The "W" formation is often the first serve receive formation players learn when they start to play 6 vs 6 volleyball. This simple drill helps the players learn and practice how to set-up the "W" formation in all six rotations, while simultaneously getting some serve receive and hitting practice.
Creating a competitive environment when training serve and serve receive skills really helps to keep these drills interesting for your athletes. This drill has the servers and passers compete against each other for points and encourages aggressive, consistent serving and passing.
Teams paying attention to the details establish "success indicators" for various game situations. For example, a team may determine for their level of play they need to be able to score from a "free ball" situation 70% of the time, from a "service reception" situation 60% of the time, and perhaps from an "out of system" situation (when a player…
This is a simple and fun game often used as part of the warm-up phase at the beginning of practice to get players motivated and improve player's competency with the overhead pass skill.
"Short Court" is a widely-used and very fun warm-up game that is also very good for introducing and stabilizing three contact play. The extremely small court means the ball moves slowly which aids novice players in controlling each contact so they can more easily learn the rhythms and timings of the game as well as reading and responding to ball…
"Small sided games" are a great way to get players lots of quality repetitions in a fun and competitive environment. Fewer players means each athlete gets almost twice the ball contacts when compared to 6 vs 6 play. This particular game challenges the side with fewer players to "overcome the odds" and the team with more players to effectively utilize…
This drill works to expand the court space your passers are able to cover while providing plenty of additional attacking, setting, and blocking reps to other players in an efficient way.
Being able to "close out" sets is a vital skill if you want to be a top team. It's often stated that a set doesn't really start until after 20. Teams should regularly practice simulating “end of game” situations and the pressure they can create. This game focuses on the final three points of a set (where many sets are…
Learning to dig the ball effectively to the the center of the court is very important if a team wants to transition well. This drill encourages players to dig accurately by putting the setter under a lot of movement pressure. Defenders will be encouraged to defend accurately because inaccurately defended balls will be very difficult for setters to keep in…
Narrow court, small-sided games are a great way to get attackers comfortable facing, hitting the ball off the block, and just develop general ball control. With simple adjustments, the game can be adapted to work on double block coordination, simple defense, attacking of the block, and/or spike coverage. It's also a great warm-up game to use as a substitute for…
Learning to be creative in transition can really help a team to become effective in out-of-system situations. The rapid play in volleyball means players regularly find themselves out of position and need to learn to adapt to a wide variety of different situations and circumstances. This small sided-game creates unusual transition situations that will challenge the players' capacities to communicate…
Being able to successfully defend against extremely hard-driven attacks can create those much desired momentum swings that can change the outcome of a set or even a match. Most often this capacity is trained with feeders hitting hard attacks of of an elevated box at defenders. However, the cues related to digging an attack from a feeder on a box…
Volleyball can be a difficult game to introduce to novice players because a certain amount of baseline skill is required for rallies to be initiated. It can be difficult to get players to move beyond the initial first contact to create fun rallies. This 3 vs 3 game permits a catch on many of the first contacts (and utilizes a…
The quality of a team's out of system play directly impacts how successful they become at winning sets. This drill trains out of system play having a feeder direct where the second contact is made at the start of a rally and then using a modified scoring system to encourage aggressive and efficient out of system attacking.
Learning to rally effectively, as well as keep a rally going, is one of the primary objectives of volleyball. In this simple drill players on both sides of the net cooperate to control the ball and keep the ball in play - using a pass (dig), set, spike sequence for as long as possible. It helps players to focus on…
"Pepper" is the classic skill warm-up drill used by almost all players around the world and it's great, players get to use many skills and get a lot of contacts in a short period of time. However, it also has some limitations. It doesn't incorporate the net, include much player movement, or require the ball to be redirected anywhere except…
"Pepper" is the classic skill warm-up drill used by almost all players around the world and it's great, players get to use many skills and get a lot of contacts in a short period of time. However, it also has some limitations. It doesn't incorporate the net, include much player movement, or require the ball to be redirected anywhere except…
"Pepper" is the classic skill warm-up drill used by almost all players around the world and it's great, players get to use many skills and get a lot of contacts in a short period of time. However, it also has some limitations. It doesn't incorporate the net, include much player movement, or require the ball to be redirected anywhere except…
Being able to consistently receive serve and "side out" effectively is vital to every successful team. This drill helps to train teams to "side out" effectively in every rotation, helps identify whether a team has any weak service reception rotations, and also gives extra training in those weaker rotations.
This simple game is great for developing the setting skills of non-setters and gives both teams plenty of opportunities to attack out-of-system as well as defend against hard driven attacks. It's a great game for developing these skills in a competitive and game-like situation.
Small-sided games like this one which incorporates a "back row attack only" limitation is a fun way to get players more practise defending medium-paced balls, helps to improve their ability to position effectively on the ball when attacking "out-of-system," and just generally helps with the reduction of attacking errors. They also make great warm-up games for the start of practice.
The "pipe" attack has become a very important part of modern volleyball - especially in the men's game. Becoming efficient with this type of attack is often essential to keeping your offense running at full capacity. This simple 4 vs 4 game is a great way to begin to integrate the attacks from the "pipe" zone into your offensive systems…
Learning how to successfully and consistently hit good angle shots is a skill that every player needs to develop as an hitting option. This small-sided game adjusts the court dimensions to encourage more angle attacking to help players integrate the cross-court attack into their game play.
"Pepper" is the classic skill warm-up drill used by almost all players around the world and it's great, players get to use many skills and get a lot of contacts in a short period of time. However, it also has some limitations. It doesn't incorporate the net, include much player movement, or require the ball to be redirected anywhere except…
