The college and HS volleyball boom

[BoxsterCy]

Good article in Star Tribune today about the boom in women's volleyball. Even with the Gophers missing the Final Four the Target Arena is expected to be full this weekend. Some interesting comments in the article about HS girls participation numbers.

http://www.startribune.com/volleyba...-s-sports-takes-over-target-center/502643342/

The sport has grown nationally from one dominated by West Coast schools to one balanced in power by the Midwest, especially with the Big Ten’s burgeoning talent.

Okay, that's good for the midwest but with all of the Big 10 strength it's not necessarily good for the Cyclones at all.

In Minnesota, volleyball has become far more popular for high school girls than basketball, with 16,458 participants last school year compared with 12,206 for basketball, according to a nationwide database.

This probably gets batted around more in the WBB threads than the VB ones but it is so true.

Last year’s Final Four drew sellout crowds of 18,000-plus to the Sprint Center in Kansas City, Mo. The championship match — Nebraska over Florida — drew more than 1 million viewers on ESPN2, according to Sports Media Watch.

Target Center holds 18,104 for volleyball, and there are standing room only tickets available for Thursday, when No. 1 Stanford plays BYU, followed by Nebraska vs. Illinois. Saturday’s championship match is sold out.

 

[BCClone]

You attending the tourney. All those tall girls could send you into shock.

 

[CloniesForLife]

I personally find Women's volleyball to be much more entertaining than Women's Basketball.

 

[Cyfan1965]

We go and play Northern Lights volleyball club teams and they have so many teams at every age group it is crazy.

You attending the tourney. All those tall girls could send you into shock.

We were in Indianapolis a couple years ago for Jr Nationals and this sweet little old lady stopped me on the street grabbed my arm and whispered..... "excuse me son I've never seen so many tall girls in all my life what is going on?" I explained it was nationals for volleyball- "Ahhh I knew something was up"

she was so cute

 

[BCClone]

I personally find Women's volleyball to be much more entertaining than Women's Basketball.

Agree. I find several men's sports more interesting but I would rather watch womens VB than mens VB.

 

[VeloClone]

Speaking from my own perspective with my daughter, I love that she gets to enjoy the benefits of team sports but without having to directly battle someone like she would in basketball, soccer etc. It's perfect for people without that "alpha" aggressiveness that's required in those other sports.

It's getting more and more popular for boys as well. There's several boys clubs around town now and holding out hope it may be offered at the HS level by the time my son gets old enough.

I can appreciate that. My daughter didn't have it either but she was able to gain a little bit of it through playing soccer. That is one thing I'm glad about her playing. She is able to stand up for herself a little more.

The convention center up here has the Northern Lights tournament every year that was mentioned above. I am always amazed at the number of incredibly athletic tall girls and boys in that tournament. I'm not used to seeing that many boys and men playing volleyball since it seems to be more girls in the midwest.

 

[dafarmer]

I am probably wrong, but basketball requires more physical conditioning than volleyball. Not that volleyball girls are not in shape, but the running in basketball on both offense and defense are constant.

 

[JMA1125]

My middle school daughter plays club vb and school bb and vb. Her grade can barely field a girls basketball team but will field two volleyball teams. The high school she’ll go to doesn’t cut freshmen and last year I heard had around 75 freshman girls go out for volleyball.

She vastly prefers volleyball because it’s non-contact. She doesn’t like crashing into other girls while playing basketball. She says she won’t play bb next year because of that.

I think I saw that the Stanford team had a player that was 6’6”. That’s crazy tall.

 

[MuskieCy]

I am probably wrong, but basketball requires more physical conditioning than volleyball. Not that volleyball girls are not in shape, but the running in basketball on both offense and defense are constant.

Basketball requires much more conditioning.

Girls with painted on uni's.

 

[Cyfan1965]

I know I have said this before but we played a 6' 7" just turned 14 year old last year. When I looked around I noticed almost every tall girl was standing with a dad that had on some sort of professional athlete gear, gear you and I can't just go purchase. Timber wolves in this particular girls case but Vikings, Wild etc. It made perfect sense once I scanned the room and there were literally man mountains everywhere.

 

[jcyclonee]

A friend of my daughter is playing in the HS All-American VB game on Friday. She got a crazy amount of swag from UA. I think that means VB has hit the big time.