Volleyball

The 34th annual SCVA Las Vegas Classic gets under way Saturday in the desert and ends Monday on President’s Day. And last year, two 18 Open Elite teams in the field made a late-season push during the USA Volleyball Girls Junior Nationals 18 Open championships in Dallas.

San Gabriel Elite 18 Roshambo finished with a bronze medal, while Forza1 18 UA tied for fifth. It was Forza defeating SG in the 18 Open Elite championship last February in Las Vegas. With Apex1 18 Black already qualified in 18 Open — the lone 18s team so far with a bid to Reno — at least one team from the Las Vegas Classic is assured to represent from the tournament in early May.

Some others should be joining Apex, clubs like Mizuno Long Beach 18 Rockstar and SG Elite 18 Roshambo, both of which are high seeds in 18 Open Elite this go around. Below, we run through the tournament and things to watch for.

18 Open Elite
Number of Teams — 30
USAV Open Qualified – Apex1 18 Black
Top Seeds
1. Mizuno Long Beach 18 Rockstar
2. Laguna Beach 18-1
3. A4 Volley 18 Purple Joaco
4. SG Elite 18 Roshambo
5. Rage 18 Greg
6. AZ Rev 18 Adidas
7. Spiral 18 UA
8. Rancho Valley 18 Premier
Players To Watch
Amara Aimufua, OH, SG Elite 18 Roshambo
Mia Christensen, L, Goldenwest 18 Asics
Jenna Giambi, L, Forza1 North 18 Kurt
Jaelyn Hodge, OH, AZ Rev 18 Adidas
Nalani Iosia, L, Mizuno Long Beach 18 Rockstar
Allison Jacobs, OH, Legacy 18 Elite
Sophia Lambros, S, A4 Volley 18 Purple Joaco
Makayla Long, MB, AZ Rev 18 Adidas (JR)
Grace McIntosh, S, Laguna Beach 18-1
Kami Miner, S, Mizuno Long Beach 18 Rockstar (JR)
Vanessa Ramirez, L/DS, SG Elite 18 Roshambo
Krystal Raymundo, L/DS, SG Elite 18 Roshambo
Mia Tuaniga, S, Apex1 18 Black
Malialani Tufuga, S/RS, Apex1 18 Black
Starr Williams, OH, Mizuno Long Beach 18 Rockstar
Outlook
This division is made up of eight pools. The last two have three teams each, the remaining six have four teams. They are playing to get into an eight-team gold bracket on Day 3, when they can start vying for the championship. Mizuno Long Beach 18 Rockstar is the top seed and tournament favorite for a reason. The club finished tied for fifth in 17 Open at last year’s USAV GJNC in Indianapolis and has most everyone back. The only team to earn an 18 Open bid so far though is Apex1 Black. The club earned its first-ever Open bid two weeks ago by finishing third at the January Thaw in Minneapolis. While other So Cal squads like Long Beach, Laguna Beach, San Gabriel and A4 haven’t yet played in a qualifier, sixth-seeded AZ Rev 18 Adidas has. AZ Rev ended up in ninth at the Music City Championships in Nashville last month. AZ Rev defeated Forza1 North 18 Kurt in Nashville. Forza1 North is in the Vegas field and could be a potential sleeper. As for AZ Rev, the Arizona club figures to be in contention late on Monday.

17 Open Elite
Number of Teams — 20
Top Seeds
1. SG Elite 17 Rosh
2. A4 Volley 17 Purple
3. Rage Westside 17 Gabe
4. Encore 17 Goldhahn
5. AZ Sky 17G
6. Mizuno Long Beach 17 Rockstar
7. ARVC 17 Adidas
8. SVVC 17 Mike
Players To Watch
Peyton DeJardin, OH, SG Elite 17 Roshambo
Olivia Keller, OH, Rage 17 Gabe
Sidney McIntosh, OH, ARVC 17 Adidas
Mellie Muir, S, Encore 17 Godhahn
Tasmin Mullins, S/RS, Mizuno Long Beach 17 Rockstar
Jennifer Wroblicky, MB, Mizuno Long Beach 17 Rockstar
Grace Xu, S, Rage 17 Gabe
Outlook
This division is smaller than its 18s counterpart but the teams are essentially playing their way toward the same goal. After starting on day one in four-team pools, clubs are chasing one of six spots in Monday’s gold bracket. The top two teams get byes into the semifinals, with the remaining four teams playing for the last two spots in the semis. Three teams in the field — ARVC, M1 and SIVBC — all played in the January Thaw Qualifier. That event offered 17 Open for a change this year. ARVC finished the highest of the trio in ninth place. M1 tied for 17th while SIVBC tied for 21st. San Gabriel, the top seed, had the best showing last year in 16s of any team in the field. San Gabriel came in 25th in 16 Open in Indy.

16 Open
Number of Teams — 64
Top Seeds
1. SG Elite 16 Roshambo
2. ICON 16 Adidas
3. SIVBC 16 Thunder
4. OJVA 16-1 Gold
5. CPA Xtreme 16 Elite
6. Momentous 16 Raul
7. Club H 16 Adidas
8. Athena 16-1 Gold
Outlook
The top seed, it’s obvious everyone in the field is going to be coming for San Gabriel Elite 16 Rosh. The SCVA club returns 10 players from last year’s roster that tied for 13th in 15 Open in Indy. SG’s run included impressive victories over AVC Clev 15 Rox and TAV 15 Black, as well as CIS 15M, which took second in 15 Elite at Triple Crown. The field begins with 64 teams and will be sized down to the final eight starting on the third day. From there, the quarterfinalists will play out the gold bracket to determine the division’s winner.

15 Open
Number of Teams — 32
Top Seeds
1. BCVC 15 Smack
2. Viper 15-1 Jolynn
3. SG Elite 15 Rosh
4. SCVC 15 Roxy
5. Absolute Black 15-1
6. Maunalani 15 Hurley
7. SF Tremors 15 Wolverines
8. Club Cactus 15 Mizuno
Outlook
The way the seedings are set up, the SCVA uses its own point system derived from regional qualifying play. The teams are young and it’s hard to predict what to get with a 15s team. But based on three days of qualifying Beach Cities picked up the No. 1 overall seed with some of the other SoCal squads attending the Triple Crown Sports NIT in Kansas City. The team to watch out for might be Absolute Black 15-1. The NorCal club brings back nine members from a squad that finished tied for 27th in 14 Open in Indy last summer. The highest showing from last season of any team in the field. In fact, Absolute was the only team to make Open playing in 15 Open in Vegas.

REMAINING DIVISIONS
18 Open
Number of Teams — 64
Top Seeds
1. Forza1 North 18 Britney
2. SoCAL VBC 18 Aurora
3. Club H 18 Adidas
4. PSVBA 18-Bobby
5. Dig This 18 Black
6. 949 18 Black
7. SG Elite 18 Elite
8. Bakersfield 18 John

18 USA
Number of Teams — 144
Top Seeds
1. SAVA 18 Black
2. Blue Crush 18s
3. Coast 18-3
4. Vegas United 18 Navy
5. Seattle Jrs 18
6. Boise Ignite 18 National
7. Hi Intensity Hilo
8. Jammers 18 Black

17 Open
Number of Teams – 56
Top Seeds
1. Club H 17 Adidas
2. 949 17 Black
3. Sunshine 17 North
4. Bakersfield 17 John
5. BCVC 17 Smack
6. SG Elite 17 Elite
7. Viper 17-1
8. OJVA 17-1

17 USA
Number of Teams — 132
Top Seeds
1. Mizuno Long Beach 17 Mizuno
2. NWAJS 17 National Black
3. Max Performance 17 Blue
4. Actyve 17 Mizuno
5. MVA 17 Elite
6. Laule’a 17 Black
7. Momentous 17 Raul
8. Rise 17 National

16 USA
Number of Teams — 136
Top Seeds
1. SDVBC 16-1
2. Vegas United 16 Navy
3. SEVC 16-1
4. Left Coast 16-1
5. Forza1 West 16 Under
6. LRJ 16 National
7. Pulse 16 Black
8. Apex NW U16 Summit

15 USA
Number of Teams – 72
Top Seeds.
1. Sunshine 15 Elite
2. SG Elite 15 Elite
3. Actyve 15 Mizuno
4. CHV 15 Lee
5. BBCLV 15 Black
6. DCVA/505VBA
7. Mizuno M1
8. Tstreet Pomona 15

I discovered The Net Live in early 2009 and was a faithful listener ever since, right up to attending the final podcast this past Saturday.

There were some references to the show back then on Facebook and at the time I was a freelance volleyball photographer based in San Diego, and it was hard to be “in the know,” living as I did a couple of hours away from Los Angeles.

Back then, there wasn’t a ton of internet media yet, and The Net Live quickly became one of my staples. As a die-hard volleyball fanatic, I enjoyed the volleyball analysis, and came to feel that I “knew” hosts Reid Priddy and Kevin Barnett after listening to them weekly, even though I had had only a handful of brief conversations with them.

So it was with profound disappointment that I heard that The Net Live was ending its 11-year run.

The initial idea for The Net Live occurred after the 2008 Beijing Olympics, when Priddy and the men’s national team returned with a gold medal. Priddy is one of the USA’s most decorated players, a four-time Olympian with gold (2008, Beijing) and bronze (2016, Rio de Janeiro) on his resume. Most recently Priddy is a beach convert, winning the last summer’s Manhattan Beach Open with Trevor Crabb.   

“We had just won the gold in Beijing, Kevin had been a huge part of our team culture, but then went into the media side,” Priddy said. “I’ve always recognized that volleyball could upgrade into media that was interactive, and Kevin and I sat down one day and brainstormed. What are all the different ideas that we have that we would love to see volleyball have.

“Kevin had very practical ideas, I’m more the dreamer. Of all the ideas, we decided that podcasting was something that I could still do while I was under contract professionally in Russia. This was something that we could actually execute, so we decided to start there. 

“We had envisioned this bigger thing, but we just stuck in this lane. Let’s just have a weekly show that’s handling what happening right now. Let’s get the people that are involved with the happenings on the show.”

Barnett, a former Pepperdine volleyball outside hitter, was on the 2000 and 2004 Olympic teams and parlayed his playing experience into becoming the NBC Olympics analyst in 2008.

“I needed practice hosting,” Barnett said. “I was new to broadcasting, I had been an analyst in 2008, kind of started in 2007, I had done some amateur stuff before that. I wanted to increase my role, and thought, ‘How hard can it be to host?’ 

“Well, I listened to my own stuff, and thought, ‘There’s some work to be done here,” Barnett said with a laugh.

The Net Live was structured, how might we say it, informally, with shows that could go anywhere from 25 minutes to two-plus hours, depending on what was going on.

“It’s more of Reid and I talking about the game. If you attended back-to-back VNL matches, you would have no idea why the roster changed, or what issues there were with the team, how they were selecting the roster, why they were selecting a roster of that type in that particular year,” Barnett said.

“The NFL only plays 16 regular weeks a year, plus playoffs, and they talk about NFL from the moment it ends on Sunday until the next game starts the next week, endlessly. And then they talk about from the end of the season until minicamp. It’s just training camp, for crying out loud.

“And nobody in volleyball had done that. We saw an area where we could not only do that, but we could aggregate some bigger things. There were some bigger ideas at the start.

“We wanted a place where we could talk about the game, expose the game and the people in it.”

The reps that Barnett got at The Net Live helped him expand his TV presence; Now he has worked with just about everybody in the sport business, including ESPN, NBC, CBS, Fox Sports West, the Olympic Channel, and the Pac-12 network. He is also one of the hosts on the Amazon Prime AVP broadcasts.

Barnett acknowledged that The Net Live was a huge part of his success.

“Just getting the reps once a week for two hours, three hours, made a huge difference in my career. Asking questions, thinking about how to make my guests look good, or address issues that ought to be addressed, all that has translated.”

For Priddy in particular, his role as The Net Live host got more difficult.

“At the 2010 World Championships, I was the captain of the national team, I was still heavily involved in the show, and The Net Live was all about truth,” Priddy recalled.

“I was saying things, and then going into practice on the national team, and having negative effects. I couldn’t be both things. I couldn’t be a leader on the national team and a friend and all of these things, leveraging personal opinions. That’s when I started to take a back seat to Kevin.”

It was about that time that Jeremy Roueche (pronounced roo-shay), perhaps best known as the 17-year veteran AVP DJ, began his stint on The Net Live, a role that would continue until the final podcast.

“I was tricked,” Roueche joked. “I was told that they wanted to bring me in just to add a music element to it, didn’t need to speak on the mic because Kevin, Reid, and Geeter were handling it, and I joke that it was a week later, but it was a few months, and Reid was playing overseas,  and I ended up being a co-host on the show. I never would have joined if they told me they needed a co-host on the show. ‘No, I’m not doing that ever.’

“I learned a lot more about the indoor game for sure. Being the AVP DJ, beach was my thing.”  

Roueche, the Olympics DJ, as well, was the DJ for the Los Angeles Clippers and now spins tunes for the Lakers, Pac-12 football and basketball, and satisfies his creative juices as co-founder of the band The Suicide Doors, crafting mixes with Tim Hampton.

“From a personal growth perspective, I’m now more comfortable with public speaking,” Roueche, who plays beach volleyball himself. “Kevin and I were just talking to each other, but I know people were listening, and knowing that people were listening, I practiced speaking more slowly, enunciating correctly, and if I didn’t know about the topic we were discussing, it’s OK to say, ‘I don’t know what we’re talking about, and I can’t add to that part of the conversation.’ I don’t pretend to know something that I don’t know.”

The Net Live’s guests are a virtual Who’s Who of volleyball, from Karch Kiraly to Hugh McCutcheon to Kevin Hambly to Russ Rose to Sinjin Smith.

Unusually, The Net Live has never emphasized metrics, preferring to emphasize integrity and honesty over downloads and likes. 

“We don’t typically check our numbers,” Priddy said.

What are The Net Live’s most-downloaded episodes over its 11-year history? 

“I would have to double-check”, Barnett said, “but I think the two most-downloaded shows are probably the AVP/Nick Lewin show (where AVP owner Nick Lewin purported went to the bathroom during the call) or the Casey Jennings show (where Jennings came in to rebut comments made during a previous episode).”

The Net Live ran for 11 years, covering all sides of indoor volleyball, all things beach, giving more coverage to men’s volleyball, and all the while were Barnett stories.

“It was fun. I really enjoyed getting to know the people. I had played for 10 years, obviously, but that’s a singular existence,” Barnett said. “On the national team, you know the players that you play with, and that’s always rotating, but here we got to talk to a lot of people from the entire game, executives, past executives, all the way back to the mid ’80 on up to the current ownership of the AVP. 

“The knowledge that’s there to be had was extensive. I would love to go back and listen to some of the interviews, honestly, stuff that I’ve forgotten, Sinjin Smith discussing the collapse of the AVP in the middle of the 90’s, and how that happened, and who the personalities are. I’ve heard that story a couple of times, but I’ve forgotten that a couple of times. It’s a really compelling story about a collapse of a huge business that had a ton of income, and had the world on its feet, and then apparently had to be rebuilt from nothing.”

At the final podcast-turned-party, Priddy said he doesn’t believe that this is the end, preferring to call it halftime.

“This can’t be the end, there’s so much value that these guys bring, that we can’t let them ride off into the sunset,” Priddy said. I’m OK with giving them a year sabbatical, but we’ve got to bring them back.”

For anyone looking for back episodes of The Net Live, they can be found on BlogTalkRadio.com.

Four of five USA volleyball teams broke pool Friday in the two-star FIVB beach tournament in Siem Reap, Cambodia, advancing to Saturday’s elimination playoffs.

Traci Callahan and Crissy Jones and Aurora Davis and Allie Wheeler won both their modified pool-play matches, while Lauren Fendrick and Sara Hughes and Terese Cannon and Kelly Reeves split their matches, with a single win advancing them to the single-elimination playoffs.

Kim Hildreth and Sarah Schermerhorn were eliminated when they lost both their Friday matches.

Callahan-Jones knocked off top-seeded compatriots Hughes and Fendrick 12-21, 24-22, 15-13 in Fendrick’s first contest since Fendrick gave birth to daughter Willa on June 3. Callahan-Jones went on to defeat Russia’s Alexandra Moiseeva-Ekaterina Syrtseva 21-18, 21-12. Their first-round opponent will be Israel’s Anita Dave-Noga Maor.

In the other pool A second-round match, Fendrick-Hughes recovered to defeat Canada’s Amanda Harnett-Marie Christine Lapointe 21-14, 21-16. That sets up the unlikely first-round matchup of top-seeded Fendrick-Hughes against No. 2 Japan’s Azusa Futami-Akiko Hasegawa on Saturday.

Davis’s and Wheeler’s first playoff match was a near walkover, as they defeated Cambodia’s Mak Chanda and Soeu Sreynat 21-2, 21-1 in 19 minutes. They won their pool by defeating Japan’s Sayaka Mizoe-Takemi Nishibori 21-15, 21-19. Their next opponent is Thailand’s Rumpaipruet Numwong and Tanarattha Udomchavee.

Cannon and Reeves beat Chinese Taipei’s Nai-Han Kou and Pi Hsin Liu 21-15, 21-6,  but fell to the No. 3 seed, Australians Nicole Laird and Becchara Palmer, 21-18, 23-21. They get Vanuatu’s Miller Pata-Shersyn Toko the elimination playoffs.

Hildreth-Schermerhorn were unable to advance out of pool in their first international competition, falling to Futami and Hasegawa 21-17, 21-16 and Australia’s Phoebe Bell and Brittany Kendall 21-14, 21-16.

Full results and playoff brackets can be found on BVBinfo.com.

Mike Placek was just looking for the simple stuff. He didn’t need to know tendencies or flaws, what his opponent’s strongest and weakest shots were. He didn’t need to know serving habits or whether they preferred a backhand or a forehand.

All he really wanted to know, as the top-ranked youth tennis player in Southern California, was whether he was playing a 5-foot-9 guy from Argentina or a 6-foot-6 monster from Australia.

“When I went to play, there were zero scouting reports, and a lot of the guys were foreign, so the only way we’d have any idea of who we’d be playing in our next match was this college tennis site,” Placek said on SANDCAST: Beach volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter. “It was super basic but it showed you who played for what school. It kept a super good data base, had a ranking based on an algorithm, and it was basically all I needed and all the tennis players lived on it.”

Placek’s talent was in tennis, but not his passion. He’d go on to have a solid career at the University of California, Santa Barbara, but he didn’t have any designs on going pro afterwards.

“I didn’t love it, but I was good at it,” he said. “Even watching the Australian Open right now, it makes me nervous.”

Afterwards, then, he turned to where his heart resided: beach volleyball. He’d grown up around the courts in Del Mar, toted along by his mother. He idolized the guys there, such as Sean Scott, and when an AVP would stop in Southern California, there you could see Placek, sitting behind the court, watching 12 hours a day.

“That’s how I learned how to play,” he said. “It was a life I wanted.”

In a decade as a professional, Placek would make an AVP semifinal, in 2008 with Russ Marchewka, and in 2014 and ’15 he’d become one of the top players on the NVL, winning a third of the events he entered. But when his playing career came to a close, and his coaching career at WAVE Volleyball in Del Mar began to take off, he found himself staring down the same exact problem he once had as a tennis player.

As he attempted to follow WAVE alum at the college level, he found nothing.

“I’d have to go on the [school] website, go through a bunch of different things, go onto the next kid,” Placek said. “I was like ‘How is there nothing more simple than this?’ So I started talking to some indoor college coaches, asking them if there was really nothing more going on with the beach game and they said no, so I said ‘Ok.’”

Placek recalled the tennis website he and every other youth tennis player lived off as a kid, and he created exactly that. He hired a programmer and up went collegebeachvb.com, which has become the one-stop shop for all things college beach volleyball.

It’s simple and comprehensive. There, you can find every individual’s record: who they played and when, the results, their rank. Everything you’d need to know, from Division I to CCAA, is but a few simple clicks.

Three years in, it’s the most reliable site for good, objective information, incredibly beneficial for coaches, fans, and players alike.

“It’s pretty cool and going back to where I started it, there’s all these college kids coming up, and if you’re a pro and don’t know who this kid is, maybe go on the website,” Placek said. “I’m hoping it’ll translate so maybe the juniors will look at the universities and see if they’re junior stacked or freshmen stacked. It’s for the college game but I’m hoping the juniors and parents of juniors can see what programs are out there and how many matches they play. I’m hoping it will be more of a resource for the youth.”

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD IT FROM THE APP STORE & CLICK HERE FOR ANDROID USERS!

VBaller app brings volleyball enthusiasts together to the nearest open gym. Players can enjoy the sport they love while on travel, establish connections, meet local players, socialize, and possibly make friends for life.

VBaller also makes meeting people and making connection less daunting because you already have a common interest which is volleyball.

When you need a break from your workload simply launch the VBaller App and discover the nearest open gym near you. You can specify the radius distance instead of the default 50 miles,
You can also plan ahead and type in destination cities of your interest.
Search local open gyms for volleyball at various level of play. Look up the address, phone numbers, and point of contact.

Meet up fellow vballers in your area. Submit open gym information that isn’t listed. Submit corrections and feedback.

VBaller App Features:

– Open gyms near you

Search by cities and it will return a listing of open gyms within the default radius of 50 miles. It shows the days, times, and location. You can filter the results by specifying a radius distance as well as schedule days.

– Detailed open gym information

Selecting a gym from the listing will show a detailed page with additional information such as Number of Courts, Level of Play, Point of Contact (if any), Phone Number, Cost, Notes.

– Filter listing by days of the week

You can filter the listing by today, tomorrow, this week, and weekend.

– Submit new open gym info

If there’s an open gym that you know of and it’s not listed, please submit by clicking the map icon, then the “+” icon, then enter information on the form.

– Submit correction on listed gyms

If gym information is incorrect or outdated please submit a correction by clicking the “alert” icon on the upper right-hand corner of the detailed gym page.

– Submit feedback about the App

You can submit feedback, features request by clicking on the Info
tab on the bottom of the page then the Feedback button.

– Create a profile
You can create a profile which gives you access to future features.

Need help?
Email info@vballer.org or via Feedback button on the Info tab.