Volleyball Q&A

Episode 4: Thoughts on USAV 18s Nationals

• VBQA • Season 1 • Episode 4

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For this episode, we take a look at  the experience at 18s Nationals for USAV and provide reflections on  the importance of creating a positive and celebratory environment for players and their families, suggested improvements like considering the time zone of the event location and avoiding cities with high crime rates, and proposed creation of a new division for 18s to provide a fitting end for great players careers. 
Final thoughts emphasize the need for USAV to adapt to the changing landscape of volleyball and continue providing valuable experiences for its participants.

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Speaker 1:

Welcome back everybody to another episode of the Volleyball Q&A Podcast. This week I'm not going to so much do a question and answer, I'm going to do a reaction, as I just got back from 18s Nationals for USAV and I wanted to give some thoughts after coming back. But I also wanted to give it some time after the event so that there's not a lot of emotionality involved, because Nationals is inherently an extremely emotional tournament. To start, I think it's important to understand that I've been to 18s Nationals before as a parent. A few years ago the club we were at, our 18s team, qualified at the American level and the girls all decided towards the end of the season that they were going to go to prom, all except one. They told the club director that they weren't going to go to nationals in Phoenix. That's where it was being held that particular year. Well, our club director also happened to be the coach of our team that season and he asked if they wanted to go play and almost all of our entire team jumped at the opportunity to go. So at the last minute we kind of all jumped in, got on a plane, flew to Phoenix and it was really and truly one of the most fun tournaments I've ever been to in my life. The atmosphere there was unlike anything tournaments I've ever been to in my life. The atmosphere there was unlike anything that I've ever seen at any of our previous tournaments. It was closer to AAU Nationals than it was a USAV tournament.

Speaker 1:

The parents were all so optimistic there, regardless of the level that they were playing. They were all so excited for their girls and to celebrate the journey that they'd been on. We stayed in a hotel that was a little ways away from the actual convention center, but it was a great setup because they had an awesome breakfast buffet, which made a really easy situation for us getting ready in the mornings to go play. As parents, we would come down, the girls were getting their plates and we would get food to eat. And it didn't matter if you knew the parents on another team, if you'd ever seen them before and we weren't familiar with a lot of them because it wasn't our age group and they were so excited about asking us to come over and sit down, talking about their journey, talking about where their girls were going to college if they were even going to college and just how excited they were to watch their girls play one more time.

Speaker 1:

It was a great city to hold it in because it was warm weather. The time zone was fantastic for everybody involved. There was a lot to do in the evenings. That was a more celebratory lot to do in the evenings. That was a more celebratory, upbeat kind of situation and it was just such a fun tournament to participate in. We had an absolute blast.

Speaker 1:

Part of it, I think, did have to do with the fact that we weren't expected to do anything, so we were sort of playing with house money, and that really was the first time in a long time that we'd played a tournament just for fun, with no real pressure or expectations, even though we brought our coach and our coach expected us to go out and play and win and push hard. It wasn't the same pressure level or the same expectation level. That was win or die does win or die. All of those things combined made for an extremely fun, upbeat, optimistic tournament, and that imprinted in my head as to what 18s Nationals was going to be when we eventually got there. It's what I really wanted to see was this overly positive, really excited celebration time for the sacrifices as a family that we've all made for the girls and the work that they've put in for their careers and just to really focus on a special group of kids that makes it all the way through to 18s, regardless of the level that they're finishing at. I would have to say that 18s nationals for our actual 18s year in Baltimore didn't quite deliver that same experience and I wanted to understand why that was and if it was really about me and our experience or if it really was something that's more universal. I tried to separate out the things that were more personal, just to us, and then look at if there were any objective things that could be feedback for 18s Nationals going forward that could make the event consistently such a fun, exciting ending chapter to all of these players' careers, which I think they deserve. So with that in mind, I'm going to give you some thoughts for 18 Nationals going forward. This is for USAV. I have no notion that they will ever listen to this or care about this in any way whatsoever. It's just an echo chamber. That might make me feel better and maybe you agree, or maybe it gives you some expectation as you head towards 18s at the end of your career. I also think that some of these things can apply to nationals for the younger age groups, but this really only applies to the experience this year at 18s, and if it does apply to other nationals, that's purely coincidental.

Speaker 1:

Number one is an item that I already alluded to, and it's time zone. I just don't think Nationals should ever be any further east than the central time zone, with the exception of Florida, if they're going to hold it in Florida. It's an extreme competitive disadvantage for West Coast teams traveling to the East Coast to have a three-hour differential and that just doesn't promote the highest level of competitive play. Now I realize I said something about Florida and it has that as well, but there are a lot of efficiencies at play in Orlando and those cities that are used to holding events of this size that can somewhat offset that three-hour differential. It's still not ideal, but think about a team from LA when they have an 8 am match and it's 5 am their time. The other side of it is going west allows West Coast teams to not have to acclimate to different times, but it also doesn't adversely affect the East and Central teams. The one exception to that is if pools do run really late and there is a pm to am type situation, but crossovers can easily be moved to earlier on day two to ensure those late times don't occur in the most competitive divisions.

Speaker 1:

These events that are crowning national champions are built for the highest levels to appoint the best teams, so they do deserve the most accommodation. I know everybody's paying the same thing. I know everybody's on the hook for the same amount of money, but this is ultimately about sports and figuring out who's the best and winning is the number one thing. So those top divisions deserve to be accommodated. First, working their way down and being able to push those crossovers earlier where they don't have to leave the facility for five hours and then come back at 7 pm and play for an early game the next morning, that's an easy, easy fix. So, overall, being able to move west versus moving east in my mind levels the playing field quite a bit more and it doesn't put anyone at a decided disadvantage, the same way that moving from west to east does, where you can have teams that are having to get up at really early times in their particular time zone and trying to play games when they would normally be asleep.

Speaker 1:

Number two cities that are in the top five for crime rate in the United States shouldn't be destinations for thousands of teenage girls, many of whom are bringing younger siblings along with them. In our time that we've done nationals, we've gotten to have Las Vegas, not on the Mandalay Inn but at the convention center, and that created some really interesting conversations that we had to explain to our daughter walking to and from the hotel. Number two we've had Detroit, and during our time in Detroit the downtown area right around the convention center was really nice, but it was about a two mile radius that we were allowed to be in, and the nights we were there there was a mandatory curfew because it was 4th of July and there was concern of gunshots at the same time as fireworks. And then number three was Baltimore. Now I understand that profitability matters. I understand convention center costs, tax incentives, hotel kickbacks, but if this experience continues, particularly at 18s, you're going to lose families. When we arrived in Baltimore, we took our Uber to the hotel. When we pulled up to the hotel it was later in the evening and we asked our driver where's a good place for us to eat dinner tonight. His direct response was nowhere after dark, stay in the hotel. So that was number one.

Speaker 1:

Number two I'm going to read you a text message that came from a parent of something that occurred when they were out and about in broad daylight. So we met up with so-and-so and fam walking back from Cheesecake Factory and they had just gotten off paddleboats and I guess there was a floating body right in front of them. We had kids in a paddleboat in a main tourist area in a harbor across from our hotel and the police were actually lifting a dead body out of the water when they were paddleboating in that water. That's not something that 18-year-old girls should be seeing or dealing with when they're at nationals and there are places to go, that the percentage chance of that occurring are much lower. This is another text message from a parent on a different team that they sent and said Yesterday at like 4.50 pm, while in broad daylight with tons of people walking all over the Inner Harbor area, we saw a kid get mugged and beaten down by a mob of other kids in ski masks while waiting in line for ice cream.

Speaker 1:

It was horrible. So many people around. No one did anything. My heart hurt for him and was so scared to say anything. They took his shoes right off his feet, his backpack and dug in his pockets, all while he was kicking at him and trying to get up to run away. It was unreal. Guys, we got to do better when we're picking destinations for where we're putting thousands of teenage girls. Travel is getting more and more expensive and more and more of a burden on parents, and the experience is going to have to deliver in some way just at a reasonable level. We can't have dead bodies and muggings in front of kids in between play.

Speaker 1:

Number three I'm going to go against something that I said earlier just a little bit. I know that the key objective of this event is to determine a champion, but this event really and truly needs to be a celebration for 18-. This event really and truly needs to be a celebration for 18 year olds. It needs to be a celebration for parents that have given up a lot. It needs to be a celebration for families, siblings, all of those people that have given so much over the years. You know what 10, 11, whatever it is through 17,. If you want to go, do different parts of the country because it's more profitable, that's great. It still shouldn't be unsafe, but warm weather cities or cities where there are things to do for entire families to celebrate together as a family as a team, as a club and as an age group. That really needs to be a priority. Families have funded a lot for USA Volleyball over these years and it would be really nice for USAV to take a look back and say we want to give you an experience and say thank you for all of the things, all of the resources, all of the support and the journey that you guys have been on with us through this, and we want to celebrate your girls.

Speaker 1:

So I want to reflect back on Phoenix and there's a reason why that event was what it was. It was in a great city with great weather, with a great destination. It was inherently joyful, based on where we were and the nature of the city, and there wasn't sort of this cloud of fear hanging over you in terms of crime. It was very conducive to family, team and community celebrations. I never got that feeling from people in Baltimore. It felt heavy.

Speaker 1:

The convention center felt heavy. It's nice but it's built in a different era and it has very much inspiration of brutalist architecture in there. I mean even down to the foyer when you walk in a lot of times we've gone into these and there's a lot of decoration, there's music playing for the girls. It's a really high energy type situation because the weather is great when you're getting there. The interior of the convention center that's relatively new looks great. Everyone is optimistic.

Speaker 1:

That component never entered the fray when we were in Baltimore, and that's something that needs to be looked at heavily is to say you guys, on average I don't know what are you spending 20 grand a year, 15 grand a year for eight years? That's a lot of money, right? We want to say thank you for this and we also want to celebrate your girls that have defied the odds. And this needs to be a great situation for you, your family, your club and the entire sport to celebrate Watching these girls go on to whatever it is they're going to move on to. Okay, this is my last key point and it's a little bit thinking off the wall here, but I believe that USAV needs to create a new division, or rebrand the Freedom Division, specifically for the 18s.

Speaker 1:

18s is one of the strangest years I've ever been a part of. It really has a unique set of challenges that no other age group has to deal with. The girls are in a different life stage and the pressures that are put on them and pull them from so many different directions is something that's new, different and unique from the other age groups. There is so much attrition on teams throughout the season you could have injuries, prom, somebody commits and they feel like that they're done. They don't need to be committed to a team anymore and they can leave Finances priorities when the team's not as good. They make commitments at the beginning of the season and they understand what those commitments are and then, when it comes time to enforce them, many times other pressures take over and they will obliterate teams throughout the season. I don't think we've ever been on a team that's lost this many players throughout the course of a season for all kinds of different reasons. We lost players before the season started, we lost players throughout the season and we lost players right before nationals. It was really one of the strangest things where the team didn't resemble really what we started out with. I know that's happened to a lot of other teams throughout the country.

Speaker 1:

Just trying to cobble together a team to get to nationals is a pretty big deal, and if your team is the same team at the end of the season that you started with, it is almost a miracle. So what I would like to propose is open, stays open. It is the gold standard, it's the one you signed up for. It's the one that really and truly determines the national champion for USA Volleyball. But it would really be kind of amazing if there was an AAU-like division that's below open but is still highly competitive. There are a lot of great players who sat home during nationals, really great players that are going to go play on great teams in college because their teams imploded for various different reasons. And for kids that are going to play in college, by the time AAU rolls around they're already at school, they've already reported and they're already playing. Why not give them the opportunity their 18th year to finish strongly or have a great finish? That's a celebratory finish.

Speaker 1:

So let's create a division that is not open and will not determine a national champion, but allows teams to be a little more flexible, and it doesn't hold you to just having to have kids that are within your club, that are tied to that particular roster because of helping them qualify City from another club that didn't make it, and put together some teams and go play one more time, just for the sheer joy of competing and for the sheer joy of having a happy ending to a season, rather than the season ending with them sitting at home and watching on baller TV or checking the scores on AES. It would be a really interesting thing because it would allow teams that lost core players to replace those players and go play at a high level. Allowing those opportunities for eight teams from other clubs other teams to come in and put together a team for one more run just for fun like what AAU offers can almost be therapeutic and it allows for a joyous end to a career rather than just sitting at home or knowing you're going to go get hammered at nationals because you've lost a huge chunk of your team. It's not even the team you qualified with. Aau is not filling the void at 18s. They are doing it at the younger age groups and there is something that's really valuable and significant about what AAU offers but their 18s just happens to fall way too late, so it ends up being non-competitive and ineffective. I wish I could impart to you the number of players and the number of times that having AAU at the end of the season provided emotional closure and a restart for girls that had really hard seasons, and it stinks for your 18s year to be that hard season and kind of go out on a flat note. I think it would be awesome for USAV to offer that type division. It creates logistical issues in terms of if a team qualifies at one level and then half their team quits, what do they do with those bids that those teams had won? How do they manage all of it? I know, organizationally, there's a way to do it, because AAU does it. I know there's a way to do it because teams vacate bids, or they get another bid or qualify up, and then those other bids go to at large pools. I think there's a way to do it to put some time behind it, but it would allow great players to have great experiences at the end of their 18s career, rather than just being at home or being at a tournament knowing they're going to get their brains beaten in because half their team is gone.

Speaker 1:

I do believe volleyball is in a critical time right now. I believe its popularity is at an all-time high, and there's stats to support that Participation is at an all-time high. Resources now, though, are becoming stretched, and experiences, in my opinion, are starting to suffer because of the sheer scale of things. I know that we have gotten diminishing returns as we've gotten older and the inflation of things has gone up. That all leads to a point where you're moving towards a peak, but the closer you get to a peak, the closer you are to it turning and going back down or sliding. So as an organization, you have to be really mindful about where you are. And how can we continue to create experiences for people that are on level or above what they're spending so that they feel like they're getting adequate value out of it? I absolutely don't want to see the sport contract. I really would love to see leadership continue to be really judicious in their reviews and be proactive in experiences to keep the sport growing. Because I love volleyball.

Speaker 1:

I think one other key thing is we're getting close to the end of one generation of parents and a different generation is coming up and they're wired very differently than we are and a lot of the things that worked with us I don't believe will work with the next generation. I also think and I think this is very much to their credit and was a failing of our group was they're a lot less afraid to take their money and go somewhere else. They're a lot less afraid of using their expendable income on things that give them joy, and they're not necessarily so focused on. This is just the way things are. They're a lot more willing to try to push things for change. Usav is going to need to take note of that.

Speaker 1:

So those are my thoughts after 18s Nationals. If you were there and you had a different experience, I'd love to hear it. If you have other thoughts and suggestions that you want to throw in the ring, that's great too. Thanks for taking a minute to listen, and we'll return back to our standard programming next week. Feel free to email me at vballqa, at gmailcom, or find me on Twitter and Facebook at vballqa, or on Instagram at volleyballqna, if you want to comment, submit a question or be a guest on the show. You can also subscribe for future episodes through Apple Podcasts and Spotify or on your favorite podcast directory.