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Recently Added
Coaching Solutions: Identifying a Winning Line-Up for Your Volleyball Team
In the first half of the club volleyball season coaches are likely to try a little bit of everything. [...]
Blog Categories
JVA Announces the 2025 JVA Girls’ Watch List powered by VKTRY Performance Insoles
(Naperville, Illinois) The JVA is pleased to announce the top female volleyball athletes in the country nominated for the 2025 JVA Watch List powered by VKTRY Performance Insoles. Over 5,100 female indoor junior volleyball [...]
4 Ways to Manage the Chaos of Volleyball Tournament Travel
Club volleyball teams are constantly on the move. Between multi-day qualifiers and regional tournaments, teams travel nearly every weekend across the state and country. Coaches, club directors, and team parents juggle travel schedules, hotel [...]
Coaching Solutions: Volleyball Defensive Technical and Tactical Player Feedback Using Match Film
Minnesota Select coaching staff wanted to provide their defensive specialists with some feedback on their defensive position utilizing match film from the previous tournament. This is done throughout the season for the coaches of [...]
News
JVA Announces Addition of Nick Maruyama to the JVA Board of Directors
The JVA is pleased to announce that Nick Maruyama has been appointed to the JVA Board of Directors as the JVA Boys Representative. Maruyama is Executive Director of 630 Volleyball in Lisle, Illinois. Under [...]
JVA Announces Donation of $10,000 to USA Volleyball to Support the Men’s and Women’s National Team Programs
(MILWAUKEE, WI) - The Junior Volleyball Association (JVA), a leading association in the growth of youth volleyball in America, is pleased to be making a donation of $10,000 to USA Volleyball Men's and Women's [...]
JVA Reveals the 2024 JVA Girls All-National Team powered by Fivestar
MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN (June 5, 2024) The JVA is pleased to announce the 86 female student athletes selected to the 2024 JVA All-National Team powered by Fivestar, which recognizes the top female indoor volleyball players [...]
Club Directors
Technology Solutions: Cyber Hygiene Best Practices
Data privacy has never been more at risk, making data privacy a growing concern for 2025. As awareness of cyber threats grows, people are increasingly concerned about how organizations collect, store, and share personal [...]
Club Tonka Wins JVA Club of the Month
Club Tonka’s staff longevity is what sets it apart from the rest. Since its inception in 1988, Club Tonka has had stable and dedicated leadership with their director, Ted Fleener. The assistant director, Diane [...]
The JVA Impact: 2024
As we look back on the past year, we’re filled with optimism and excitement for the continued growth and success of our sport. The progress achieved at both the grassroots and elite levels reflects [...]
Coaches
Enforcing the 24 Hour Rule
The 24 hour rule is a common policy implemented by junior volleyball clubs to prevent communication during a tournament between parents and coaches specific to the coaching decisions made during the tournament, more often [...]
Game Management Tips to Create More Runs of Points and Win Games
Volleyball is a game of runs; the more point runs you create, the better chance you have of winning the match. Studies show that if you can score THREE runs of THREE points your chances [...]
Coaching Solutions: Lineup Considerations to Prioritize Winning vs Experiment with Different Lineups
Many aspects of coaching are more of an artform than a science. Lineup decisions, especially early in the season, certainly fall into that category. There are many factors that need to be balanced, so [...]
Boys
The Western Boys Power League Develops Solutions for the Growth of Boys Volleyball
Absolute Zero Volleyball Club started out as a girls program that arose from the need to provide training for fundamentals and mechanics in a fun environment. The club is based on the “Science of Volleyball” [...]
Appalachian Boys Power League Launches in 2023
Growing boys volleyball in Tennessee has been a most rewarding challenge. In 2012 K2 Volleyball Coach Cory Felts started a boys team that included his son and his son's friends, some other coaches' sons, and [...]
From the JVA Office: How to Increase Matched Competition for Boys Volleyball
Boys volleyball is growing at the grassroots level, with more tournaments adding 12U divisions due to the demand for high level competition as the sport continues to catch the interest of youth at a fast [...]
Girls
3 Benefits of Upper Body Strength Training for Volleyball Athletes
It can be easy to focus on the lower body when training for volleyball. All of the jumping, fast reactions and explosive movements that happen on the court are started by the lower [...]
3 Benefits of Lower Body Strength Training for Volleyball Athletes
Lower body weight training is very common among athletes who are looking to improve their performance on the court. When looking at collegiate and professional volleyball players, there’s no shortage of athletes that [...]
2024 JVA Beach Watch List powered by Fivestar
(June 26, 2024 Milwaukee, Wisconsin) The JVA is pleased to announce the 2024 JVA Beach Watch List presented by Fivestar that recognizes the top female beach athletes from JVA member clubs this season. Over [...]
Beach
Beach Solutions: Creating a Budget for a Beach Volleyball Club
Budgeting is a process of guestimating what your business will look like for the next 3-6 months, 12 months or more. It's important to create a budget because it gives you a roadmap for [...]
Beach Solutions: Practice Considerations to Maximize Potential and Develop Talent
Whether a beach program has 10 participants or 100, coaches need to have a plan in place to challenge the athletes who are advanced, while also keeping the players on the lower court motivated [...]
Beach Volleyball Clubs of America (BVCA) and JVA Forge Transformative Partnership with Volleyball Life
Milwaukee, WI, January 3, 2024– The Beach Volleyball Clubs of America (BVCA) and the Junior Volleyball Association (JVA) are thrilled to announce a groundbreaking collaboration with Volleyball Life, ushering in a new era of excellence [...]
Culture
From the JVA Office: Facing Rejection and Taking Risks
Rejection comes in many shapes, scenarios and forms. The struggle that comes with rejection causes some to fear rejection and avoid the hard situations, and instead they remove themselves from the chance to fail. But playing it safe only limits...
5 Ways to Prevent Entitlement in Youth Sports
Entitlement is unfortunately becoming more prevalent in youth sports today, and we have no one to blame but ourselves. Young athletes feel as if they “deserve” certain consideration regardless of preparation or effort. Parents, coaches, mentors, grandparents, leaders of young...
From the JVA Office: How Small Volleyball Clubs Thrive in a Competitive Market
The size of the club will not break your success; a small mindset will. The increase in junior volleyball participation has led to growth in the number of junior volleyball clubs. New clubs are forming, large clubs are acquiring smaller...
Events
From the JVA Office: JVA Gives Back
When JVA began in 2006 with a volunteer board and one event, we had no staff. We met in 2009 for a strategic planning session and wrote our mission. Our main goal was to [...]
An Official’s Impact: Helping Others Learn the Game We Love
"Officials love the game of volleyball. I have always viewed it as a way to help others learn the game that I love." As a young child, Rachel Kirk watched her mom play in adult [...]
From the JVA Office: The Chitown Boys Challenge Makes Boys Volleyball History
In 2021 the JVA and AAU teamed up to create three new boys events as part of the JVA AAU Boys Volleyball Tournament Series to launch in the 2022-2023 season. The first event in the [...]
Awards
JVA Honors Student Athletes with the 2024 JVA Athleader Award
MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN (May 20, 2024)– The JVA is pleased to announce the exceptional group of student athletes named as 2024 JVA Athleaders powered by Fivestar. The 25 distinguished male and female volleyball players also [...]
Pulse Volleyball Wins JVA Club of the Month
When Pulse was established in 2014, there were no boys' volleyball clubs in existence in the inland Orange County region. After many conversations, the Hart family took the leap of faith to start a [...]
Club Fusion Wins JVA Club of the Month
Established in 1999, Club Fusion sprung into the club volleyball world when Bill Milborn held a tryout at Huntley High School and marched into Fusion’s first season with less than 10 teams. 25 years [...]
Training
Coaching Mental Performance: TARGET Culture and Intrinsically Motivated Athletes
One of the most prominent issues I hear from coaches is that their team needs to be more “mentally tough” or “resilient.” They will say, “my team just can’t win long rallies,” or “they [...]
Coaching Mental Performance: Team Identity and Value Systems
Despite a club’s best intentions to make sure all coaches are maintaining consistent verbiage across age groups and skill levels, and keeping the expectations of the training environment relatively consistent, it often devolves into [...]
Coaching Mental Performance: Reinforcement and Punishment
After the season I always find it appropriate to challenge coaches to reflect on how their teams formed and performed throughout the season. Often with these reflections we get coaches that feel as if [...]
Parents
From the JVA Office: Let’s Set our Views on Volleyball
I asked a high school female volleyball player to name her top three favorite volleyball players. She took a long pause, then said the first name of a high school volleyball player she saw play [...]
Fundraising 101: It Doesn’t Have to be Painful!
For time-starved volleyball parents, fundraising for the season can sometimes be overwhelming. When factoring in tournament fees, travel, food, and other expenses, some parents in the United States could spend around $700- $1,000 a month [...]
Technology Solutions: Growing Competition Leads to New Solutions
Youth sports have taken over the weekends of parents across the country. Travel, new equipment, and club fees makes those weekends anything but cheap. While some see the rising cost of youth sports as a [...]
Recruiting
Recruiting Solutions: Early Season Meeting with Your Club Athletes and Parents
The recruiting process can be very overwhelming to the athletes and parents. Clear, open and honest communication is key to a successful process that helps your athletes achieve their goal of playing in college. Here [...]
Technology Solutions: Using Video and Stats to Take Charge of Athlete Development
Oregon Juniors Volleyball Academy (OJVA) club director and master coach Steve Suttich says that OJVA players are committed to using video and data not only for recruiting, but to develop skills and improve their volleyball [...]
Recruiting Solutions: Staying Pro-active in the Recruiting Process Outside of the Club Season
The recruiting process in general is currently slow to develop for athletes and colleges. Many schools are navigating rosters due to COVID waivers and adjustments in budgets. The transfer portal is also having an impact [...]
Travel
Building a Budget and Schedule for the Club Season
It’s September, which means we are in full preparation mode for the upcoming season, and the most time consuming part of preparation is budgeting and scheduling for each team. Here are factors that can guide a director when preparing...
2020 JVA Challenge Series presented by i6 Features Record Number of Events
The JVA is pleased to announce a record breaking 31 events named to the 2020 JVA Challenge Series presented by i6. These events share in the JVA’s ideology to provide high quality events and a great experience for all their participants...
A Summary of the Girls 18’s Indoor Championships Survey Results
This past summer, we posted an article about the various options that U-18’s have to finish their season. We also addressed feedback from some of the coaches who attended the various championships, and concluded with a survey to gather...