clubonlyforus

Im truly just not sure about that. Dave was fed up like a lot of us parents at all the cussing and belittling that was going on to all the girls. I'm sure he got upset about what happened with his daughter being told that she was the best setter at K2 (which many of us believe), then there was a dispute with K2. The next thing we knew, she was tossed to the side like she didnt matter. A disagreement about a different matter with parents and management, shouldnt be taken out on the player, period! Like I said before, I think he was probably planning on starting a club anyway. With what went on last year, it just got started earlier than expected (my guess). Many of us parents were also upset about the number of free rides that were given out and paid for by US! Believe me, the last 2 or 3 years of K2 was spiraling down hill for many of the customers. We just wanted to take our money elsewhere. If you will look, there are a few former elite players, that may have been considered the best players in the area, that left as well. Not everyone came from a "2" team or from the bench. So maybe Dave did start it just because his daughter didnt make the "1" team last year. But, there was over a hundred more girls came with her. Does that say something about him, or K2? I think both. Many of us needed a change, and we have trust in him. Simple as that.

I totally agree. K2 could not offer us what KVA could this year so we moved. We also have friends at all the knoxville clubs and wish all of them success. I think the motive behind why dave started the club has gotten a little off though. He has coached volleyball for quite sometime and has loved the sport most of his life. I dont know for sure, but I think he has thought about running a club for a while now. I believe that the things that were going on at K2 probably sped up the process, but I think he would have started a club anyway. His daughter has only one more year of high school, and he had no intentions of leaving the sport. Since he apparantley didnt agree with the coaching philosophy at K2, then why not start a club of his own? Nobody trashed K2 when they split from smjvc, Chris and J just felt like the needs of club volleyball were not being met in the knoxville area so they started K2. I would imagine if KVA starts treating some girls different than others and/or treating the 2 teams like second class citizens, then we will see a new club open up in a few years again. lol.

Lol

The problem with having to pay the extra travel expense for the player is, because the parents have to also pay to travel. So if the parents go to every tournament, like most do, then they are paying for 1 1/4 of hotel rooms instead of 1 hotel room. And paying for 2 vehicles to travel their family there instead of just 1. I dont have a problem with it if the parents are ok with it. But it is much more expensive than KVA. If the parents dont travel to the tournament, then yes, it is less expensive than what it would cost for a family to travel. One of the many reasons most of us parents wanted something different is because of this. We felt like K2 was taking the "family" out of it. We want to work as a family through the season, be able to experience the joys, comfort the disappointments, and be a family. Not just drop our child off on Friday and hope everything goes alright until Sunday night. Last year, the elite teams went to the MEP and a few different tournament than the 2 teams. The schedules were quite different. Maybe it is different this year, but I doubt it. The elite tournament at the wilderness is pretty good but the regular tournament is more like a PR tourny. Why has Pheonix Rising never went to the wilderness?

The "2" teams decided to play a "1" team type of schedule so they pay accordingly. If you will notice on each team, the cost is determined by how many and which tournaments they go to. The team decided that. If a club had 4 teams that thought they were good enough to play the hardest schedule, they should be able to do it. The wilderness tournament is not real tough.There are a few teams that are worth playing, but most of the weekend is spent dominating until the end.

K2 doesnt include travel. Their Elite teams pay an extra $1200 to $1500 to cover the travel of the players (team bus and hotels) but the other teams are like any other club, travel expenses are extra. It also depends on which tournaments the team decides to play in.

This is all news to me. I think she was the winningest coach at CN. Wonder what happened?

And stop bashing someone we dont know on a website? And instead, talk to them face to face with our problems? Ok.

BigBlue, its probably a little wierd to have Eleni on the KVA website since all of her training came from SMJVC and K2. Maybe he was trying to get some credit or just not thinking, I dont know. I probably would not have put her on my website. But, I dont think it matters. Any college coach looking for recruits will do their research and know where she came from if they are investigating the club. I dont think having her on the website swayed anyone to go to KVA instead of K2 or PR. Almost everyone in the knoxville volleyball community knows the deal so I dont think it really matters. Knoxvolley, after you have been at K2 for a few years, come back on here and let me know how you feel. I thought it was the best thing since sliced bread but it went downhill from there. Hopefully the opening of KVA woke them up to make some changes and then they can have a long life and keep the competition with clubs that we all need in the Knoxville area. If they didnt wake up, they wont be here five years from now.

Problem is, people like J and Tom know a LOT about volleyball, but dont know how to coach young girls worth a crap. We have had coaches that knew how to coach but didnt know all the in's and out's of volleyball and coaches that knew everything about volleyball but couldnt "reach" the girls or coach them up so they could win. Some of the these young coaches may be really good and some may not.

Most of the top teams at kva, if not all of them, will never play in club. They will only play power and open. That is part of how to get better. As the season moves on, a team may decide to adjust that if they are getting creamed all the time, but I know the mentality at kva is to play highly competive tournaments, not rec ball.

Also, Bearden's Libero and Setter played together about 7 years ago for their first year of club at SMJVC. They have been great friends ever since. The Libero is graduating early or she would be playing club this year also. The MEPL is basically pool games each weekend until the "championship". You get seeded for the next weekend on how you played this weekend. It is mostly top clubs that do it and is very competitive. It goes along with the idea, to get better you have to play better teams. Instead of going to a tournament and maybe seeing one or two really good teams in the finals, you play them all weekend.

VBD69, you are way off. Most of the people that left K2, left because of the two you mentioned. There are not many parents that would tolerate their daughters being treated the way they do. Its funny that you mention they need someone who cares about the team instead of themselves. That is EXACTLY the opposite of those two. AC coaches will not leave. Expecially Coach Cantrell. He has been there forever and always will be. ORCAT nevers knows what he/she is talking about.

I sure wish there was a perfect club in the Knoxville area, because that is where we would be! KVA is not perfect as we have all read (because everything on the internet is true). PR just seems to be at a level above rec ball. Nothing wrong with that unless you want to try to be the best and play against the best. K2 has too many coaches that think screaming and cussing and demeaning the girls is the way to get the most out of them. So we have KVA. Time will only tell. I, however, truly believe that KVA will prosper. A lot of people in the knoxville club community know the director of KVA and have put their trust in him with their daughters. For a third club to open in a town of less than 400k population, and start out with about eleven club teams, plus all the hybrid teams, tells me that the other clubs were not doing their jobs. Again, only time will tell but my money is on KVA.

Why should OR be opposite Karns in the bracket? From what I have been told, Karns was 7-1 with a loss to AC, Clinton was 6-2 with wins over OR and AC, OR was 6-2 with losses to Clinton and Karns, AC was 6-2 with losses to Clinton and OR, Halls was 5-3 with losses to Karns, OR, and AC but a win over Clinton. If all that is correct, then it should have been Karns 1st, Clinton 2nd, OR 3rd, AC 4th, Halls 5th and so on. I would expect Karns and Clinton to be opposite, and the others to be ranked accordingly. I dont believe that the Clinton coach just up and changed the bracket on her own and get by with it. Sounds like people are mad after the fact. Karns and Clinton played in the finals like it should have been if the wins and losses I said are correct.

Anyone?

Its funny, orcat, you didnt complain about the brackets when they came out days ago. You only complain after losing. And how does one coach rig the tournament awards? Sounds usual from you Your #25 is a really good player for being only freshman. I think she will be a power house by her junior year.

Congratulations to Karns! Congratulations to Lyric! They will have their hands full in Regions. As usual, more excuses from orcat. Karns beat everyone except AC in regular season and Clinton only lost to Karns and Halls during regular season. I dont know how brackets are made but seems like to top teams made it to the finals. Good luck to everyone!

So how did District 3 shape up this season? I have been out of the loop a little this year. I am guessing Karns is first an Oak Ridge is second? How is everyone else ranked? Who plays who during the district tourny? Thanks.

KVA will certainly play open level for the top teams. That is something all of us have talked about before is PR playing club everywhere they go and not being seen. Also, we have played open before and been whooped, but we got better as the season went on because of playing better competition. If you are winning tournaments, you are not playing up enough. For the first year, KVA will have at least a couple of very competitive teams.

k2ruth, I would expect that kind of response from you about KVA. I agree that PR is not competitive. I dont know if they choose it that way to keep costs down and to keep players from having to travel all over the country or what. But for as long as they have been around, they should be better. K2 had the knoxville area sewn up until they decided to move outside of knoxville, push the parents (customers) out, and have inexperienced coaches and/or coaches that are so insensitive to the girls that they quit before the season is over. Had K2 done their job like they should have, there would have been no reason for parents to decide to branch off and start another club. KVA has some really good things going for it. First of all, the bearden coach has coached volleyball for YEARS. While coaching the two team at K2 for a couple of years, he beat the one team several times because he knows how to coach up the girls instead of screaming at them and then expecting them to play better. He was able to take bearden to state his first year without the best talent. KVA is also offering a hybrid that is between rec ball and club travel so players and parents can get a feel for club ball without spending a fortune. This is something that knoxville has needed for a long time. KVA also has a heated facility with six courts instead of 3. Yes I said three since baseball, and karate took over the 4th court at K2. KVA is also heated instead of being in the TEENS through the winter (that is ridiculous). It is also in KNOXVILLE where it should be. The parents are also allowed to travel with their players and stay in the same hotels because it should be a family thing with all the time and money that club ball consumes. etc, etc, etc. K2 had done us good and we had a good time and experienced a lot, but they decided to push the parents out and thats just what happened, we went elsewhere.

I agree Knack. I am not going to take anything away from AC's past success, but volleyball has grown by leaps and bounds in the last several years in East Tennessee. In order for a player to stand out and not play club, she would have to be amazing. When it comes to scholarships being given out and a college coach has say 100 girls to look at, and 80 of them play 9 to 12 months a year and the other 20 play only 3 months, it is not hard to see which way the coach may look. Even if a player is really good, she can never have the "experience" of someone playing as much as a club player. Also, unless a lot of recruiting is being done by parents and high school coach, colleges dont have the resources to go to dozens of high school games to look at dozens of players. They can go to a couple of big club tournaments and look at hundreds of players. I think for the most part, a player needs to decide on one sport by high school if they plan on playing at the next level. There are always exceptions, but generally speaking, I think that is the case.

If you would go back and look at the last couple of seasons, you would see where I fully supported AC in their ability to truly coach and do it without club player. I always felt that if you were to take out all the club players at every school and play only high school players, AC would never lose a game because they knew how to coach players to be better. AC usually started out a little low, then increasingly got better as the season went on. Unlike most other schools that just leveled off. I do think that since coach Wade is gone, it is not the same. Only time will tell now if it is. I know AC graduated most of their players last year and will be down for a year or two, but then we should see a change or it will be telling about coach Wade being gone. But most high school coaches in our area are not much on volleyball coaching. They simply dont know what to do. The exception might be private schools, but they are able to afford bringing in top coaches, even some that coached college before. For the public schools, that is not the case. Good coaches that know the game are far and few between.

I couldnt agree more Bigblue. I know the people you are talking about and it is true. Matter of fact, when Wingate signed Handel, the coach told them to leave PR and go to K2 because she would be exposed to bigger competition, play in better tournaments, and therefore get better. Her dad was very loyal to PR and really didnt care for the move but done what was best for her. Then she was treated like crap at school because of it. That is what turned me off of the Karns coach and PR. I felt like Karns should have been in state contention a few years back when she had all the tall players, but she could not coach them to victory. But, in reference to lack of coaching at your school, that is typical to East Tennessee. There are many many more inferior coaches at high schools than good ones. It is sad to see players that have some raw talent and could do good things, maybe even get some scholarship money at a small school, but doesnt have a coach that knows what they are doing, and doesnt have the thousands of dollars it takes to play club. Thats what sucks about crappy coaching to me. By the way, the Libero for HVA last year, Winstead, is sitting on the bench for HVA. I dont know if/what college she is going to, but she is helping with the team.

Unfortunatley when you are 6'6", you dont need to do much right in volleyball. You can have awesome 5"9" girls on the front row, but when they have to get around someone who is head and shoulders above them, it makes it hard. Even if the player is a little slow and raw. You cant teach height. I would imagine she has had colleges interested for quite some time. If she is able to become a good volleyball player, then she will domintate. I am a little surprised to hear you say that about your coaching blue. A couple of years back, I felt like they had a state champion team with the talent, but the coach was not able to put them there. Your school is not the only one with that problem. I dont know what some of them are thinking at times. I feel like they should find the strengths and weaknesses of EACH player, then put them in a position to win. Too many times, a player stays in that is playing pityfully or is an upper classman instead of putting the best six players, for that day, on the court. I think it is early still, and you guys will come out with several wins.