The Coaches Group Chat

E5: GCU #1, Future of Volleyball Officials, AAU vs. USAV, Storytelling in Volleyball

• Matthew Houlihan, Arielle Houlihan, Chad Gordon • Season 1 • Episode 5

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Have you ever bumped into a celebrity doppelganger or felt the pang of missing camaraderie from a break? No, it's not a new reality TV theme; it's just us, weaving personal tales with the fabric of sports commentary. This episode takes you from laugh-out-loud branding brainstorms featuring Marcus Mariota, all the way to the solo ventures of everyday life. Our storytelling doesn't end with humor; it also casts light on Grand Canyon University's climb in college volleyball rankings and an engaged discussion about the future of officiating in the sport. Matt August, assistant coach of Grand Canyon University, even gets a nod for his sideline enthusiasm and shared love for our podcast.

Who said sports discussions couldn't be as critical as they are entertaining? We tackle the pressing issues facing USA Volleyball and the structure of boys' volleyball in the States, debating the shortcomings of the system and fostering a competitive environment. Our insights suggest a dire need for technological advancements in officiating and the potential transformations within the sport. The discourse continues as we critique the impact of volleyball rule changes on player dynamics, revealing how new regulations might tip the scales between traditional skills and the quest for viewer-friendly action.

Ending on a note that tugs at the heartstrings, we recount an emotional video making experience that transcended the digital space, reminding us of the profound effects of capturing life's moments. Unexpected twists turn into cherished memories as we share a travel story involving none other than Nancy Pelosi. Together, we navigate the meaningful intersections of life, sports, and the personal connections that carry us through each episode. Join us for a session that promises as much depth and reflection as it does laughter and innovative thinking.

Arielle Houlihan:

Do you want to hear? The funniest thing that somebody said that I looked like today. Yes, I got just got a. Sarasol from like literally two minutes ago. That's like a typical one. I've gotten like a bunch of them. The funniest one was who's the Von Schwitz kid in in in Wreck-It? Ralph Vanellope, vanellope Von Schwitz, vanellope Von Schwitz is Sarasol from Ah, damn it.

Chad Gordon:

I haven't seen Wreck-It Ralph, but that makes sense. You were so close, Okay hear me out, you ready?

Arielle Houlihan:

Yes, did you see the Super Bowl commercial? Did you see the Super Bowl? Did you watch it? Yes, did you watch the commercials? Most of them yeah, Okay, did you see the Sarah V Michael? Sarah for Sarah V.

Chad Gordon:

I did.

Arielle Houlihan:

Hilarious. Okay, hear me out Ready.

Chad Gordon:

You're not Michael Sarah.

Arielle Houlihan:

Marriott Marquis. Add Marcus Marriota for the Marriott Marquis.

Chad Gordon:

Yes.

Arielle Houlihan:

Incredible yeah.

Chad Gordon:

Missed opportunity.

Arielle Houlihan:

Marriott Mitch and I were calling all of DC Mitch and I were calling it the Marriott Marquis, the Marriott Marcus the entire time and then it spiraled into Marcus Marriota for Marriott Marquis and a commercial where he changes his Marriott, makes him change his name and just switch it.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, 4m's.

Arielle Houlihan:

I mean for sure, yeah, 3m that's a good company, but 4M I think it's an incredible idea.

Chad Gordon:

I don't see how it's possible to go.

Arielle Houlihan:

I think it's a win.

Matt Houlihan:

We should be hired as a branding agency.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'm full of ideas like this we haven't recorded in a little bit.

Chad Gordon:

Two weeks.

Arielle Houlihan:

Two weeks, yeah, two weeks, you miss us.

Chad Gordon:

No, not really you miss me, he missed us. Yeah, we missed you a lot.

Matt Houlihan:

We talked about you on our trip.

Chad Gordon:

I live by myself, so I don't talk to anybody about you guys.

Arielle Houlihan:

He thinks about us all the time though.

Matt Houlihan:

It's true, he journals about me. I know it before he goes to bed.

Arielle Houlihan:

Chad Gordon for better health.

Matt Houlihan:

He writes a sticky note, just thinking about Matt and Eriel Love.

Chad Gordon:

This is not how my Tuesdays go.

Matt Houlihan:

Just to be clear Don't lie. Don't lie to the people like that Should we talk about some volleyball.

Chad Gordon:

No.

Arielle Houlihan:

We can.

Matt Houlihan:

Let's do it. Let's hop into it. We have spent two weeks since we recorded. We have so much to discuss. First and foremost, we have a new number one.

Chad Gordon:

The Lopes.

Matt Houlihan:

The Lopes Grand Canyon is the currently number one ranked team in the AVCA Long beaches of the two. Is that right?

Arielle Houlihan:

Does everybody have every ranking have? Grand Canyon is number one.

Matt Houlihan:

No easy buckets in AVCA. I don't know about the media poll.

Arielle Houlihan:

Coaches.

Matt Houlihan:

I don't look at dozens, I don't know the coaches.

Arielle Houlihan:

Coaches is AVCA right.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, coaches is AVCA. There's a media poll too. Yes, I don't know the media poll which is like three people.

Arielle Houlihan:

Why am I not part of the media poll?

Chad Gordon:

You're too famous.

Arielle Houlihan:

Is this a call for me being on the media poll? I'll mess it up. It'll be so biased You're going to put in people like ironically, that's the problem.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, it'll be an ironic poll.

Matt Houlihan:

We could get a changeorg petition started to get you on the media poll.

Arielle Houlihan:

Do I deserve to be on the media poll? Yeah, man, absolutely.

Chad Gordon:

Did he say no, he didn't say no, check the footage. He may have shook his head vigorously.

Matt Houlihan:

Why would you want to be on the media poll?

Chad Gordon:

I don't know if I want to. I just think that.

Arielle Houlihan:

I deserve a call. You just want to be called, see if you can turn it down.

Chad Gordon:

Got it OK. That's more in line with what I expected. That's more in line with my brand. Yeah, I just want to get a call saying hey, would you?

Arielle Houlihan:

like to be a part of the media poll?

Chad Gordon:

No, f*** your face, whoa impressive You're going to have to put the explicit mark on this podcast.

Matt Houlihan:

The beep, this one yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

Making my post-production editing so much more difficult over here.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, sorry Bob, we have no Bob again, so we're not positive.

Chad Gordon:

This is recording, or?

Arielle Houlihan:

not. We tried to bring in another Bob.

Matt Houlihan:

Bob number one is out of office in Hawaii for a week and vacation. Bob number two said he was going to be here, but it didn't show up on a further review of his his find my friend's location. He's currently running a private lesson in Campbell.

Arielle Houlihan:

So I don't think he's going to make it.

Matt Houlihan:

He forgot about us?

Arielle Houlihan:

for sure he's going to show up in like three hours. Okay, so Grand Canyon.

Chad Gordon:

Yep, what do you got?

Arielle Houlihan:

Stanford is going to play Grand Canyon this weekend, so Matt has to tap out of this one. If anything on Grand Canyon for us, Matt.

Matt Houlihan:

I've been watching a lot of Grand Canyon film. This week we uh for Stanford, I think I've watched USC play like 19 games because they always play the team that we're about to play the week before. So I've seen USC play every team. So I've watched a lot of USC, usc Grand Canyon footage. Um, I have nothing to say about Grand Canyon this week. I mean, I'm in dialed in mode. The one thing I will say watching film is I have a compliment to give to Matt August, the Grand Canyon assistant coach.

Arielle Houlihan:

Number one. He watches our podcast. He does.

Matt Houlihan:

Friend of the pod, he watches the podcast, so shout out to Matt for that. But number two, I'm watching footage and I'm going through some some hitter, just hitter clips on volumetrics and I'm watching their middle swing and their middle goes up and makes this play where he like wipes a ball off the block kid from 352.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah, um, cameron Thorne goes up and wipes a ball off the block and great play. But bad August just goes sprinting down the sidelines. I've never seen a coach more stoked on a play in my life. He goes berserk. Um, I'm going to, I'm going to post the clip of it just to. I'm just going to rile up a little. A little Stanford Grand Canyon coach rivalry, but he had the greatest coach reaction on the sidelines.

Arielle Houlihan:

Daniel size photo of him going crazy.

Matt Houlihan:

Daniel. Daniel had when when Daniel's fired up, he had some of the most energetic sideline coach.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, like very yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

No, but Matt August. I think he he might have jumped 20 inches off the ground.

Arielle Houlihan:

Oh, wow, I can't wait to see this.

Chad Gordon:

He was shown his vert. This is from Thorne wiping a ball.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, it was like a. It was like a rat long rally and then like a ball play at the net and from the middle of the court he jousted the net. One hand throws it all the way out of bounds.

Arielle Houlihan:

Score like four to one. I'm actually I don't remember. I don't remember what the score was but.

Matt Houlihan:

I leveraged play yeah, but it was a. It was an intense play and he was juice. I can't wait to see what the score was and what the it was probably like two, two in the first, I don't know SC, or is this BYU or this? Was that against SC? Yeah, I'll find the clip. I'll post it on.

Chad Gordon:

I'll post it on my Instagram, can we, while we're giving a positive to GCU, can we bring up one, one problem?

Matt Houlihan:

Go ahead.

Chad Gordon:

It's not. It's not that bad. I was trying to watch the second match in your live stream. Couldn't just couldn't get it going.

Arielle Houlihan:

That's it, it wasn't working.

Chad Gordon:

I don't you know tech is hard, it was fine. The first.

Arielle Houlihan:

Matt didn't press play on our podcast one time. Matt August could have not played. I got the, I got the audio.

Matt Houlihan:

I got the audio.

Arielle Houlihan:

Did you watch the?

Matt Houlihan:

fall in metrics of of match number two.

Arielle Houlihan:

I thought you were talking about the audio of the grand Canyon game. I was like you listened to the game. That's weird.

Matt Houlihan:

No, I don't even know if all metrics has audio. It's all just video and depends on the video file.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, some of them do. Yeah, try to watch, try to support, try to, you know, get a little grand Canyon on one screen and then UCLA BYU on the other.

Arielle Houlihan:

You know that was a five center, why bother having?

Chad Gordon:

two monitors.

Arielle Houlihan:

What was the second night on that one?

Matt Houlihan:

Five center.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, both five and they split. Yeah, champlain goes from libero to outside and then he hits I mean, he hit like 800.

Chad Gordon:

No way to be fair, he chanked a ton of balls that he needed to have night one. Like sure they were like easy spin balls and like he just has them like lined up and they just hit them. Weird, like even Spraw was like you know senior guy who like never makes that kind of error. Like we just had like a bunch of those. It was super weird. And then night two he comes out they don't play that well in the first or the second and then like he's unstoppable, like he could do nothing wrong.

Chad Gordon:

It was unbelievable. So he won that second match for him for sure. Um watch it if you haven't.

Arielle Houlihan:

I have not seen it yet. We were at Pepperdack. That's great, um, but it was at BYU, right? Yeah, I mean that BYU is a wash to me.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, they started bringing in refs from out of town as well and stuff like that.

Arielle Houlihan:

So Wait for real, you're kidding.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, so the the love to hear that yeah, the BYU, I mean.

Matt Houlihan:

I mean, it's been notorious Like we know why.

Arielle Houlihan:

So they, why did they, why did they commit to doing that though?

Chad Gordon:

I don't. I don't know if this was a BYU thing or if this was a conference thing, or I don't. I don't know, I don't know why. I don't know how that decision was made, but the commentators made it a point a couple of times. I was just like, hey, like this BYU thing.

Chad Gordon:

It might be, but it was like hey, like these folks from out of town and and all this kind of stuff, and they flipped between night one and night two. I thought the refing crew for all the matches that I watched and I watched the Grand Canyon, byu stuff, and then I watched UCLA and I thought everything was fine, great, no.

Arielle Houlihan:

Still, it's the crowd, and it's the atmosphere, and it's the everything.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, there's, there's there's stuff and you like I mean, you see, like coaches like oh man, like kind of like those 50, 50 ones that like end up being like 80, 20 when you're at BYU, they just like they won 50% of them instead. And I was like, oh man, like I could see where, if you had that call in that moment, that turns the tide in the set and that didn't really happen in some pivotal moments and it's like, okay, well, it's probably what it should be, but no, they were.

Chad Gordon:

They were both two great weekends of volleyball at BYU Cool, so good matches.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'll never forget that June Jasper ball.

Matt Houlihan:

Oh yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

That was wild. I've never seen anything like that.

Matt Houlihan:

And there was no, no challenge, no challenges left because we had to use and they were putting the replay up because we had to use. We had to use a challenge on a massively horrendous call in ball that they called out, and you don't get your challenge back when you.

Arielle Houlihan:

that was back when you didn't keep it, and that was it.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, and then it was just done.

Arielle Houlihan:

Oh, they kept showing the replay on the on the broadcast and everybody was like, oh, this is not good.

Matt Houlihan:

Challenge rules have gotten. I think challenge rules have gotten better.

Arielle Houlihan:

I think we were griping on challenges at the beginning, but like in general, we have to have a time limit on challenges.

Matt Houlihan:

Completely agree with that. Like time and I think they've been better this year, honestly, a minute and a half, we're done. I think I think the challenges have moved faster across the board this far throughout the year. I'm saying like the old you get three challenges and that's it, whether you win or lose it Like, if you win a challenge, you need to be able to keep it, that's just my, I think that's been a great. That's a must must keep rule for challenges.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, I mean in the, in the systems for all the stuff are only going to get better, like it's never going to be worse than what it is today. Right, like the cameras are going to get more inexpensive. It's going to cost less to run all the stuff. More of it's going to be automated and it's not going to take 200 grand to put in something, it's going to take 15.

Matt Houlihan:

Maybe there's a computer vision component that.

Chad Gordon:

I mean for sure, for sure there is right on on some of this stuff. But like those cameras, right, like the reason that BYU has probably the best challenge system around right is that they have cameras that are 60, 120 frames per second. Everybody else is filming on a Game Boy color that's at six frames per second. So like the ball's here, and then it's here and it's like it bounced somewhere in between. Yeah, where's the line? I don't know.

Matt Houlihan:

We had a challenge this week against Pepperdine, where it was a, alex Rotman served a ball down the line and yeah, the silent one. Yeah, we saw the line and they, they call it, he calls it out or says call stands and costy goes and asks him and goes what did you see? He goes. It pixelated right as the ball got there and I couldn't tell, so I had to stay with with the call.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, he's like how convenient? Is there any computer vision updates for us? On on the volleyball Dork side, we still just, still just grinding the long run. We're still still still yeah, thanks.

Chad Gordon:

No, I mean we're, we're forming the company right now and that paperwork I mean just I think that's been the biggest thing for us is like I just didn't know how long it would take to like stand up a corporation. So we're, we're, we're trudging through all of that and then hopefully here in the next week or two that'll be stood up and then we can kind of go full speed on them, some of the stuff, and then I think I'll have a better idea, timeline wise, of you know what's the first product and when does it, you know, kind of get out there and when can we start talking about more stuff and uh.

Matt Houlihan:

But you know what they say, Chad, if you're not embarrassed of your first launch, you launched too late.

Arielle Houlihan:

So I'm announcing my computer vision product that I have been working on.

Matt Houlihan:

Ariel vision, where the ref is always wrong. I saw what I saw. I will yell at you and posted on Instagram Redact the names, it's fun. I do have a question for you how far away do you think we are from every is?

Arielle Houlihan:

extinct.

Matt Houlihan:

Well, there is a referee crisis and shortage my question is how far away do you think we are from each court? Like we have baller TV, each court has a camera.

Chad Gordon:

But having like a camera on each end line and then the in out calls touches being called by ten computer vision, like how far away is that, yeah, Like I mean, tennis is the right, like simplified example, right Of like it's just ball in out and you could do that with a, you know, with a computer today, right, Um, especially with if you had cameras on both sides. Yeah, you could, you could definitely do that.

Arielle Houlihan:

Why are we not doing?

Chad Gordon:

that it takes money. Yeah, you got to like baller, tv has a huge incentive, right. They make a large chunk of change to be in all of these tournaments and, to you know, be the exclusive whatever 100%. Um, and so you know, and they went back to their. They had the end line for a little bit right. They probably talked to coaches like no, no coach wants the fish eye, it's the parents because the parents pay for baller TV, and that's the thing right Cause Graham and grandpa are buying the baller TV subscription.

Matt Houlihan:

And if they're team, if Sally's team is on the other side of the court, they don't get to see Sally. They're mad yeah.

Chad Gordon:

Tough deal, right and so. And baller TV doesn't want to double their capital output there, you know, buy twice as many things. So yeah, I mean you, you could do it like technology wise it's no problem. Like, maybe you would need 60 frames, a second set of 30, but super doable, the touch calls being automated. That would be tougher. Yeah, um, you'd still probably miss micro touch type of things.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

Cause I mean the, the cameras that they use like the bolt six guys that are doing like VNL and like we'll do the Olympics and all that. This guys are like 200, 240 frames per second, like it's super high quality and it's a really high frame rate.

Chad Gordon:

So if anything moves, you see it and you see it really clearly. So you can go and you can look at all these touches. You're like, oh, the pinky, was it wind? No, the ball hit it right here and you know I got it. But yeah, I mean they've, they've done a great job with the in out calls and all that kind of stuff. So I mean, obviously you can do it. Tennis has been doing it for years and yeah, but I mean it takes money and volleyball notoriously doesn't have a lot of that.

Arielle Houlihan:

But trending up, trending up for sure.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, my, my, my thought is just like all right if there's a referee shortage and they you know, they just changed the rule on doubles. Like they're, they're removing a lot of things that are like we can talk about that.

Chad Gordon:

We can talk about that. That's a great. We should add that to the non-skid. Yeah To the outline.

Matt Houlihan:

That's not a docket, but my, my thought is like, all right if they're. If you have a referee shortage and you kind of see some of these rules that are being changed, like the double rule is one where it's like let's just remove the judgment from the referee's hands and just let them play, right, and it makes it just easier for TV to. Obviously that's a factor, right, Not not ending the rally as much, but if you're, if you get rid of a lot of the judgment call on, you know, does the ball spin? Or you know what is, what is the lift versus what is not, so on and so forth. More and more things can just be done by a camera and calling it an app. I think you could still and obviously for club tournaments, you can still have the work teams, you can still have your line judges and you know down ref that calls touches at the net.

Arielle Houlihan:

The judgment calls are are tough, though.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, but doesn't it seem like? It seems a little bit like the strategy is to try and remove some of those judgment calls. Right, they used to. We got rid of nets for a while.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, but we're really testing the boundary on the judgment calls Like is he over or not, and uh, is it a lift? Or who touched the ball last or not, Like that's a tough one at the speed of the game right now.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah Well, I mean, look at our teams compete, look at international volleyball. Very few lifts called. Yeah, Jams wives barely calling lifts, get rid of doubles. Okay, that's another judgment call. That's gone. I could see them going back to the Nets rule, the back row attack stuff is is judgmentee of like. Sure, you still like Up at the net, but if you had a camera on the net you'd be able to do that. But let's, let's say that for club tours that's not going to happen. You still need a official.

Arielle Houlihan:

You need still need someone who has like, but one official would be fine.

Matt Houlihan:

Right, yeah. But if you take a, if you take a ton of that judgment away and you're like, hey, all you need to watch for is who's the right server, Right, I could see them. I could see them.

Arielle Houlihan:

You could have one ref per two or three courts on that.

Matt Houlihan:

No, I think you still need one ref per court right now for a club tournament, because you you need to do overs, you need to do probably still need to do Nets.

Arielle Houlihan:

Obviously Over can be automated.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, but that's All the stuff.

Chad Gordon:

When it comes to like these small touches, I think it's going to be the toughest part.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

Right, anything that's black and white of like did the net move because somebody hit it, or the ball hit it, or like you'd probably get that kind of stuff if you had a camera on the net. Again, I mean like you could also just have a 16 year old standing as the R2 and just be like him. He did it. You know, like those guys aren't doing anything anyway.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

Um neither did John Wallace. John Wallace was the worst out of ref I've ever seen.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, he's got his little he's got. His little, he's got his little dog his little squeaky whistle.

Arielle Houlihan:

He did not care at all and he would call nothing and he was getting yelled at by coaches. He's like I don't care, he's like I don't know, Maybe it was my favorite was always this Like I'm watching here.

Matt Houlihan:

He knew the perfect deflection. I was here I'm watching under Sorry DiGrasse to talk. Smack on John Wallace's down reference skills.

Arielle Houlihan:

I told a kid to hit another kid when I was the up ref at a tournament and friends of you, so I don't know what could be worse than that Telling another kid like, if you get hit under the net, hit him back when you're the up ref.

Matt Houlihan:

She actually did say that.

Chad Gordon:

No, I'm not surprised.

Arielle Houlihan:

The kid was like he, he hit me up from underneath the net and I was like then hit him back Like what are?

Chad Gordon:

you going to do? My eyes were down, you know. I don't know. I'm watching under. You got to get him down there, yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

What are you going to do about it? You want me to fight for you.

Matt Houlihan:

Do you guys have thoughts on the, the updated double rule?

Arielle Houlihan:

I have a lot of thoughts on it. I've read like some wild posts on people being so anti.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

I thought that I was all for getting rid of it, until I read how much people hate it. And I understand their side of it a little bit.

Chad Gordon:

How much of that is like get off my lawn.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's a little get off my lawn, but like also the undersized center is going to, uh is going to get shit on for this.

Chad Gordon:

Why.

Arielle Houlihan:

Because the tall physical kid now gets to, gets to go and not be as clean. So you've got these undersized kids that are just athletes that touch the ball really well and like you see their touch and you're like man, this kid can set a ball. And now you get rid of the double rule.

Arielle Houlihan:

I will say the opposite side of it is like nobody's going out there trying to double the ball. Like you're trying to lay a ball up there for a hitter so that it can, like you're putting the ball in the right place. So like obviously the technique is going to be the technique, but there's also a part of it that's like the undersized center, Like has a good touch on the wall, is now going to get overlooked a little bit more because you can have not to talk shit. You can have a kid like the Texas center who has a horrible touch on the ball and that kid will get recruited over the small kid who's got a good touch, because who cares? So I understand the side of it that is like I like I'd push back on that.

Arielle Houlihan:

I mean, I do push back on it a little bit too, but coming from an undersized center like I get, struck a cord. It does. It does make me think about the, the little kid who is training at a high level and maybe that, maybe the sport develops into, not that kid getting overlooked, a little bit more.

Chad Gordon:

I understand all that. I mean the point like we joke about. Hey, volleyball has no money. It has no money because there's no advertising.

Matt Houlihan:

It's on our television.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, Like money got it. So you need to do it for the fans to help the TV product. I understand it. Yep, I don't really agree with the get off my lawn folks because at the end of the day, like just because I can double, it doesn't mean it's hit a ball.

Arielle Houlihan:

Right yeah.

Chad Gordon:

So I mean, I know plenty of big setters that can't like locate a ball. They couldn't locate it with one or two like touches on the ball.

Matt Houlihan:

Totally doesn't matter, yep.

Chad Gordon:

So I don't, I don't know, I don't, I don't think I'm not. I'm not even like split, I'm probably like 90, 10.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'm like 80, 20 on it. Like I agree that the double role need, like let's take away more judgment calls. I get that.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm like 99, one like get rid of the double.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

Great, get rid of it Like just there's okay If it's a, if you, if you double it and you see someone who just absolutely spins the ball, you know how hard it is to hit that ball.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay. So I asked you this question last night, right Of like, if this is such a weird, I have to put my drink down because I have to show you if you, if the double role is being I'll hold this for you. If the double role is going away, can you, can you at the pin, like, let's say, you pass a ball to the pin? Can you go here here? No, why.

Chad Gordon:

Because it's not a single move Right, like that's the point, that's how the double is called, but how? Fast, it can't no chance.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah no. The obvious answer is no.

Arielle Houlihan:

Will the sport evolve into some sort of new touch, also to be clear.

Chad Gordon:

They're to be clear. They're not removing it on the third contact.

Matt Houlihan:

There it's only being removed on the second contact Boom, you can't double the first one anyway.

Chad Gordon:

Okay, but like you mean like from like an attacking sample like could I get? Up here and just like, swat out of it with two hands and go boom, boom. Like no, she's starting like she's starting to be, like you direct it with the right.

Arielle Houlihan:

So I'd say a bunch of tick-tocks being like, can I now go here and then go and hit the ball myself? And obviously you can't do that, but how fast the game goes, can you?

Chad Gordon:

start to juggle the ball. Yeah, to be fair, it's on the second contact only. Okay, because it? Well, it's not even just a second, it's a as long as the ball is not being played over the net.

Arielle Houlihan:

So we've gotten rid of the first contact double. You can't dump it. We've gotten rid of the second contact double.

Chad Gordon:

Unless you're dumping, still would be a double Well dunking it or whatever. On attack yeah you cannot attack with a double, which they probably were in a room and thought of that exact situation.

Arielle Houlihan:

Had a couple of martinis or like guys they did not, they did not, yeah, they're no fun they didn't have. They didn't have fun while coming up with the rules.

Matt Houlihan:

No chance, I'm 99% for it. Like.

Arielle Houlihan:

I don't want to be the devil's advocate, by the way, I don't. I want the double role. Yeah, you're 80-20. I get it.

Matt Houlihan:

The main thing for me, it's TV. Let's make this as clean and simple as possible so that we can make this sport watchable for a common fan. Yeah, I get it the beach purists. It's like no spin whatsoever.

Chad Gordon:

Get off my sand If I go play in a Santa Cruz B.

Matt Houlihan:

Right now it's harder to play the B than it is to play in the open because every B player is like no, that ball spun two centimeters Double you're out. No, like, let's play the game. Yeah, Let the game be played. Watch and see how great this game is, not. What wait? What just happened why? Why did they lose the point?

Arielle Houlihan:

What was that? It can be a Olympic level setter and touch a ball in a B and be like I literally can't set the ball without spinning a little bit Like it's ridiculous. It's so hard to do so like why would we play like that? Yeah?

Matt Houlihan:

I mean and the other argument of the like the little setter, like small setter versus bigger setter talking to. I talked to Taylor about this Taylor Averill, he was communicating about like the different setters that he's hit off of and we were talking about big set, like the big setter movement, how there was like a movement in the NCAA for like let's get the biggest guys.

Arielle Houlihan:

We can little setter movement, the loy ball, yeah, yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

Like after the loy ball, everyone's like I want a big setter.

Arielle Houlihan:

One of them might be a great example of this, the six, six lefty setter, right For sure.

Matt Houlihan:

And Taylor was talking. He's like there was a setter in the in the USA gym. He's like I just couldn't hit off of him, like it was. He was up here and he was bringing the ball down to me and I I just couldn't Like we had no connection.

Matt Houlihan:

And he's like he's a great setters, great player, great blocker but like his his sets were just unhittable to me, right, and so when it, when it comes down to it, like settings about location, can he locate regardless of size? Yes, the other things are all great, great pluses, right, having Micah at six, six, six, seven, that's a good blocker and offensive with the greats, like those are all great things. But he also locates six, seven, six.

Arielle Houlihan:

I want to say six, six.

Matt Houlihan:

He's not. He is not a undersized setter. Wow. So I mean those, when it comes down to it, like there are guys who are tiny, like Argentina setter, who can absolutely dish the ball and they're going to play over the big guy because they know how to run the offense, they know how to locate and they will find ways to cover up the quote unquote weaknesses in their game. I'm going to go for a run. I hopped down on the strand and I just take off.

Matt Houlihan:

We're up north I had a Thursday morning and I'm just out and I get up to the pier and I just see these like USA volleyball banners are like the little sand blocker things out there and I like stop to look and see. I'm like, oh, that looks like try born. Oh, that looks like uh, that looks like, uh, trevor Crab. Oh, that looks like. Just going down the list Like wait, what is happening right now? And then I see just like all of the USA volleyball players out there warming up and I'm like what is going on?

Matt Houlihan:

I go and yeah, just random Thursday I go finish the run North Seiko.

Chad Gordon:

Like you know, quality time yeah exactly.

Matt Houlihan:

I get, I get back to house, I'm like so there's like a legitimate beach tournament going on right now down by the pier. Like do you want?

Arielle Houlihan:

to go check it out Thursday morning.

Matt Houlihan:

It's like our talking or one day off and we were like that.

Arielle Houlihan:

Were randomly in Manhattan Beach.

Matt Houlihan:

Like sure, yeah, let's go down there. So we went down and sure enough, right when we walk, walk up hurlers. Like setting up a camera on the court.

Arielle Houlihan:

Like hey, we've got the top beach athletes some of them in the world playing right here and not like nobody's watching.

Matt Houlihan:

It was like a nobody knows it was like a pickup game and we're like where's like, can we?

Chad Gordon:

just get a videographer out here.

Matt Houlihan:

Like the best cover that. Literally, that video that was posted by ABB is probably the best coverage of that day.

Arielle Houlihan:

I did take a couple of videos of the guy that had a camera there. They had a USA volleyball shirt and I was going to make a tick talk just like, with some funny sound being like doing their best out here.

Matt Houlihan:

The poor guys, the poor guys, the guys with this poor guy take photos and take videos and like try and do something like check, checking that box of like. This was in my job description, but I also need to do 19 other things today.

Arielle Houlihan:

I was like don't mess with this poor guy.

Matt Houlihan:

I was like I could post a video right now and it would be, but, yeah, but just more, more of a, more of a sign of the times for, like for beach volleyball, my goodness, like that, sport deserves so much more in terms of production and just marketing.

Chad Gordon:

I mean the most coverage of beach volleyball happens through whatever the McKibbins choose to do.

Arielle Houlihan:

Exactly. And the McKibbins are there and like why are we not?

Chad Gordon:

promoting. They're putting on their own events and getting more people to show up to that than actual qualifier events.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah, need, need more people like the McKibbins on on the sport 100%.

Chad Gordon:

But they're I mean, they are big enough now, where I mean they, that's what they do. Right, they're not playing anymore, they're just making content. They're just like I mean, obviously they make enough money doing that, so, like it, it needs to be a business enough, you know, for these people to enter that game. Otherwise it's just financially doesn't make any sense.

Matt Houlihan:

Right. Well, I mean, it's got to be part part passion to to start right, to build, like someone has to really go in and build it. Someone's got to be first and so, yeah, I think that's that's definitely a part of a part of it. But there is enough out there that I think, if more and more people jump into it and are creating and getting content and filming and and pushing that out, that you can make money off of it. Still, if you're a, you know, if you're a content creator, if you're a videographer, um, or you're someone that wants to build a brand around beach volleyball, then that's what you do.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah, obviously girls volleyball is a whole different thing, but like men's volleyball, beach volleyball, the black sheep of volleyball like need help.

Chad Gordon:

There's somebody like great characters in the sport too. Right that like you don't even have to find like these, like diamonds in the rough, I mean, because it's just completely untapped. You can pick the diamonds sitting on top of the pile off of the pile because no one else has farmed that right. Like I don't know it. Just it seems like a like a golden opportunity for somebody to come in and fricking drive to survive this thing, or whatever. Yeah, I mean eventually, right yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

But I mean, yeah, it always. There's always a push around the Olympic year, right Of of that's. That's their time to shine, no doubt, and then there's a little bit of an afterglow and then it kind of fades away and then you got to wait you know another two years until the Olympics comes back again.

Matt Houlihan:

Continue on with our docket. Yeah, the next thing that we did have listed on the on the dock was a little AAU update Current registration numbers. This is 10 days ago that he texted me. The current registration numbers is 1160 boys teams. So I have a question for both of you. How did USA volleyball drop the ball on this situation so badly?

Chad Gordon:

For those wondering at home, that's how many teams were registered last year. How do I know that? Talk to Joe.

Matt Houlihan:

So we already got a 200. Everyone's only going to see me laughing hysterically but, I had a lot to say earlier.

Chad Gordon:

The crowded home miss last 17 minutes Okay. So the question is how did how?

Matt Houlihan:

did USA volleyball drop the ball so poorly?

Chad Gordon:

It's not even though they dropped it. It's that they forgot there was a ball and you just grabbed it and decided that they were playing a game. Usa was taking a nap. I mean it wasn't even like. I don't even think it's like a USA is that fault.

Chad Gordon:

I just think yeah you just okay, maybe, but like I just, I think that you just decided to try and was like hey, there might be a crap load of money to be made here and this might be a great thing for us to get get our feet wet in and, oh wait, no one's going to fight us for this.

Arielle Houlihan:

I think that AAU hit the jackpot and they were there at a time where USA volleyball just was had a like complete and total misstep of what they were doing with boys, did not realize it. They were warned multiple times and didn't take us seriously, and then it happened. Yeah, you say us, and it's I think it goes to a group of club directors, a bunch of club directors who were having issues.

Arielle Houlihan:

And I've honestly I applaud boys volleyball around the country. It is incredible what they did, like a group of club directors that all got on the same page and said like we, enough is enough. We have to do what's right for boys volleyball. Like this made boys volleyball take a step in a huge direction and it's been healthy for the sport. There's no reason that this is like that. Even USA volleyball could come to any of us and say that this was bad for the sport. It was great for the sport. It drove the sport into a great direction and there was help given to club directors that needed a place for kids to go and have a real national championship. And there was too much being held over everybody's heads in their own regions and their own issues that were going on and there wasn't any changes that were willing to be made. And so the club director said you know what? We have control over what's going on.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, I think it's important to like, when you think about the issue, to break it, to break down, like the USA volleyball structure, on how that really prevented them from being able to be proactive. Like USA volleyball is the NGB, the national governing body for the sport, and they run the championship and they run a number of qualifiers that gets you to the championship Right. So if you earn a bid in those events you get to go. Each region operates on its own. It's like all of these regions are their own little entities that are technically separate from USA volleyball and so when you have each region doing their own thing and each region has its own way of customer service and its own way of how they handle you know their club directors and their customers that are in that that space, it causes a lot of problems. Southern California had a bunch of issues and that was kind of the big, I'd say, the final, final straw.

Arielle Houlihan:

That was the biggest part piece of all these clubs in Southern California wanting to make the move.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, Like USA volleyball is kind of takes a walled garden approach of like you, you, you come into their world, you have to play by the rules yet to do everything their way. But each garden is different depending on the region. Whereas, like hey, like if we we tried to talk to the NCAA about running we run a grass tournament called Grassman and I reached out to them about running it through the NCAA and like having all of our kids have memberships already, trying to run the insurance through them, and they said absolutely not, we run all events in this area.

Arielle Houlihan:

Monopoly.

Matt Houlihan:

Like that's. This is what we we are the event organizers. Aau takes the approach of like, just like free market. And they're like hey, if you want to purchase your insurance through us and it's cheap and you want to run an event, no problem, you go, run your event, you. But you're going to compete with any other person that also wants to run an event. So the impetus then just falls on like who can, who can run the best event and who can provide the best customer service, that's the person that wins. There's no like hey, this region runs, these people run this region. You need to play by their rules, it's. Anyone could do anything under the AAU umbrella, as long as you follow these. You know general guidelines of what.

Matt Houlihan:

You know what needs to be done, and so it's just full competition, and so that makes everyone better. There's certainly things about you know, AAU versus USAV stuff that like we want, like the player transfer rules and some of those things that we don't want to open up and make these wild west type of situations where everyone's just like constantly having to fight and battle. There's certainly some guidelines that are needed and and good, but having competition and having actual say about how things progress.

Matt Houlihan:

It's the most important thing is the biggest reason why I think teams have continued to add on to AAU is that there's a lot of opportunity and they make it easy for teams to get involved.

Arielle Houlihan:

But also when you have I mean, boys volleyball is small, like when, when a couple people go, the rest have to follow to keep the sport together. And it's the thing that girls volleyball and boys volleyball are different. On girls volleyball, there's enough of a market for there to be two national championships.

Matt Houlihan:

Girls girls AAU numbers. There's, as of 10 days ago, 4,440 teams registered for AAU.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's. That's literally four times the amount, and there's a USA volleyball event that is just as big. So we're talking like we are one tenth of what is going on with girls volleyball. You can't split up boys volleyball and think that that is that is going to happen when you have the largest clubs all coming together saying we're on the same page, let's keep us together, let's make sure that we all are going through this in the same fair way. You have to take them seriously. There are 10 clubs here that got together and said you know what? Enough is enough. Are you on board? I'm on board If you're on board. And USA volleyball did not take us seriously whatsoever and that's the reason we left.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah. In those calls and in those meetings USA volleyball literally said we can't do anything about it. We're not in charge of the regions.

Arielle Houlihan:

Hours and hours and hours of weekly meetings with club directors through COVID, through like right after COVID. I mean, how many, how many Zoom calls were we on? I mean it was a actual time commitment, that was it was countless.

Arielle Houlihan:

It was a recurring weekly or twice a week Getting everybody on page, on the same page, trying to make sure that we were doing right by everybody, and we had through COVID, that was what pushed us of like we have the time to sit down and say you know what, like, let's all really get on the same page here. And Zoom was like a a thing and we were all able to be face to face, of like, okay, we have to do right by this. And we did not have leadership at USA volleyball saying you know what you guys are really valued it just it's, that's a fact.

Matt Houlihan:

Yep, All right If Chad put your CEO hat on for a second. You're the CEO of USA volleyball now and you want to bring boys volleyball back to USAV. What do you do? Just give up?

Chad Gordon:

I mean, it's just.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, well, Chad's.

Chad Gordon:

Lost cause fire me. This is a PSA, I can't do it.

Arielle Houlihan:

This is a PSA, usa volleyball. Please don't hire Chad Gordon to be the CEO of USA volleyball.

Chad Gordon:

I just can't, can't even imagine. No, I mean it's, the structure is fundamentally flawed. Right, there is a financial incentive for all of these regions.

Arielle Houlihan:

How do you take it back?

Chad Gordon:

You have to uncouple the regions from from all the like. The structure just can't work that way Right, like if everybody can kind of just go off and do their own thing. I mean I just don't see how that's a long term.

Arielle Houlihan:

So you have to rewrite the bylaws, you have to have the board come together to vote on. Burn it to the ground and start over On board to the ground to start over.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, I mean it's, it's just not working Right and so, but I mean like the girl side is interesting, right, because it's big enough where, even with all of that and like, let's be honest, there's a financial incentive to run in these big tournaments, you can still hey, I didn't qualify for the open division of the U S. Well, who carries man? I'm going to Orlando, it's no problem. Whichever you win, I'm in the fourth wave. Oh, I'm in the 17th Shoot. You know, girls volleyball is not going to have that problem, but on the boys side, yeah, you need everybody under one roof, otherwise it doesn't work, at least today. Maybe in 10 years, twice as big.

Chad Gordon:

I hope, I hope it sometime, yeah, I hope we have a 17th wave for poised nationals one time. But yeah, I mean, there are just too many people who have their own motivations, right when it's just it's tough to wrangle all those cats back into the barn. So is that the metaphor? Is that it?

Arielle Houlihan:

I don't think that you've been hanging out with that too much lately.

Chad Gordon:

Cats back in the barn.

Arielle Houlihan:

That was like yes, Absolutely.

Matt Houlihan:

Hey, my mind immediately drew that picture. So yeah, I could see cats going back into a barn.

Arielle Houlihan:

Oh my gosh, you too Sold. What would you do, Matt, to get boys back to USA volleyball?

Matt Houlihan:

I mean, I'd start talking to club directors and, like, the biggest thing that USA in the conversations that we had with USA volleyball, the biggest things that was brought up was supporting the men's national team. Like, usa volleyball is the group that is in charge of supporting our men's and women's national teams.

Arielle Houlihan:

To which we want to do.

Matt Houlihan:

To which we responded no problem, we want to make donations to the men's national team through you know. We asked a you to make donations with the funds that come from the entry fees for the national championship, and the response that we got was no no, we will not earmark it for men's volleyball. You can make a donation, but it will not be earmarked just for the men's national team.

Arielle Houlihan:

To which, who cares? I'm going to just write Eric Soji a check. Yeah, wait, wait, hold on, hold on. This is a joke you a.

Chad Gordon:

You wanted to, oh yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

We asked, we asked a you Not even to make it, to make a donation.

Arielle Houlihan:

This happened a couple of weeks ago. A couple of weeks ago, Balboa wanted to make shirts with which we are doing we are. We are doing this Balboa and Beta Bay shirts saying Paris Olympics, supporting the men's national team. All proceeds go to the men's national team.

Chad Gordon:

Great, we asked USA volleyball Correct, and then they would not earmark it.

Arielle Houlihan:

Jamie Davis said no, take our money To which we said, to which we now are Okay, no problem.

Chad Gordon:

What are you doing?

Arielle Houlihan:

We're doing it anyways, and I'll write the actual individuals on the team of check. No problem, I will write you individually a check and I will. I will give you each money.

Matt Houlihan:

Beer.

Chad Gordon:

Russell and beer Aaron.

Arielle Houlihan:

Russell, here you go. Here is a.

Chad Gordon:

The bigger the mustache.

Arielle Houlihan:

Here is a 50 cent check to whatever or whatever, however much we get, Like they it goes to the national team.

Chad Gordon:

Now we'll just pay the kids Better. Yeah, I mean sure, great Double down 100%.

Arielle Houlihan:

Unreal.

Chad Gordon:

That doesn't make any. This is one of those things I just don't get Right. It's like yeah, it's like a bit like when you get to the answer you're looking for, hang up or whatever. That money ball thing is like stop beating the dead horse, Correct, Dude? We're trying to give you money.

Arielle Houlihan:

We want to support the group of people that we are trying to help produce. Yeah, like we're trying our hardest to help grow this sport in the right way. We want to help like that pipeline. Why would you not incentivize?

Matt Houlihan:

Because that was their number one chip that they tried to use to keep clubs involved which are hey, I, I get it, we want. We want to support the national team.

Chad Gordon:

No one's going to play in your national like, but you have to solve.

Arielle Houlihan:

Don't treat us badly.

Matt Houlihan:

You have to solve the problems at the core of the issue. Right, when customer service is not there and the main source of your revenue, which is the clubs. Right, who are paying the entry fees, whose parents are playing the, paying the admissions, doing all of those different, different things, and when they're not being taken care of, you're going to seek an alternative option that is better for business.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

That's what was done in Southern California, that's what's been done in multiple cases across the country, and when there is a free market solution, the market will go where it is better serving them.

Matt Houlihan:

So if you, if whoever the CEO of USA volleyball is that wants to bring back boys volleyball and bring that national championship, there needs to be conversations with club directors about hey, how can we help solve these issues, how can we help bridge the gap in these solutions? Cause I think what, what USA volleyball really wants, when it comes down to it, is they want the national championship back, because that's the actual money maker for them. Yeah Right, like yeah, they made money on the, on the qualifiers, and they made. They got their cut back and their kickback from that. In terms of the, they get the entry fee, they get a portion of entry fees for any of the bid tournaments, but when it really comes down to, is the national championship. So how do you get clubs to get back to being in the national championship? It's understanding how they can help better provide a experience and service that makes their clubs.

Arielle Houlihan:

Let us be very clear AAU has done that.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, that's exactly, that's literally. They need to do what the AAU has been doing.

Arielle Houlihan:

And, and like we're not saying that AAU has done a bad job, no, no, no, no, they've done a great job AAU has done a very good job and so like for this is just saying how we got to this point, 100% Like it's going to be a very long road for there to be any change made because AAU has done a great job with what they're doing.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, if AAU was not doing a good job and USA Voliwell got their act together.

Arielle Houlihan:

Totally Sure.

Matt Houlihan:

You. Even still, there still would be a split.

Arielle Houlihan:

There's people who, no matter what, no matter what, I will say there are people who are loyalists on USA volleyball and that's it, and they're losing their clubs right now.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

They are losing their clubs. There is no way around it. The the teams in the regions that are or I would.

Matt Houlihan:

I would rephrase and say that they're losing.

Arielle Houlihan:

They're losing players because they are for sure losing players.

Matt Houlihan:

There's plenty of players that are willing to willing to play and compete, specifically if, when USA volleyball keeps the championship kind of in like a Like, the one thing you say volleyball does, their championship rotates locations like last year was Vegas or they did Vegas, they did. They've got Texas this year right and you keep it in an area that's 18s is a Baltimore.

Arielle Houlihan:

Do you know that?

Matt Houlihan:

No.

Arielle Houlihan:

I didn't know idea.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah. But yeah, if you keep it in an area or a location that's a little bit easier to get to, sure, like the West Coast or but the Infrastructure of a you girls is in Orlando and it is nice to have the infrastructure there.

Matt Houlihan:

For sure, stadium courts and the I've started to hear more grumblings this year about the Having to keep going back to Orlando than I have in the past. For sure, yeah, it's just for it's. It is expensive, like the flights to flights to Orlando from the West Coast. Well, it is expensive.

Chad Gordon:

The problem is, you know it's July 4th and you're next to Disney and all that.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah right, I mean you're competing with a Summer holiday, right, so it's not like you, as I've always sending us to the greatest locations for the for the tournament they're, you know nobody.

Chad Gordon:

Nobody's going to Indy for the yeah, whatever's going on. Well, maybe there's like a Indy 500 send me, send me to. Austin.

Matt Houlihan:

Texas or death.

Arielle Houlihan:

Isn't big enough, send me down.

Matt Houlihan:

Send me to Dallas, yeah no, they just closed Sam bar. Rip to Dallas, sam bar.

Chad Gordon:

Okay, dallas is out. Yeah we're just back.

Matt Houlihan:

Send me to Vegas, let's go to Vegas.

Chad Gordon:

Vegas for championship over here, that's not a good idea, sure, but it'd be fun as a club director down for.

Arielle Houlihan:

Honestly, I'm down for the one of the LA tournaments to move to Vegas. I'm okay with that. Yeah, but the LA is not gonna be happy about that and that's not ideal for them, but I am totally in for it.

Matt Houlihan:

All right to. To wrap up my thought on on this one Whoever what? If you want to get boys volleyball back, it's it's communication amongst club directors. Yeah it's. Anybody wants to get it at the same time if you're a you and you want to keep it, you keep doing that. Yeah right, because there's no reason for anyone to leave.

Matt Houlihan:

That's for there's no reason for anyone to leave if you continue to show that you are dedicated to listening and hearing and being Customer-centric and how you handle things should the national team, should the men's national team players be expecting checks From any of the Joes?

Chad Gordon:

Yeah six months.

Arielle Houlihan:

Not from the Joes, probably, but from I'm, from the I'm pretty sure a hand fund, absolutely.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm great. I'm pretty sure that the a you made a donation to first point. That was, that was a conversation. So they made a donation, not of insignificant amount, to first point and there's conversation about Asking them to increase that even more With the, with the demand that has has come through.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'm not even totally sold on that one, I just I like.

Matt Houlihan:

Right, you just wanted literally.

Arielle Houlihan:

Foundation that says that they're going to support whoever like. I'm not even totally on board with all of that. I'm just like our men's national team is a tangible thing, like we have to support them. We have to support our Olympic team. Yeah, our team that is going and training year-round, going and playing pro and going and dedicating their pinnacle of what our we have to support them and Whatever found like, whatever is going to support them, we have to help with that.

Arielle Houlihan:

They need cash, cash for snacks and like we yeah, we have to buy their honey singers like we have to.

Matt Houlihan:

I love honey stingers.

Arielle Houlihan:

We have to help them with their. Sponsor out. We need to. We need to do a better job of supporting our national team Period period.

Matt Houlihan:

End of sentence to the next part of the docket. What do we have? Last one is Capitol Hill recap the Capitol Hill volleyball classic I.

Chad Gordon:

Was there cap?

Arielle Houlihan:

Chad. I was not there you watched it, though you saw it online.

Chad Gordon:

I mean, I saw some of the stories, yeah okay, what was your thoughts? Well, you're famous.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm Known niche, she's niche famous.

Chad Gordon:

Famous why have your own tournament if you're not gonna be famous at it? Just lean into it.

Arielle Houlihan:

What are you doing? I totally agree. Who are you?

Matt Houlihan:

There's someone on someone in one of Ariel's Instagram's that was like my friend, my friend owns Capitol Hill. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna text them and then send them this to like, try and get her in trouble.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yes, like my friend owns this tournament, like I'm gonna send this to them and I was like what?

Chad Gordon:

do it.

Arielle Houlihan:

Who's your friend? Tell me about your friend.

Chad Gordon:

I yes, yeah, yeah, I would love to hear who are you talking? Yeah, I love feedback. Yeah, about myself.

Arielle Houlihan:

What was your thoughts on? You're outside perspective other than I'm famous.

Chad Gordon:

I'm a big fan of the other running presidents.

Arielle Houlihan:

Oh me too.

Chad Gordon:

Those are, I mean. Those make for great content.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, so here's the the inside look on the racing presidents.

Chad Gordon:

They're called the racing presidents.

Arielle Houlihan:

They come every year. They've been here to the event for over a decade, over a decade. They there's like a huge tryout every year as it has there should be, and there's like a hundred or two hundred people to try out for it and the heads way between 80 and 100 pounds, depending on which one is a lot, a lot of core strength required for this.

Chad Gordon:

I mean, they're very heavy and they are like they're there.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's a workout.

Chad Gordon:

I feel like if you let's also like too far is gonna be a problem.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's like hot, it's like a sauna in there, it's hot and it's not bunny suit hot, but it's like it's warm. They I could be a handler for the after the amount of times that I've like done this with them, that I was like telling them when to duck and telling them one like the whole thing, and the guy that was their handler was new and he was like you could do, totally do this. I was like I know I've done this probably more times than you have by now, but the guys that do it, they like can't, you can't see who's in it. Like it's very under, it's like the, the leprechaun guy at Notre Dame. Like you're not supposed to like know who he is, or something crazy or they're gonna go like guy, like in the goofy suit at Disney.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, but you have to like stay in you guys, thank you, yeah, very, very.

Matt Houlihan:

You don't take your head off on court 17 totally. Um, it's unprofessional.

Arielle Houlihan:

But they love our event because we let them do whatever they want and we like run around and like let them go on the court and like go up and hit a ball or something ever and they do these appearances that are like Literally standing for three hours taking pictures of people and they don't move at all. That's tough. They're like we hate it, but, like your event, we get to like run around and like be chaotic and like go and like mess with people because I literally am like Do whatever you want.

Arielle Houlihan:

Some of the referees get very upset. Deal with it Like very, very upset. Like I got reprimanded a couple times a couple years. You need to let us know when you're gonna do that because nobody don't.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm like. But I don't but, but do we they're?

Chad Gordon:

they're 10 feet tall gigantic heads, like you'll see them coming, you know you know they're gonna do there for 30 seconds hey look the Capitol Hill classic. Everybody will be fine if one of the Racing presidency never ruins your game, will give you an extra 50% Totally, it's totally fine, you should hope that they come by, because they like you're just gonna have to sit there for a couple. Fortunately we took.

Arielle Houlihan:

We did like a bunch of like stinty stuff at a referee guy that was like here you can have my whistle and like he was very nice, so like it was all good. You gotta, you gotta kind of size up the right referee for that Totally Shocker of the weekend for me I had a lot of shockers of the weekend, but big shocker of the weekend was like some of the refs like really like me. That's like a big Change in my life.

Chad Gordon:

I mean it just in that bell curve. They're gonna be people on both ends, yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

I mean referees, though I thought it was like a whole collective.

Chad Gordon:

Oh.

Arielle Houlihan:

No, they like oh, the head referee would stutter like wanted to take a photo with me and it was like a whole thing. I was like wait, what yeah?

Matt Houlihan:

but Rebecca's like family.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, rebecca's great, but like, but like there was like they all thought it was like hilarious, because I'm not fighting about wrong things. I Did pitch to my mom and my brother about the stay off the sport court thing, and I got the exact response that I thought I was gonna get.

Chad Gordon:

I'm like from each of them.

Arielle Houlihan:

I agree with you, but like we have so many other things that we're dealing with right now, we're not gonna, and I was like, yeah, yeah, I got it, okay, whatever.

Chad Gordon:

All right, so next year.

Arielle Houlihan:

So maybe next year.

Chad Gordon:

I heard you had a famous Plain flight on your way out.

Arielle Houlihan:

Oh, I sat next to Nancy Pelosi on the flight out as one does.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, you guys talking video or what Totally wild Like great.

Arielle Houlihan:

Great, we talked about we talked about the Super Bowl.

Chad Gordon:

Okay.

Arielle Houlihan:

I got on the plane like commotion going on, and then Looked over, she's wearing this like bright pink blazer and I'm like, oh, why is Nancy Pelosi on the flight? Looked over and then what's the other lady?

Matt Houlihan:

She's like running for Congress or something all the liberals were on my flight.

Arielle Houlihan:

I was like, oh my goodness, like what's going on? Secret Service guy with a full gun, like the whole thing. And I'm like I was like how in the world did they let me sit next to these people? Like this is wild. And then there I will say the one story that I have, like that was very funny that we can talk about when we were about to take off. There's like a phone playing like on full volume. You know how like that happens on planes where, like some kid is like on his iPad.

Chad Gordon:

I thought you were like some older people. Like you know, they're watching some video that their grandson sent them or something like that, pretty much so announcement comes on like please put your headphones on if you're gonna be watching a video.

Arielle Houlihan:

And Then it didn't stop. And then she came. The flight attendant came out to walk and looks over and it's Nancy Pelosi and she's playing her. It's her phone playing on full volume. She's like ma'am, you have to put like, you can't have that on full volume.

Matt Houlihan:

She's like oh Okay, I was like wait, I'm not on a private plane right now. Nancy.

Chad Gordon:

Pelosi.

Arielle Houlihan:

Matt, do you have your own thoughts on the Capitol Hill volleyball classic in Washington DC presented by New Balance and Washington and baller and molten and Ultra ankle and Joe and Joe and Joe unconventional diner and.

Matt Houlihan:

Make you fulfill all your sponsor obligations.

Arielle Houlihan:

Repeat in my head my thoughts.

Matt Houlihan:

I had fun because I brought the girls, so it was Saturday. It was fun to try. I traveled with the girls solo. It's the first time one of us has traveled solo with both girls like flight across the country.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, they're there. Yeah, they're good, they're just not on what, they're, just good travelers.

Matt Houlihan:

We get to the get to the tournament and then it's just, it's a, it's run by the Goldbergs, so it's run by Bonnie and Mitch and you, and so it's cool for them to see. So I thought it was important for them to number one to be there in the first year of Barry not being there and getting to see you guys kind of run the show. And then just I mean, you were a circus, like it was a circus.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, it was a circus of you being there. Imagine the Cacker party for three days, except double it, triple it, quadruple it.

Chad Gordon:

Of people coming up to you crying.

Arielle Houlihan:

Pretty much it knows, yeah, a lot of people just coming up and saying and did people saying hi, I mean yeah, like I don't know, I don't, I didn't see any tears, but I saw a lot of people who were just genuinely excited to see it. Like, kind of like half watery eyes. Sure, like and walking away, being like it was, it was insanity. Like I seriously put the over under on one and a half that morning, being like maybe somebody will come up and take a picture.

Chad Gordon:

One and a half dozen.

Arielle Houlihan:

Like it doesn't. I took over a thousand photos of people. It was, I'm telling you. It felt like I was in a simulation. I was like what is happening? It was, it was some weird stuff, people coming up being like okay. So we think your team is really cute and like I'm like wait what? And they're like okay, well, if you could give Peter my phone number, if you could give Zach my phone number, if you could naming kids on my team by name.

Chad Gordon:

That's really specific.

Arielle Houlihan:

It was so specific.

Matt Houlihan:

Your team's got to be so juiced on that it was it was out of control.

Chad Gordon:

You should only show them like people, like naming Peter and Zach, and just be like yeah, max, no one asked about you. It's so weird. Our group chat was so funny.

Arielle Houlihan:

They were all were like coach, I have an Instagram Like. Why don't you let them know that I dropped my ad? Like whatever. Max sent the group text his phone number just written out. Like Max, we have your phone number this year. Yeah, I just wanted to make it real clear that I have a phone number Like it was when you just replied and nobody's asking about you.

Arielle Houlihan:

So funny. Like yeah, I was actually blown away by the whole weekend. Riley said to me she was like people are asking to take pictures with mommy. And I was like yeah, why do you think they're asking me to take pictures? And she was like because you're a really good coach. And I was like that is really cool, like that's a really cool thing for my kid to say to me. And then she was like goodbye. And then like ran off and tweaked out or something like crazy.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah, where's Ali? Yeah, yeah, it was really yeah. This is wild. Yeah, I mean, for me it was. I thoroughly enjoyed that. I liked watching you because you're just in your element and you know, sometimes you watch someone when they're like, oh, like you're in a, like a float, like you were cooking. You were just in a float state. You were often doing your thing. It was fun, really fun to see.

Arielle Houlihan:

I have learned that I can just talk to myself with if I have a camera on me, like 20 feet away, like I just feel like it's my own head, that is like living over there, that I could just get to talk to and like I I could do it all day long. Well, I don't know, it's a weird, it's a strange thing.

Matt Houlihan:

Just the fact that it was the capital classic, right it's home so you have this, like that location is just so natural for you and you have been doing that for years. So, it's like literally everything that you did that weekend was what you had done for yeah it just was.

Arielle Houlihan:

I was just. I couldn't go anywhere without people.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah but that's like crazy. It's the literal target market of the people that you're trying to reach. It's I mean I didn't realize.

Arielle Houlihan:

I will say I had a conversation with somebody earlier today of like I did not realize what my platform was until like recently.

Arielle Houlihan:

Of like there's a lot of like feminism and empowerment stuff that like I never intended on setting out to like preach about, and it's just what I embody, I guess, and it's a it was a very, very cool thing for me to have little kids coming up to me being like I want to be a coach when I grow up, like nothing that I ever thought was something in my wheelhouse of of doing, and it was a very, very. There was a couple of conversations that I had with people that were super special, that were like, oh, I didn't have this when I was growing up, I didn't have somebody that I looked to and was like, oh, I want to be a coach exactly like you when I grew up, like that just wasn't a thing, and so for that to be something that I'm like kind of stepping into is a super strange but like very cool thing, like exactly the space that I want to be in. So it was a special event.

Arielle Houlihan:

Then like stayed up till like I slept, no like did not sleep the night before the event started I slept for 45 minutes and then had to leave that night because I, if I did not sleep, I was legitimately going to have an aneurysm, and then slept, slept that night and was fine. And then the next night so the night before the last day I got back to the room at like 1230. And because I had stayed with my brother, because my mom had gone back to me and Mitch stayed really late until all the teams were finished, got back to their like 1230, stayed up till two writing the writing the dialogue for the video that I had just come up with next morning for the next morning and then decided oh, this needs to be filmed when all the courts are not being played on, which means we need to be there at 530 the next morning.

Arielle Houlihan:

So texted Kylan and was like I'm so sorry, but we're going to need to be there in a couple hours. And she woke up at 515 and was downstairs meeting me at 530. And we went and filmed it. Within like 20 minutes before people were coming in the doors went up and started editing. And then it that whole video. Like the process of making that video was like I don't think I've ever cried so much like through a process of making a video, which was definitely shown on the video, but like I don't know. It was just like a really cool experience to be able to like go through. It was the right thing to do and it was definitely very well received by a lot of people.

Arielle Houlihan:

So it was a it was a special thing for my family.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, it was a special weekend.

Arielle Houlihan:

It was a very special weekend, glad, glad it's over.

Matt Houlihan:

Very glad it's over, but it's not a relaxing weekend. It's not a relaxing weekend but it is fulfilling for sure.

Chad Gordon:

I looked over and I was like I didn't push play again 30% chance he didn't record this. Thank God, we other.

Matt Houlihan:

We have the other, the back half of that scares, the found episode scares the living day. Let's add a man on that note. I'm clicking, and right now under the team.

Arielle Houlihan:

Goodbye.