On a recent episode of GMS Live, Hall of Fame and Olympic Volleyball Coach Marv Dunphy shared a saying he adopted from a previous coach of the USA men’s and women’s national teams, Harlan Cohen. Marv continued to use the quote with his players throughout the remainder of his coaching career. The advice in the saying?
“Hit the volleyball anywhere but the net.”
When I heard the quote, I recalled a volleyball practice I was coaching a few years ago. At some point during the practice, I stopped a drill after a handful of consecutive hitting errors – each of which was an attack error into the net. I reminded the players of the importance of hitting the ball over the net. We know that some of those attacks, after going over the net, would be blocked, and others would go out of bounds. But, several would also turn into kills or additional transition opportunities.
1%
I then went and watched a few NCAA women’s volleyball matches to learn what percentage of attacks into the net might be acceptable. At our next practice, I told my players, “Only one percent of our total attacks should go into the net. For every one spike into the net, we need 99 more spikes going over.”
As I’ve been watching the 2024 Paris Olympics, I’ve been paying close attention to the types of hitting errors that are made by these elite attackers.
The takeaway is quite clear. The best teams in the world, and the best players in the world, attack the ball over the net at an exceptionally high rate.
Olympic Volleyball Spiking – Where do players Hit the ball? Anywhere but the net
MEN’S OLYMPIC VOLLEYBALL
Here is the data through the first round of men’s pool play matches:
The 12 mens teams combined to hit only 13 balls into the net, equaling barely over 1% of all attack attempts. More notably, the winning teams in the six opening matches only hit four total balls into the net, equaling 0.66% of attacks. The losing teams more than doubled the amount of attack errors into the net.
* Violation errors include illegal back row attacks, lift violations or double violations called against the attacker, or net violations called against the attacker.
WOMEN’S OLYMPIC VOLLEYBALL
Here is the data from the first round of women’s pool play matches in Paris:
The women, despite significantly more overall hitting attempts, hit fewer balls into the net, which resulted in a much lower percentage of attack errors that didn’t go over the net. Amazingly, half of the Olympic field played an entire match without one ball being spiked into the net. And one full match (Brazil vs Kenya) didn’t have one by either team.
Similar to the men, the teams that won hit a lower percentage of balls into the net than the teams that lost.
USE THIS INFORMATION TO HELP YOUR ATHLETES
After analyzing nearly 3,000 total volleyball attacks throughout the first three days of the Paris Olympics by all the athletes, we see that the amount of attacks into the net should hover around the 1.0% mark for good teams and good players.
Not surprisingly, a much higher percentage of total attacks are hit out of bounds, and even more than that are blocked by the opponent.
If you want your teams to win tournament championships, region championships, league championships, and state championships — follow Marv’s lead and encourage your players to hit “anywhere but the net.”