faq

Teams

Each year, we have teams in the 12s, 14s, 16s and 18s age levels. Each season, players are placed on teams based on skill level. There are additional factors that will be considered and this will be covered during the general information meeting.

Practices

Each team will practice twice per week on Mondays/Wednesdays or Tuesdays/Thursdays. The schedule is posted on the Practice page. Most coaches will ask their players to arrive 20-30 minutes before each practice to prepare and warm-up. All practices will be held at the Hoop in Salem.

Tournaments

14s through 18s age levels teams will compete in a minimum of seven (7) tournament days. 12s teams will compete in four (4) tournaments with the exception of 12 black that will compete in five (5). All the tournaments will be listed on the Master Schedule page. The tournaments typically begin at 7:30 am with coaches meeting and final matches end around 7:00 pm. Each team will play no less than 4 matches (8 sets).

Calendar Page

Click here to go to the Calendar page.

Coaching Staff

Our coaches include current and former college coaches, current and former high school head and assistant coaches, coaches who have been trained and have coached for us for number of years, and current and former college players. We will identify our top coaches for each level in October. For information about our staff go to our coaches page.

To Register

There are few steps to this process and the most important is the USA Volleyball registration. Go to CEVA's site, click on the Membership tab, click on returning players, new player, or login. Follow the instructions.

We need completed and SIGNED Medical release forms. On the medical form, if the shots are current and you don't remember the date, write "Current".

ALL PLAYERS MUST BE REGISTERED THROUGH USA VOLLEYBALL PRIOR TO TRYING OUT. WE CAN'T MAKE EXCEPTIONS.

Philosophy on Winning

For us to be clear on this, we train to compete and we strive to win.

There is no question that winning builds confidence and motivates, but winning does not ensure the quality of the performance. Winning is how we win and not whether or not we win. Our philosophy is Performance over Outcome. We also have a primary goal that each athlete has a positive, learning experience.

Our mission is to provide our players with the opportunity to develop their volleyball skills and to play volleyball, with quality coaching in a positive environment that promotes good sportsmanship, leadership, character development, personal integrity, and self-discipline.

Club sport vs. School sport

We have players that compete in multiple sports and we support our school sports. If a player has a school basketball game for example, that will take priority over Club practices for the club program teams. Exception is for our High Performance teams that requires higher commitment to volleyball. Even in this case, at times, players are allowed to miss practices to compete for their school. Team coaches will cover this topic during their pre-season team meeting.

What does the Club fees include

The Club fee includes: All USA Volleyball participation fees, tournament fees, uniforms, club operating expenses that includes but not limited to practice facility, coaches salaries, coaches training and certifications, and all direct and non-direct expenses to participate in multi-day tournaments and for some this includes airfare. Simply.... what we list on our fees will be what you should budget for the season and there will NO ADDITIONAL FEES in order to participate in our club. If the cost of any given tournament is higher that what we have budgeted, parents will be notified well in advance.

BUYER BEWARE: I have added this section to educate parents and prevent potential issues. Some clubs have started to post club fees and not include travel and may not include uniforms. AS PARENTS YOU SHOULD KNOW AND ASK QUESTION AS TO WHAT YOUR FEES INCLUDE. This is an way for club directors to do less work, eliminate most of the headaches of travel planning and places greater responsibility on the parents. In our Club Brochure we have included the estimated expenses related to some of the tournaments. This figures are club costs. If parents are traveling, there may be additional expenses. Long story short, if the club is charging you $1,600 for fees and not include travel, if the team travels to Vegas, Colorado, Washington and add couple of multi-day travel, you will be spending somewhere between $3.200 and $4,600 for the season depending on how many people travel with the family, which airline and hotel you are able to book. For a fun activity, click here for the expense calculator (XLSX format).

Now what our fees do not include is meals and transportation to and from local tournaments. Teams can choose to enter additional tournaments and based on the tournament, we will bill the direct expense for that tournament. Normally a 1-day tournament will be about $10.

Fundraising

The best means to raise funds is the Donation Letter and the Pledge card. You can find the documents and other fundraising opportunities in the Fundraising page.

Each team will be entered in seven tournaments. Every team will be entered in our region’s Power League and two other tournaments within our region. There are no restrictions on the number of tournaments teams can enter. Teams can choose to enter as many tournaments as they wish. Cost of each tournament within our region will range between $85 to $150 per team. Outside our region, cost of major tournaments range between $175 - $700. This does not include travel, room, and meals.

Power League: Tournaments are once each month beginning in January. The first tournament in the series is the qualifier which consists of a morning and an afternoon pool play. Teams are seeded in various divisions (8 teams per division) based on clubs previous year's record. Purpose of this tournament is seeding within our region. It's not unusual to change sites after the morning pool play. The remaining tournament sites will not change. The 2nd through the 4th tournaments will begin with pool play, followed by bracket play. The top two teams will move-up one division, the bottom two will move-down, and seeds 3 to 6 will remain in the same division. The Power League season ends at the end of April with Regionals. Teams will be competing for their division championship. The Top 16 teams will compete in a two day tournament. All other will compete in a one day tournament. Athletes not participating in the Volleyball Festival, Northwest Volleyball Championships, or any other major tournaments will will end their season at this time.

Regional Tournaments: These are tournaments hosted by clubs within our region sanctioned by the Columbia Empire region of USA Volleyball.

Inter-Regional Tournaments: These tournaments are hosted by clubs located outside our region. Past years, our teams have traveled to Arizona, California, Florida, Hawaii, Nevada, and Washington. There are additional cost such as travel, hotel, and meals in order to participate in these tournaments, but the experience is well worth it. Past years, we have taken teams to the President's Day and the Emerald City classic tournaments in Seattle, the Volleyball Festival in Sacramento, California, and Northwest Volleyball Championships in Salem.

National Qualifiers: These tournaments are hosted by various regions, sanctioned and approved by USA Volleyball HDQ, in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Upper level teams have the opportunity to enter and compete in these tournaments. Successful team can earn a bid (spot) in the Junior National Tournament (JOs). This event will place teams from the grassroots Division to the Elite division of USA Volleyball. Players from this event are selected to participate in the USAV High Performance Camp, and possibility to advance to the Youth and/or the Junior National Team. The Pacific Northwest Qualifier, in Cheney, Washington is the nearest site to Oregon. We have also sent teams to compete in the Crossroads in Colorado, and Tampa Bay qualifier in Florida.

Tournament days and times: Most tournaments are held on the weekends, mostly on Sundays due to the availability of facilities. Majority of Tournament Directors (TDs) conduct their coaches meeting at 7:30 AM. First match are scheduled at 8:00 AM. Tournament begin with pool play, followed by bracket play. For example, if there are 8 teams, they will be split into two pools of 4 teams. Each team will play the other 3 teams in the pool. Using the win-loss record, and other means in cases of tie, they will be ranked 1 to 4. The top 2 teams will play in the championship bracket, and the bottom 2 will play in the consolation bracket. Final matches will start sometime between 4:30 and 5:30 PM.