Anyone have a daughter playing club volleyball in or around Houston? If so which club? Our daughter is trying out for the 13U team at Houston Force this summer. Any and all advice is greatly appreciated!

We have some very close friends with 2 daughters who are in or have been in club volleyball. They're the kind of friends who our respective kids consider each other cousins and call us parents "aunt" and "uncle."

The oldest is a senior in HS and played for Houston Skyline. She was on their top 17U team which was #3 in the country. Every single girl on that team is going to play in college. Our friend's daughter is signed with HCU- volleyball recruiting is pretty odd compared to football or baseball. She had several bigger programs recruiting her but they dropped her in favor of getting kids out of the transfer portal. Anyway, HCU is a D1 program that's won the Southland Conference 2 years in a row. Unfortunately her senior season was cut short by a torn ACL but she's kicking ass and ahead of schedule for her rehab.

Their younger daughter is in 8th grade and is about 5'11". She's on the same path too. This spring their tournaments have taken them to Dallas a couple times, Las Vegas, and Salt Lake City. I think they have some other out-of-state trips to take coming up as well. She also plays for Skyline.

But, this is also a family where the athletic genes mean that if the kids want it (they have a 12-year old son in 6th grade too) they will play their chosen sport after HS. Dad is a 6'10" former D1 power forward and mom is 5'9".

My daughter has played since 12s and is currently playing as a 16 in 17s. This has been at 2 clubs, so I've seen a lot of club volleyball. Will try to organize my thoughts later, but this podcast's intro episode is not a bad overview. It is two Houston area volleyball dads.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/welcome-to-volleyball-dads/id1648988303?i=1000581971953

Great thoughts right there which really apply to almost all youth sports.

I don't have the volleyball insight except from our friend but as it is with all competitive youth sports- it's a marathon and not a sprint. Don't worry so much about having the best kid on the team or the superstar at 12 or 13. Put them in the position to compete and grow and if they have the aspiration, talent, and drive to play at a high level you can worry about where they're at when they're 16 or 17.

There are tons of kids out there who peak before they even hit HS.

Thanks. A lot of the above probably does apply to other club sport. My only other experience in that is with basketball and a lot of it would apply there..

I will say this, volleyball is well-organized and mostly well run. So it at least has that going for it.

AES rankings are terrible.

Since we are talking about the Houston area, which is the Lonestar Region, use the junior rankings available there. Much much more accurate when trying to compare teams within the region

http://www.lsvolleyball.org/

Go to junior rankings

Girls volleyball is pretty cut throat like any other sport. What you're really getting out of club is reps. Also, college recruits heavily from club, so if playing in college is the goal best chance is to play club.

My experience is club fees are in the range of 5-6000 for national/regional, and 4-5000 for local. I factor 5-7k for national travel 3-5K for regional.

There are ways to make it cheaper and more expensive of coarse but that's my rule of thumb.

Our family likes club, but really enjoy school ball. But for our district, most kids that play also do club.

Yes, AES rankings aren't great. But it's an easy resource if a person's new amd trying to get a relative idea of where everyone stands. It also has schedules so that you can see where amd at what level teams typically play.

Volleyball Parent is a good app that picks up the AES stuff along with USAV rankings.

You're not really selling it for me

There are clubs that are also less prestigious and are trying to keep costs down for kids.

Lastly, remember that your daughter's success or lack thereof in any sport isn't a reflection of you as a parent.

94chem said:

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These are the posts that make me glad I had a big family and didn't have to mess with this crap.

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Mess with what crap?

I have 2 boys so they're not in volleyball but the both play travel baseball. The older one also plays football and will be in 9th grade next year where he'll keep doing both. The younger one is only 9 so no tackle football yet but he does flag football, basketball, and baseball. They're both excellent students and we spend as much time as we can hunting and fishing along.

Sure, we're busy as hell but we love it. And, we've tried to make it abundantly clear to both boys that playing any of these sports is completely their choice (the older one quit basketball last year because he didn't really love it) but they can't just sit around and do nothing. If they want to play rec-level that's fine too but neither one wants that- in baseball they both asked to play at a tougher and more demanding level and put in the work to get there.

Frankly, I think having our boys be competitive in sports and the work they do outside of regular practices to be outstanding life lessons. You learn to work as a team, even with people you may not get along with. You learn the value of hard work and overcoming adversity. You learn perseverance. And perhaps the biggest of all, you learn how to fail and how to pick yourself up and keep going.

I truly enjoy just watching them practice and work. Seeing them fail and seeing them grow. And, I appreciate just the times when we're driving to & from practices or games and we get to talk.

Will all this time, money, and effort translate to playing in HS? I can only speak for sure about the older one but that's a resounding yes. Will it translate to him playing beyond HS? Again, only speaking for the older boy the answer is most likely yes. He's at a point where you can see where he projects in both football and baseball- he says his goal is to play both football and baseball at A&M while majoring in engineering. All three are lofty goals but we're here to encourage that and let him figure it all out on his own.

What I drill into both of them is not about being perfect and not making mistakes or even about how they have to win. It's to control what you can control- attitude, effort, and intensity. If they can honestly say they've given their best in those things I'll never have a criticism. And that they cannot be afraid to make mistakes or fail- you have to go balls out and do the best you can without fear of making a mistake. Because if you're scared to make a mistake you will almost certainly make a mistake. Then, if you do make a mistake, get back up and keep going.

Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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Please don't spend any money on travel anything hoping that it will lead to college. Spend the money on your kid because they love the sport. If college follows, fantastic.

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Depending the HS, to make a lot of the teams, be it football, baseball, basketball, volleyball, or softball if you're not a freak athlete already then you better have been putting in the kind of work from travel baseball or club volleyball to make the team.

At the HS my boys will attend not a single freshman in the baseball program, let alone the varsity roster, didn't start playing travel baseball by at least 12U. You just won't make the program. I know several families who thought their kid would be just fine because they dominated at rec who didn't come close to making the program.

In basketball, all the boys have been playing AAU since they were 7 or 8 years old.

If you start your kid playing select baseball at 7 because you're convinced it will get your kid a scholarship then I would agree. There's a large measure of self-reflection and reality which needs to be present. There are tons of kids who are studs at 12 or 13 because they mature early and are passed up before they're 15. Our close family friends I mentioned above started their oldest in club volleyball when she was about 10 and she wasn't remotely the best or most physically impressive but she's long since passed up most of those other girls as she's matured.

Now, perhaps my perspective is skewed somewhat because I was a D1 football player and so was my younger brother while our younger sister was a swimmer at another D1 school and lettered all 4 years. Now my brother's son is a college football player too at a strong D2 program. I'm 6'3" and my wife is 5'8" and she had the opportunity to play D2 volleyball but chose to go to A&M instead. Our goal isn't thinking it will lead to college but to put our boys in position to be the best they can be, love the sport, and play as long as they're able to and want to. Who knows where it ends up for our youngest but our older son is at a point where you can start to project- him being 6'0" 170-175'ish, very long and athletic, and barely into puberty is a pretty good jumping off point- especially when he projects to being 6'5". And he's built like I was before I blew out my knees and got fat- broad shoulders, narrow waist, big ass, and big legs.

Captain Winky said:

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I have a niece who plays club volleyball and another playing club softball. They are constantly traveling to various cities each weekend and they never end up in the same location and are always separated. Not only is it a huge money suck, it is also an incredible time and effort suck. It sounds like an absolutely miserable existence when it is very unlikely that either will play after high school.

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Have they told you it's miserable? Or are you just miserable b/c they're better athletes than you?

Tarpon Chaser pretty much nailed it in his post. I'll add that less than 1% of the kids involved in travel sports will be playing at the next level.

I have one daughter running D1 track, a 6A district and area 800m champion, and 2 time XC state medalist.

I'll be at the UIL state track meet Friday night watching my wheelchair athlete compete.

His brother is a HS track and XC runner.

Their sister plans on swimming in HS next year.

I've run 7 marathons the past 3 years, but am now doing a body transformation to try to get my 200, 400, and 800m times closer to the national standards.

We're not lacking physical activity or love for sports. We just say no to all of this club stuff. No club swimming, club track, etc. When you have 6 kids, it's easy. You just say no. No. The same way we say no to these elite colleges that want $80K/year. No. We just tell them no thanks; we'll just go there to grad school for free.

Last summer the 2 runners and I went to Leadville for a week and hiked Mount Elbert and Mount Massive, our first 2 14ers. What was cool was that all 3 of us did it with ease. All the miles I've run paid off for something I'll never forget, and I'm glad we had the resources and time to do it.

94chem said:

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I have one daughter running D1 track, a 6A district and area 800m champion, and 2 time XC state medalist.

I'll be at the UIL state track meet Friday night watching my wheelchair athlete compete.

His brother is a HS track and XC runner.

Their sister plans on swimming in HS next year.

I've run 7 marathons the past 3 years, but am now doing a body transformation to try to get my 200, 400, and 800m times closer to the national standards.

We're not lacking physical activity or love for sports. We just say no to all of this club stuff. No club swimming, club track, etc. When you have 6 kids, it's easy. You just say no. No. The same way we say no to these elite colleges that want $80K/year. No. We just tell them no thanks; we'll just go there to grad school for free.

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I'll also say that parents should not fall for the GPA games that kids will play to be in the top 10%. We can easily be convinced that these things are the best things for our kids. Unfortunately, it can get very unhealthy quickly.

Yeah, and my wife has 2 Masters, and is in a doctoral program, and I have a Ph.D. We understand the importance of a good education, but there are tons of good colleges that will open amazing doors. We also said no to the early decision racket. You can read about that here. It promotes the same elitist myths as club sports. I'm not bashing all club sports; I'm just saying that a lot of it wants your soul and your wallet, and there are a lot of lies that people make themselves believe.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/01/opinion/college-admissions-applications.html?smid=url-share

Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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Buford T. Justice said:

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I had a conversation with a parent of a juco baseball player yesterday that will be moving to a Big 12 team next year. He said, "looking back, all of the time and money spent, it wasn't worth it. I wish that he had just gone to college and not played baseball."

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I've heard from college soccer coaches that they'll have scholarship players begging to be cut because they don't want to play anymore. They won't quit because they feel like or have been told that they owe their parents for all the money spent on club/travel soccer.

That is insane.

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That's sad.

I know I wouldn't trade any of my experiences being a collegiate athlete and part of those teams for anything. Even after 8 knee surgeries and the beating my body has taken. It made me who I am today. And I wouldn't trade the experiences with my boys to this point at for anything.

As for our boys, we've consistently made the point to them that playing and the work with it is their choice. If they don't want to play or don't want to compete at the level they're at that's completely fine. But it's also our job to make sure they understand that if they have goals of not just making the team in HS but performing at a certain level and then playing beyond HS there's a level of commitment and sacrifice required. The same holds true for any endeavor. Our message has been that our commitment will match their commitment- if they want to do the work to play at a higher level then we'll support that completely but if they don't then we won't. They have to want it on their own.

Academics are #1 though in any case and both are involved in various academic extracurriculars at their respective schools.

Thank you guys for all the responses. This is totally her choice. She hasn't really been into sports at all until this past year. I am a head high school basketball coach and I always felt she stayed away from sports because of that. About October she asked to get a lesson from our volleyball coach and fell in love. She has played a minis league this year and it just made her more motivated and love the sport more. They are having tryouts at the club and she asked to play. She will do school ball in the fall and then hopefully if she makes the club she will play that after. I just love watching her compete and get better. Being "in the business" of coaching, I know all of the traps and downfalls and I could care less if she plays in college or after this year. I just want to help her be the best at something she loves. She will turn 12 this month and is already 5'8. Hoping she keeps growing!

coachallout said:

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Thank you guys for all the responses. This is totally her choice. She hasn't really been into sports at all until this past year. I am a head high school basketball coach and I always felt she stayed away from sports because of that. About October she asked to get a lesson from our volleyball coach and fell in love. She has played a minis league this year and it just made her more motivated and love the sport more. They are having tryouts at the club and she asked to play. She will do school ball in the fall and then hopefully if she makes the club she will play that after. I just love watching her compete and get better. Being "in the business" of coaching, I know all of the traps and downfalls and I could care less if she plays in college or after this year. I just want to help her be the best at something she loves. She will turn 12 this month and is already 5'8. Hoping she keeps growing!

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It's a lot of fun. Even the travel can be fun. Hope yall enjoy it. Good luck.

AustinCountyAg said:

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I hate travel ball and all the crap that goes with it, especially for kids under the age of 10. Let them have fun being kids doing kids things, not dedicating every weekend to tournaments and time away from family activities, birthday parties, etc.

I played college baseball, and didn't start playing travel/club baseball until about junior high when it became recognizable that I was good (better than most), and that I enjoyed it. Hell it pisses me off now watching my kids (twins 6 yr old boy/girl) play little league softball/baseball. So much bickering among coaches and parents from running up the score and playing the games only to win, not to teach fundamentals and the actual structure of games....I'll stop my rant because it doesn't realate to v-ball.


In regards to v-ball I will say this much. Being from Bellville where the v-ball program is a dynasty in this state and taken extremely serious. most girls in town start playing "club" around 2nd grade. The club is a local Bellville thing with teams for each grade. They play locally with Katy being about as far as they go for tournaments. It is more about just getting the girls to play together and teaching them the game. By the time they reach junior high level it gets more serious and a lot of girls decide it isn't for them. They also only play about one or two tournaments a month for only a handful of months a year. It isn't year around. Mainly because they don't want to wear them out and to hate it at a young age only to quit when they get older from burn out. Luckily, tradition and expectations in town create a winning atmosphere that helps keep the girls motivated.


not sure if anything I even typed up is now relevant to this thread. good luck.

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Know Coach Brewer personally. She is an amazing coach and its still crazy to me she is the only volleyball coach in Bellville's history. I have been in public ed whole career but now am at a school in your town that isn't public.

NoahAg said:

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Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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Please don't spend any money on travel anything hoping that it will lead to college. Spend the money on your kid because they love the sport. If college follows, fantastic.

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BUT, spending $30K on volleyball over four years might earn them a $3K partial juco scholarship! It's an investment!

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Or they could recoup all of that in one year of a scholarship to a whole bunch of different schools. Take our friends for instance- total cost of attendance at HCU is north of $50K including room & board.