Volleyball: Local Coaches Voice Approval Of Pool Play Proposal

Michelle Smith

Michelle Smith

Sunday, July 20, 2014

High school and junior high volleyball coaches who normally take their teams to various invitational tournaments during the regular season can expect pool play to remain more balanced if a proposal passes next month.

The proposal is the first of five the Arkansas Activities Association has on its agenda when the annual meeting of the governing body convenes Aug. 6 at the Statehouse Convention Center in Little Rock. If it passes, it will allow tournament directors the ability to make last-minute changes and adjustments in case a team failed to make it or elected to drop out, which many coaches approve.

"It's going to provide more flexibility, which is needed for tournament directors," Bentonville coach Michelle Smith said. "It makes more sense to do this. Putting on those types of tournaments can be a challenge, and it will help those directors when things happen that are out of their control."

Teams are allowed to play up t0 10 sets, with each set ending when a team scores 25 points, during the pool play portion of the tournament before heading into bracket play. Teams could get their number of sets diminished if a team elected to drop out or didn't show up at the last minute because they weren't allowed to play any team in their respective pools more than once in pool play.

The proposal, which was brought up by the AAA's volleyball advisory committee, allows seeding groups to have as many as six teams in a tournament, and it would allow tournament directors to make any last-minute changes if needed in order to give all teams their full allotment of sets. That would also help them with seeding purposes once pool play ends and bracket play begins.

"It's going to make everything more fair for all the teams involved, especially if there is no-tiebreaker," AAA executive director Lance Taylor said. "It's also going to allow tournaments to adjust pools as well in case teams fall out and make everything more balanced."

Fayetteville coach Jessica Phelan said her teams have been fortunate and never ran into a situation where it didn't get the full amount of sets during pool play. She said the proposal would put Arkansas in a position that is favorable with other teams where the Lady Purple'Dogs travel for tournaments.

"The wording makes things a lot easier in case the need arises to adjust something," Phelan said. "I think a lot of the proposal is focused toward junior high tournaments because most high school tournaments have three or four teams in a pool."

The proposal, if passed, will be added into the AAA handbook and will be effective immediately. It will need a majority vote by those schools that participate in volleyball in order to pass, and area coaches don't believe that should be a problem.

"I absolutely think it will pass, and it sounds like it will pass with ease," Springdale Har-Ber coach Shyrah Schisler said. "It's a good thing to have because it's going to make things less stressful during tournaments, and I think it will allow teams to have more opportunities to be successful in these types of tournaments."

Sports on 07/20/2014