The Coaches Group Chat
Grab a drink and a seat at the table with hosts Matt Houlihan, Arielle Houlihan and Chad Gordon as we chat about the world of volleyball, coaching, business, and whatever else Arielle feels like!
The Coaches Group Chat
S2E7: All-American Dream Teams, High School Rule Shake-Ups, and Summer Schedule
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We are putting the AMERICA into our All-American team while discussing the scarcity of top-tier American rosters in college volleyball today. We highlighted key American players, examined high school volleyball rule changes, and ultimately celebrated the importance of recognizing homegrown talent in the sport.
• Crafting an all-American team of volleyball players
• The significance of celebrating American players in international-dominated NCAA
• Recent high school volleyball rule adjustments
• Excitement surrounding local competitions and events
• Plans for an upcoming All-Star game to honor local talent
American Volleyball Team Roster Analysis
Speaker 1Who's the top American team If you look at full roster ?
Speaker 2okay , Full roster , full roster Of Americans . You have to eliminate all of the international kids .
Speaker 1Yes , exactly , you have to replace the international player .
Speaker 2Who wins ?
Speaker 1With an American . Which team has the best American roster ? Welcome to week six . Huge , this could be week six . It could be week six . Huge , this could be week six . It could be week seven . Tbd , who knows ? You got to release them .
Speaker 2We got a lost episode from season one that we were sitting on .
Speaker 1We got a few of those . Yeah , Just sitting in the hopper Well this is a very important episode because we're talking . We are all American .
Speaker 2This week it's all about the americans okay , so we came up with a hysterical . We had a hysterical conversation at the stanford game a couple weeks ago and uh about we ? How we should make an all-american team but you have to be american .
Speaker 1but you have to be American , all American .
Speaker 2And then we were like , wait , what of the top 10 ? Like , how many teams are actually like only from the United States ?
Speaker 3None , very , very few Stanford is . Yeah .
Speaker 2That's it .
Speaker 3When I heard you ask this question before I heard top five and I was like no , oh not in the top five no chance .
Speaker 2Yeah , so we're going to make our all .
Speaker 1Americans . There's an international on pretty much every top team Not to say that we don't like the international kids . We do , but we want to give .
Speaker 2We want some all American awards .
Speaker 1The flowers to the Americans because they deserve them .
Speaker 2The American children that grew up in the club system of the United States deserve some recognition of the United States deserve some recognition , absolutely .
Speaker 1So we're going to go through . Each of us has a couple . Let's just go down the line here . We're going to let Chad start , because we don't know what Chad has in store , so he's going to be a surprise to kick us off . Who is your first ?
Speaker 2All-American Boy .
Speaker 3From my MIVA champions .
Speaker 2Mr Parker .
Speaker 3Opposite of the year Coming in hot . I don't know We'll see Today .
Speaker 2Yes , who else is up for opposite of the year Doesn't matter .
Speaker 3Nobody , not American .
Speaker 1Well , I will put in next oh , dang it . Mine is also an opposite .
Speaker 2Really .
Speaker 1That is an all-American . Yeah , this guy my is also an opposite . Really , that is an all-American . Yeah , this guy's good Jalen Phillips is CSUN . Yeah , of course it is he knew I was going to throw a CSUN boy in there . Jalen's been killing it . He's already . I believe he won the first week of the ABCA Player of the Week Award , so he is eligible to be player of the year . And he's on CSUN .
Speaker 2And he to be on season , so and he's on season and he hits over the top of almost every block he faces
Speaker 1every american I haven't seen I have not seen him try and swing over the top of nikolov or heno .
Speaker 2Yeah , okay um , my first american award is gonna go to the america award kioni kioni thin , I like that yeah sure , I love an undersized he's efficient , he's efficient and undersized . Undersized mustache yeah yeah , he's just like a baller , yeah , so yeah , kioni's my american . I like that number three . Chad back to you for your second Tony's my American .
Speaker 1I like that Number three .
Speaker 3Chad back to you for your second oh man , I thought I was only going to have to have one . Joke's on you , I do , if I can steal , flexin .
Speaker 1You may steal it Also .
Speaker 3all opposites were going on . To be fair , yeah , on the right , but it's just going over the top of people and yeah , I mean big transition from him from the left last year and he's just kind of having his way right now . It's pretty impressive because they are . I mean , he's just launching balls these are just moon balls and he's just like I will wait and take 17 steps in my approach and just hit over the top .
Speaker 2He's also a father now .
Speaker 3He's a dad yeah .
Speaker 2And he can have his baby on a bench too .
Speaker 3If you didn't watch episode five , we talk about babies and benches . Chad will lay it out for you . We got to go back and watch that other one , yeah .
Speaker 1Who's your setter ?
Speaker 2My setter is Andrew Rowan .
Speaker 1For All-American Andrew Rowan . Yeah , all right , I'll follow it up .
Speaker 2My setter will be Tread I do think as better as more than Andrew Rowan .
Speaker 1I'm not saying that yet . I think thus far in the season , tread has had more of a test than UCLA has had . So , rowan , they lost Ohio State .
Speaker 2Yeah , but this episode is BYU , if this episode is , if this episode is airing in in two weeks from now , but just thus far , thus far I think tread has had a very impressive season , I think specifically in the byu matches back down uh , the back down from area four is sick .
Speaker 1And then he had a huge couple huge blocks . He went back , he got the uh , he had a big ace to get him back up to match point only block for block of the year , though in that game , block of the year . Yeah , yeah , spiking the spike .
Speaker 2Yeah , I've never seen anything like that actually . Two plays in that game where the Keone block and then the tread back down , but I've never seen anything like either of those plays .
Speaker 1Yeah , they were very good . But , yeah , I think that would be my other setter there . And then do we have any ?
Speaker 2other honorable mentions . Any other notable honorable mention ? Americans Honorably discharged .
Speaker 1Americans , that's not what that is no .
Speaker 3I don't think that's what that means . Nope .
Speaker 1Nope , and on that note , we're going to move along . No , we have to . Who's the top American team If you look at full roster ?
Speaker 2Full roster . Full roster .
Speaker 1Full roster .
Speaker 2Of Americans . You have to eliminate all of the international kids .
Speaker 1Yes , exactly , you have to replace the international player .
Speaker 2Who wins With ?
Speaker 1an American . Which team has the best American roster ? Great question , you're welcome .
Speaker 3USC Stanford , Stanford question you're welcome usc stanford .
Speaker 1Gotta throw ucla in there . I mean you gotta think some of these kids on the bench are pretty good , though exactly you eliminate edo and then you replace that with someone else and for ucla , ucla's ucla's got the same roster yeah , ucla's gotta have it david decker , that's what I'm saying sorry , that's number 9 , 19 , pretty sure he's lefty I'm pretty sure I don't think he's lefty .
Speaker 3He may or may not be , but 11 kills , 6 errors on 23 for 238 . There you go the other night . So if you didn't watch episode 5, .
Speaker 1We covered his stats .
Speaker 3We still don't know if he's lefty . He's definitely there , he's definitely number 19 .
Speaker 1And his parents love alliteration David .
Speaker 2Deckard double D . Thanks Matt . Thank you Matt . Ucla for sure I'd say Long Beach is not as good without oh well , they're done . Ucla for sure Irvine's got to drop off there without the international .
Speaker 3If you lose Heno .
Speaker 2I mean , that's still a really good team , then you're losing your Australian kid .
Speaker 1The Australian kid doesn't play , he's like the next guy up .
Speaker 2Who's the other guy ? Who's the second outside ? He's from New Jersey , number six .
Speaker 1What's his stat line ? Chad ?
Speaker 3I don't know Don't what's his stat line . Chad , I don't know Uh don't get yelled at by Heno . If he doesn't hit it hard enough , that's about it .
Speaker 2Uh , okay , who's next ? Uh .
Speaker 1I do think Stanford is the only time I can think of that . Doesn't have an international kid right now on the on the Does USC have an international kid ? Yeah , they got Guy .
Speaker 2Guinness Guy .
Speaker 1Guinness is Israeli . I'm not sure about if they have anyone else .
Speaker 2Okay they're close Uh .
Speaker 1Yeah .
Speaker 2Loyola's got the Chuck Sure Check outside .
Speaker 1Hawaii . Honestly , if you removed all the foreigners from Hawaii's starting lineup , I still think they still probably . You replace it with Finn Kearney . You replace it with Kainoa . You still have a pretty darn good roster there of just Americans .
Speaker 2Interesting . Hey , I'm all for the international .
Speaker 1Agreed , but to give our shouts to the American boys .
Speaker 2It's a fun game to play . It's a fun game .
Speaker 1Just flirting with it . We're just having fun . What is happening ?
Speaker 2We're just having fun . What's next ? Next up is We've had a number of rule changes .
Speaker 1We've discussed a lot of rule changes this year . Oh , rule changes , high schools , they're feeling left out .
Speaker 3They want to make some rule changes .
Speaker 1They're like usa volatiles changing rules for babies thank god we've got uh , we've got matt preaching for foul out on service rules . We've got all sorts of things . So let's change some rules in
High School Volleyball Rule Changes
Speaker 1high school chad . Can you lay the context for this role please ?
Speaker 3Yeah , this is the whatever , the NFHS right , the governing body for high school rules .
Speaker 2The National Federation of high schools high school sports . Yeah , I would check out . Exactly correct , I was gonna come up with something funnier .
Speaker 3Oh sorry , that's all good , it's fine , we can cut this part , but yeah , I believe it's either this fall or next fall . They're changing the rules . No double contact to kind of meet the game where it already is collegially is it this fall or is it next fall ? That's a great question for our producer to look up , bobby . But anyway coming to a high school gym near you probably .
Speaker 2Honestly , it's going to take them a year anyway to figure it out , hey referees stop it .
Speaker 3That's about it . And then I think the other thing for high school is it was you know how we play with . It's like the super panel-y it can't have ridges or whatever . They were getting rid of that rule . I didn't know that was even a rule wait what ? What the ball ?
Speaker 2the ball is literally a tachycara uh no , we like , we , we use like spalding stuff .
Speaker 3Sure yeah , big old tf 5000 kind of exactly uh , but now , because nobody else uses that . Yes , they're like hey , you , you can use now , if you want Moulton Mikasa , whatever right .
Speaker 2So each league is going to determine what ball it is .
Speaker 3I mean probably .
Speaker 2Or each school is going to determine .
Speaker 3I don't know . I mean if you look at like how , but you get it down to the states .
Speaker 1It's a state issue now , is it ? It's like abortion .
Speaker 3Give it to the states , yeah , yeah no , it's not like abortion , but thank you they're close , obviously , but not quite the same , um , but yeah , I mean , you know the same way , like hey , I go play nebraska , like I use an adidas ball , like yeah , and every coach wants to kill the other coach based off of the ball that they yeah because we went to minnesota or mary , I don't know where it was all of a sudden .
Speaker 2It's the nike ball and you're like wait the nike state is using the nike ball illinois .
Speaker 3No problem , we train with the nike ball . Didn't like it , but we had it , we had it . But it was also like hey , is it bodden baden , whatever ? It was like what's this one school with this one ball ? Like how did they sign this contract ? This is so random , but anyway . So change of there's molding .
Speaker 1I'd love that rule number one like just remove as many judgment calls as possible , but also high school refs prided themselves on . It was like going to a CBVA B tournament where anything that spun even slightly they're just blow the whistle and the rally .
Speaker 3You know why that is , though ? Right , because they get paid per call .
Speaker 1Every time they blow the whistle , that's $2 .
Speaker 3There you go , good incentive , absolutely .
Speaker 1Swallow the whistle on those , just let the boys play . I remember when we used to play with the high school tachi car or whatever it was , but it was all white , and so then there was way less doubles because they couldn't really see because , they all had glasses . You know , like is it spinning , is it not spinning ? But now , when you've got the , the multi-colored ball , you can actually tell the , tell the chuck when you uh , when you're actually sending a bad set out there . I like that . I like that adjustment . Perfect from my skills .
Speaker 2It's good , I was I was actually like back and forth on the double call thing until I saw it . I was at the final four . I watched Izzy Stark double a ball , but like athletically double a ball , and I was like , oh shit , this is actually like . This is great . Like that was , that was the best double I've ever seen Like super athletic and like transitioning to the net and just like just trying to take it like here and .
Speaker 2I was like that's clean , clean and like it's not clean , but it shouldn't be called , and yeah , it was good those are .
Speaker 1Those are good additions , okay , cool , all for the tv friendliness we're thinking about maybe adding some high school chatter in here we are yeah , maybe I already do high school rankings for Northern California , for Dimes , for boys volleyball . Yeah , so Dimes does the top 20 high school teams .
Speaker 2So we might just shoot the shit a little bit about it on here .
Speaker 1So yeah , I'm ready to pop my head into a couple high school tournaments . Just see what's up . See what's up See how the high school game is evolving and developing . We'll take it from there . The boys deserve to have some buzz . Let's give them some buzz .
Speaker 3Harker to the moon .
Speaker 2Let's go Mason , Always Harker . You're a Harker homer .
Speaker 1Harker homer for sure .
Speaker 2I'm not a homer for any high school in the Bay Area .
Speaker 1I'm a St Francis grad , so I'm a St Francis homer . I'm not . No , I'm not . I'm a St Francis fan , though I'm happy to see him succeed . Go Lancers . But I also am a fan of Bellarmine , because we got friends of Bellarmine . So , hey , go Bellarmine . Lots of things that could happen .
Speaker 2I'm not .
Speaker 1I'm not for grabs for hire . You're a gun for hire .
Speaker 2Yeah , money talks want me to be a fan ? Put a t-shirt on , pay me money . I will hoot and holler . No , I won't .
Speaker 1I have a . I have news that I would like to break on the pod . Can I break some news ?
Speaker 3Speaking of our news was intact before , so yeah , if you could break it , that'd be ideal , thanks , I will certainly do that for you .
Speaker 1Uh , no , nor cal cup tournament this year what the news has been broken .
Speaker 3You're welcome yeah , what do you ? What are you gonna do ? All spring exactly .
Speaker 1I know I'm just gonna have to . I'm coaching a 12 team . Actually I took a 12 student , cool take it over for bj . Um , yeah , no , nor cal cup . This is coaching high school . We did not get rid of . I took a 12-seam . I'm taking it over for BJ , yeah no , norcal Cup this year .
Speaker 2Bj's coaching high school . We did not get rid of BJ Go Bills . No , no , no .
Speaker 1I'm merely a placeholder until King BJ returns . Yeah , I got the final rundown from the convention center Finally . We are in February and I've been trying since May of last year to get our contract for convention center for this year .
Speaker 2It's just the city . The city just won't .
Speaker 1Yeah , no , it's been a very educational experience
Event Organization and Grassman Tournament Origins
Speaker 1. I will say that , just understanding how these large event spaces operate , what drives them , what makes , what makes them tick , uh , and the number one things , at least for San Jose , is hotel rooms . Uh , our last year event , we got moved into the halls because they didn't have anything , and so they just moved us because they would prefer not to deal with the South hall . So we got lucky , um , but we have no hotels cause everything , because they would prefer not to deal with the South Hall . So we got lucky , but we have no hotels because everything was local .
Speaker 2So it was all very . No , they didn't give it to us early enough then either , and we can't get out of town if you don't give it to us early .
Speaker 1Yes , but their biggest driver is the hotel rooms , and so they can't book out in advance or won't book out in advance without a guarantee of hotel rooms .
Speaker 1So it's a chicken and egg situation for event organizers where if I want to get this tournament on the books a year in advance so I can actually go out and advertise the teams and try and get teams from out of state , I need to be able to get it booked early . They don't want to give it to us early because they're not sure the hotel rooms are going to be there , so they try and hold off and hold off , and hold off until you know , now it's we're literally three and a half months from when the event would be and they're like all right , you can have these dates . And now no one , not even the local teams , want to go , because they've already committed to another local event .
Speaker 1So it's a very interesting dichotomy , and the balance that I'm now trying to figure out with them is do you play the game of guaranteeing hotels to them Just up front , saying what is the guarantee that you need ? Okay , that's what I'm going to hit , but I need to sign this now and you need to sign this now so that I can go out and bring this event , which we know will be a quality event , to the volleyball market and say , hey , this date we're doing this plan accordingly . So that's the game that I'm currently now playing and got to learn this year , and learned the hard way of In year two of trying to run it back . The biggest thing holding the event back from being at the next level is how much room nights you're bringing , because that's what makes them money , that's what makes them the . You know they have to hit their quotas for the city . So that is why no NorCal Cup .
Speaker 1We're on the topic of what will actually be taking place still is going to the Bay Area high school all-star game and some of the things that we got to run it last year during NorCal Cup , which I thought was awesome . It was great . But now , after running it during the event , where it was difficult for players to play a full day of club volleyball and then come and do the event I want to maneuver it into its own day , its own , its own thing in its own venue . Where would be the coolest place that we could host the barrier all-starStar Game ? Think outside the box . Here We've done it at Willow Glen High School in like a traditional high school gym setting , which is fun .
Speaker 2Stanford would be one .
Speaker 1Like Burnham yeah .
Speaker 2Or Maples , or whatever .
Speaker 1Could I set up sport court in the middle of downtown San Jose somewhere , or something like Nebraska in the football field , but like , do it somewhere unique .
Speaker 3Teraflex on the tarmac .
Speaker 2It'll be called Teraflex , on the tarmac too , for sure .
Speaker 1We could get Teraflex probably sponsor that Private terminal at San Jose the .
Speaker 2Teraflex on the tarmac terminal .
Speaker 1Brought to you by the cockpit All on into the Southwest engines .
Speaker 2I mean the outdoor space and that stuff , the setup for that , and that's going to be an activation That'll be expensive .
Speaker 1So like so probably just the best college gym we can get Probably just like the best space that we can . Anything you guys think should be added .
Speaker 3Yeah , paypal Park Done .
Speaker 2PayPal Park would be so much fun . It's going to be hard at that time .
Speaker 1Well , that's true . We also are also running two days of Grassman this summer . Put it in the middle .
Speaker 2Yeah , sixes and fours , we're choosing one .
Speaker 1Should we run the All-Star game ?
Speaker 3at the Grassman yeah .
Speaker 2No , just one . One day is four . One day is four .
Speaker 1One day is six , one day .
Speaker 2We will do one day and we will do fours , and that's it .
Speaker 1It was like a . It was an overwhelming amount of people that voted for two days . It was 80% , wow , 80% of the people .
Speaker 2Little did they know ? An overwhelming amount of people do not drink like we do .
Speaker 1Yes , that's true .
Speaker 2I don't remember .
Speaker 1All-star game in the middle of the grass man . Chad played in the original grass man . So the original idea of the grass man , the reason I called it the grass man , was Are you telling me like I don't know ? The reason why .
Speaker 1I was there I grass man was because it was supposed to be the iron man of grass volleyball tournament . Grassman started as three events supposed to be doubles , triples , quads and then the individual who won the most points . So if you won the doubles and won the triples and then it got second in the quads , you would be crowned the grass man , the overall champion , the iron man , the burning man of grass volleyball . So yeah , we're getting back to our roots . Chad was there . Chad won literally every division of the original grass man .
Speaker 3He is the original grass man no , I mean technically , jones won too , because we didn't we didn't play in the doubles on friday or whatever . Yeah , so we had no points from that . We won the triples me me Jones and Malibu Stew , and then we won the quads me Jones and Bobby .
Speaker 2Oh , Bobby , you're on that .
Speaker 3I played triples with the Lodgy and Javi . That was where .
Speaker 2Oh , yeah , yeah , yeah .
Speaker 3We were supposed to pick up Fred Stahl , or maybe Malibu was supposed to come back or something , yeah , and it was like the day before , or I thought we picked you up like no , it was . No , it was another girl , it was john's friend , oh yeah . Oh yeah , I know who you're talking about . So yeah , then we .
Speaker 1So we won the quads with three yeah , you guys beat like doug and connor dom and the finals and yeah , all these , all these hacks that ended up at uc irvine yeah , yep lacy just cited out on the right .
Speaker 3No , what are you talking about ? Yeah , you scored . I remember , I remember watching that yeah you were . You were . The bailout on the right jones was like running like front ones and stuff .
Speaker 1I don't know you guys killed it , but yeah , we're back to our roots .
Speaker 3Multiple events we'll actually crown a an overall champ , yeah just to set the record straight , I've been banned from this event for winning too many times , so , so that's why you won't see me .
Speaker 1You banned yourself . What are you talking about ? Yeah , because I hurt you . Self-banned yourself .
Speaker 3I just want to give the kids a chance to win it . That's really all it
Summer Volleyball Events Planning
Speaker 3is .
Speaker 1He's looking for an excuse to be able to drink more beers on the sideline , not going to drink themselves . That's what the event calendar looks like for me now . No more norco cup . We're running the all-star game . We're running two days of grass man . What else can we add ? You got any ? Got any plans ? Anything you'd like to see ?
Speaker 3you guys coming to poland or what's going on ?
Speaker 2yeah , I'm trying to go to japan . I'm trying to go to . I got lots of things on my list but none of them have to do with running more events let's just manifest this right now .
Speaker 1We're just going to talk , we're talking to the camera . This is just going out there for episode . Whatever this is , we are , we're going to be at an international V&L event this summer and we're not counting Chicago V&L Like that's easy .
Speaker 2No , it's not , because it's two days before nationals and we're definitely going to have a hard time getting there .
Speaker 1Perfect , we're not counting that anyways , so it's gonna be an international one japan , poland , give me , uh , what's it , is it ?
Speaker 2are they going back to ? Are they going back to japan ?
Speaker 1no , they're going back to . Uh , where's the ? Where's the place that taylor airville loves , that has the jolly bee chicken or whatever is that ? Oh , philippines . And then the philippines . There you go . Yeah , they could go to the philippines let's go see cousin james , james , I think I bet you james watches this . James , if you watch this podcast send me a message send me a message on whatsapp and tell me that you saw this . Should we come visit you and the philippines and watch vnl beta bay offsite yeah , coach group chat retreat .
Speaker 3I like it done easy we're doing it anyway .
Speaker 2Life update Non-volleyball related .
Speaker 1Chad sulks into a corner .
Speaker 2Oh , I have an update it was Bobby's birthday . Oh it was , it was your birthday . We had a fun birthday , yeah .
Speaker 3All of our closest friends and their parents , and a cake made out of wood .
Speaker 2We took a tequila shot in the parking lot . It was wonderful we actually could have tailgated outside that day .
Speaker 3It really wasn't that bad .
Speaker 1We had a crew at .
Speaker 2We had a crew at Dutch Goose . Dutch Goose was popping . Yeah , it was so much fun . Happy birthday .
Speaker 3Happy birthday .
Speaker 2Happy birthday . I started shrinking . Yes , it's the best I know , so good .
Speaker 3Season two , crushing it .
Speaker 2Really , I started it and I had started it before , but I like didn't watch it , like I wasn't paying attention at all , and so I only got through like 20 minutes maybe of the first , like first , and that was it . And like I turned it off first season , like first episode . And then so I started it because you guys spoke so highly of it , and I started it and I was like , oh my gosh , this is the moment that you like realize that you're watching a good show and you like wish you could start it over and I'm like I get to do this . And then I watched the first episode and I was like this is great . And then I watched the second episode and I was like I'm gonna start watching shrinking instead of going to therapy . So this is really great and like wonderful , and I am so excited about it , phenomenal yeah , yeah , I wish I could go back and re-watch .
Speaker 2That's what I knew you were going to say when I said this we're going to go home tonight and we're going to put it on . Yeah , I'm very , very happy about it .