smile. I guess Iskra Odintsovo got the last smile as they stuff blocked Stanley on the very next play.

Late in the 3rd set they pull Ball and Stanley (after Stanley missed his serve) and replaced them with another setter Pavel Zaytsev (#2) and a different opposite. Iskra Odintsovo won 25-22 anyway.

Boy’s High School Volleyball Grows 16.2%

According to the National Federation of High Schools (NFHS) report released on September 5th, boy’s high school volleyball continued its growth pattern. During the 2006-2007 school year, the number of schools having boy’s volleyball programs grew from 1,726 schools to 2,006 schools, a 16.2% increase.



The number of boys participating in boy’s high school volleyball grew from 42,878 to 46,224, an increase of 3,346 boys. The 46,224 participation number now exceeds the 1973-1974 numbers (43,050) and is the third highest rate since NFHS has collected and published the participation information. The NFHS results are based on figures from the 50 state high school athletic/activity associations, plus the District of Columbia that are members of the NFHS.

The highest number of boys participating in high school volleyball according to NFHS records is 63,544 which occurred during the 1971-1972 school year. The following year, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (Title IX) legislation was passed. In an unfortunate side-effect of an otherwise very positive goal, boy’s and men’s volleyball opportunities shrank drastically as schools attempted to comply with Title IX requirements.

Graphs of boy’s high school volleyball participation and growth rates can be found at: High School Program Growth

Men's News Tidbits

More AVCA/USAV Coaching Meeting Notes
During the meeting that occurred during July (at the JO’s), the topic of raising the number of scholarship equivalents from 4.5 to 7 was discussed. The MPSF is working with their coaches and administrators to garner support. The next step would be to approach the NCAA. The MPSF members agreed to hold off raising the issue to the NCAA until AFTER the acceptance of expanding the NCAA Championship tournament from 4 teams to 8 teams. The Championship expansion issue is already in front of the NCAA. It was approved in concept but was not funded in the last budget cycle. Hopefully, it will get funded this year!

NORCECA Continental Championships
The US national team performed well, as expected, against the NORCEA teams during the championship. They captured the Gold Medal earning a spot in Novembers World Cup. The top 3 teams of the World Cup will earn a spot in the 2008 Olympics. They only lost two sets in the entire tournament. The sad thing is the attendance. Now that the national team has moved to Southern California for training purposes, you would think they could draw more than 900 fans at the Gold Medal match. They drew a total of 3,625 total cumulative fans during their 5 matches. In comparison, the European Championship match held in Russia, had 9,300 in attendance in that one match! Volleyball may have been invented in the US but the rest of the world has sure embraced the game more aggressively.

National Team Video
I was in discussions with USAV about their plans on sharing video of the tournament with the fans. USAV is working on an upgrade to their website that would allow them to provide more video but it isn’t completed at this time. I have offered to host match video on Middle Hitter as an alternative until the USAV website is ready. USAV said they would consider the alternative and get back to me. Hopefully, one way or another, the fans who do not live in Southern California can see some of the action.

I have seen two short video’s with members of the national team on YouTube recently. The first one was “USA Volleyball Short Shorts”. The second one was "Danny Kinda and Team USA". Both videos are funny, at least for those fans who really follow men's volleyball. They must be sanctioned by USAV because several players are in each video and the second video even has Coach McCutcheon! Check em out... Since many of the national team players played way before most of the high school age players even thought about volleyball, it is good for the kids to see the players in something more than a few photos and statistics.

DI Schools Who Can Afford to Expand

In between the two four day sessions of the USAV Junior Olympic National Tournament held in Atlanta this past July, the AVCA and USAV held a coaches meeting on the status of men's and boy's volleyball. Several topics were discussed but I am going to focus on DI expansion during this post.

Kathy DeBoer, AVCA Executive Director shared a report with the attendees that listed all the Division IA programs and their Title IX proportionality numbers. The list highlighted schools that had the potential to "overcome" the Title IX issue because they had a higher percentage of female athletes than the percentage of total female undergraduates. For example, the University of Cincinnati has a 50.5% female to male ratio of athletes but only a 47.3% female to male undergraduates ratio. In short, Cincinnati could add male athletes at the varsity level and not fail the Title IX test.

Of course, Title IX is not the only reason for DI schools not sponsoring a varsity sport. There is always the program costs issue. However, most schools use the Title IX issue as their excuse.

The list provided to the attendees highlighted both DI schools who were "just below" the female to male ratio comparison and several that had a higher female to male ratio. The schools that had "room to spare" include:
Cincinnati
Georgia Tech
Kansas State
Maryland
Michigan
Nevada-Reno
Oklahoma State
Purdue
Toledo
U.S. Military Academy-Army

The source quoted by AVCA/USAV was the WSF article in USA Today. The list is larger if it includes those highlighted because they are near the ratio.

Cincinnati, Georgia Tech, Kansas State, Maryland and Purdue were all at the most recent NIRSA national tournament. Do they want to upgrade to a varsity program????

The Off Season

Thank goodness the national teams are active, otherwise this would be a very slow season for men's volleyball. I don't mind watching some AVP action but I have a strong preference for the 6 man indoor version of volleyball. Maybe it is because my age has caught up with me and covering the sand court with two people is totally exhausting for me (after only 3 or 4 rallies), :)

The Men's National Team had a great World League tournament. It is good to see the USA back into the medals for an international tournament. Their "older" roster of players performed well against many of their competitors who were using younger, less-experienced players intentionally or due to injury. I think the momentum will boost their confidence as they enter the 2008 Olympic qualifying tournament rounds. It does worry me some that they still have to play some teams who will bring their experienced rosters to these tournaments and the Olympics. Only time will tell.

A couple of months ago, I noticed that the Canadian National Team website listed Anaheim as the playing location for a September tournament. I looked at the USAV and NORCECA websites and could not find any tournament listed for Anaheim. I suspected the NORCECA tournament would be the one listed on the Canadian website. This was confirmed last weeek when USAV announced the tournament will be played in Anaheim September 16th through the 21st. I know the California fans were complaining when World League didn't schedule one of the three weekends in California. It looks like USAV already knew that California was getting the NORCECA. The NORCECA tournament will provide locals to see a lot more than one team and a lot more matches than a World League event. So congratulations.

I am starting a list of "things to do" for the Middle Hitter website this upcoming collegiate season. I will share some of them on another post.

Let's see if I can keep my resolutions to post more frequently this year, at least during the off-season.

Investing In The Future

I am capturing this article in my blog since I will eventually be moving the article off of the home page.

In the post-match press conference after Team USA’s 3-0 World League victory over Italy, there were several discussions by both coaches on the future of their teams. I thought I would share some of their thoughts and comments.

Coach Gianpaolo Montali, the head coach of the Italian National Team took some time to discuss his philosophy for the 2007 World League competition. Coach Montali became the head coach in 2003 and his many accomplishments include the silver medal in the 2004 Athens Olympics.
The Italian team currently has four experienced players who are recovering from injuries and did not travel with the team to the US. Players such as Luigi Mastrangelo (MH), Matej Cernic, and Alessandro Fei (MH) are expected to return to the team this fall. Although they may have missed some practice with the team, the Italians will be ready for 2008 Olympic qualification tournaments including the key European Championships qualifier.

During the World League series, Coach Montali stated that he was using this opportunity to prepare his less experienced players for the future. He feels the experience they gain in the World League will prepare them for competition in 2009-2010. While he feels the athletes are very good, they do not have the experience necessary to play at the highest level. Montali offered an example using Saturday night’s second set against the US. The Italians has three match points but were unable to close it for a victory. The US ended up winning the set 30-28. Coach feels that a more experienced team would have most likely been able to turn those opportunities into a winning set for Italy instead of the US. Coach Montali also offered that the roster he has chosen for the World League matches in Chicago would most likely not qualify for the Olympics based on that inexperience.

Montali was also asked if he would prefer if his national team players would stay in the Italian leagues during the off-season. He mentioned that Matej Cernic, who played for Fakel Novi Urengoi in Russia this past season, was one player who did not. Coach stated that he personally did not have a problem if team members did not play in the Italian league.

Coach Hugh McCutcheon, the head coach of the USA National team also offered some insightful comments regarding the future. Another reporter inquired why Sean Rooney did not have substantial playing time while playing here in his home town. Sean did substitute in for the setter in a blocking role for a couple of occasions during the two Chicago matches. Coach McCutcheon responded with the fact that Sean is a great athlete and represents the future for US national team. Coach did start Sean for the first couple of matches in Portland and allowed Sean to play most of the sets in those matches. The reason he choose Riley Salmon to start along with Reid Priddy was based on Salmon’s experience and its impact on the team’s passing consistency. Coach stated that Sean is a good passer and was known as a good passer in his NCAA college level but international volleyball is “light years” ahead. McCutcheon once again emphasized that Sean is a great asset and can continue to develop into a key national team player.

Coach McCutcheon was asked if the Korean league that Sean has played in for the past two years was strong enough to develop Sean’s skills to the level he desired. While McCutcheon did not respond regarding the Korean league specifically, he did mention that he understood Sean was talking to 3 or 4 other teams in other leagues. He also offered that he believes Sean realizes that the money is better in indoor volleyball than beach volleyball but that it is a choice for Sean to make regarding whether he wants to play AVP.

Lastly, Coach McCutcheon stated that US players are slightly handicapped in developing to world class volleyball players due to the NCAA rules. In other countries, the college age players are not restricted by NCAA rules on numbers of practices and hours of practice. As a result, the foreign players get more “reps” in at an earlier age and develop faster. This is the reason many of the US players develop at a later age (post-college).

While both coaches are focused on improving their current team, both have an eye on the future...

USA Completes Sweep of Hobbled Italian Team, 3-0

I am capturing this article in my blog since I will eventually be moving the article off of the home page.

The US National Team completed their home sweep of the Italians in World League play Saturday evening in front of 3,720 fans in Chicago. The scores were 25-19, 30-28 and 25-23. The Asics Junior National Championship tournament also being held in Chicago provided an additional source of fans from both local and out-of-town junior players and their parents. Pockets of junior players could be seen throughout the crowd, some still in their team uniform shirts.

The Team USA starting rotation included three different players tonight compared to their starting rotation on Friday night’s match. Kevin Hansen, who saw action in the 4th set Friday night, was the starting setter Saturday. Tom Hoff, who occasionally subbed into Fridays match in a blocking role for a few plays, was one of the starting middles. Hoff replaced David Lee. Lastly, Clay Stanley who was only used as a serving specialist Friday night was the starting opposite, replacing Gabe Gardner.

On the Italian side, Alessandro Farina, the Italian starting libero Friday night, was unable to play Saturday night. Prior to the match, Farina felt disoriented and nearly passed out. There was no prognosis on his condition at the post-match press conference. In his place, Alessandro Paparoni became the starting libero. This impacted the Italian offensive power Saturday night as Paparoni was a key attacker with 14 kills on Friday night.

The first set was close for the first ten points with the last tie score being at 6-6. Clay Stanley and Reid Priddy kills began to stretch out the lead to a 3 or 4 point spread. Team USA put together a run of points resulting in an Italian time out with the score 20-17. Reid Priddy put together back-to-back aces moving the score to 22-17. The first ace was shanked while the second one hit the floor untouched between two players. Coach Montali performed a double sub with Matteo Martino replacing Alberto Cisolla and Mauro Gavutto replacing Lorenzo Perazzolo. Priddy’s next serve resulted in an out-of-system free ball back to the US side and a Riley Salmon kill, 23-17. Tom Hoff ended the set with a quick, 25-19. Statistically, the US hit .380 and Italy .180. Both teams had only two serving errors with the US getting one ace. Clay Stanley had seven kills with a .550 hitting percentage.

The second set was the best set of the match. After the US jumped to a 3-0 lead, the next several minutes of play resulted in side outs or two point runs. Italy tied the set at 16-16 when Priddy was called on a back-row attack while attempting a roll show on an out-of-system set. For the next couple of rally’s both team seemed to lose focus as they were standing around letting balls go unpursued and resulting in a several free balls back to each other. The score was tied again when Kevin Hansen attempted to bring an overpass serve receive back over the net and was called for a lift, 21-21. Coach McCutcheon called a time out just before the up official signaled for serve. After a Millar kill, Giordano Mattera surprised the US with a dump with no US blockers up, 22-22. Italy had the first three attempts at set point, 23-24, 24-25 and 25-26. An Italian mental mistake resulted in a 26-26 score when after making a good dig on a Hoff quick attack, they let the dig drop to the floor within a few feet of several players. Clay Stanley put the match away with back-to-back kills, 30-28. The US maintained its .550 hitting percentage while Italy improved to .350. The US had a cumulative 2 aces to 8 service errors and Italy had a total of 5 service errors with no aces. USA had 5 blocks and 12 digs. Team Italy has 2 blocks and 5 digs. Another notable difference was 10 Italian ball handling errors versus 5 for the US. Clay Stanley had 10 kills in the second set.

David Lee started for Ryan Millar in the third set. Christian Savani and Cisolla kept Italy in the match with their timely kills. After the technical time out, Kevin Hansen would not be given the serve signal until he realized the up official was asking him to tuck in his shirt tail. Once he complied his was signaled for serve. Cisolla’s strong play, assisted by an Andrea Sala block resulted in Italy taking a 13-10 lead. The US charged back and tied the score at 15-15 with two Riley Salmon aces. After being tied at 17-17 and 19-19, the US blocked Cisolla twice resulting in a 21-19 lead and an Italian time out. After exchanging points, a missed serve by both teams resulted in a 24-23 score. Riley Salmon’s roll serve ended up with Tom Hoff stuff blocking Savani for match point. Cumulative stats for the US: .440 hitting, 4 aces to 10 service errors, 14 digs and 10 blocks. Stats for Italy: .330 hitting, 0 aces to 8 service errors, 9 digs and 4 blocks.

In the post-match press conference, Captain Tom Hoff was asked about the significant improvement in service errors compared to Friday night. It was noted that many of tonight’s serves were more of a role shot versus a full hard swing. Hoff said that the team discussed their Friday night service errors and agreed to focus on improving Saturday night. That focus resulted in a reduction of 7 errors (10 down from 17) with six of them coming in the second set. Coach McCutcheon stated the general instruction is to swing away if they have a great toss but they should control their serves with a point of getting them in if the toss is not ideal. They believed their block could protect them if their half speed serves were in bounds.

I will share more of the non-match related press conference notes in a separate article.