2010 Dr. James Coleman USA National Team Award - Alice Englert

Dr. James E. Coleman USA National Team Award
Alice Englert

Alice Englert was born in Mitchell, S.D., but has been a resident of Burbank, Calif., since the middle of her senior year at Burbank High School. After a brief stint in Sawyer’s Business School, Englert worked in the Motion Picture Industry for 20 years. In the late 1950s she began her involvement in real estate development, which she continues to this day, but clearly her life’s work has involved volleyball.

Englert was first introduced to volleyball during the "jungle ball era" in Catholic Youth Organization (CYO) League competition as a child, but learned how to play ‘real’ volleyball at the park in Burbank after she and others attended a demonstration by a coed team from Echo Park. Soon after, Englert helped organize competitive play in the Burbank Parks and Recreation Department. In the years that followed, Englert was involved in every aspect of volleyball; playing, coaching, giving clinics, officiating, organizing, directing, serving on committees and managing.

In 1967 Englert was honored as a USA Volleyball George J. Fisher Leader in Volleyball for her work to that point. She had been a regional official for 10 years and served three years as chairman of the Women’s Volleyball Association. Englert was a member of the Regional Executive Committee, published the Regional Newsletter and helped Harry Wilson with his Volleyball Review publication. As a member of USVBA’s International Relations Committee, Englert served as coordinator on the many Japanese team visits to the United States. The players were housed by local volleyball families. This was an innovative ‘Alice Englert plan’, developed out of need that fostered good relations and increased international exposure.

Englert’s experience with international play and, eventually, the Olympic movement, began when she was a member of the first U.S. Women’s National Team to compete in international competition – the 1956 FIVB World Championship in Paris. In 1960 the World Championship was held in Rio de Janeiro and once again Englert was on the team.

After becoming a member of the USVBA committee on International Selections, Eligibility and Public Relations, as well as serving on the Women’s Olympic Committee, Englert was named the manager of the U.S. Women’s National Team. The first two teams toured Canada, playing the USSR in every major city (1965) and Mexico to play the Mexicans (1960). Then, in 1967, her team placed second in the FIVB World Championship in Tokyo. Later that year at the Pan American Games in Winnipeg, her USA team won the gold medal. Her final trip as manager was to Cali, Columbia, with the 1971 Pan American Team.

Englert was a tireless volleyball organizer and a manager extraordinaire! She was the pioneer of managers for U.S. Women’s National Volleyball teams. She addressed every aspect of the trip, from tryouts to getting the players back home safe and sound. She either found housing for out of town players who were trying out, or she housed them herself. She attended to the special needs of each player, always anticipating needed solutions. If it existed, she knew where it was. If it was needed, she would find it.

Englert was the head of the delegation and she made sure the team was treated properly. In Winnipeg she had the team move from the barracks that usually housed students, to the modern, comfortable teacher’s quarters. There were the furry, warm white coats for the players going to Japan in January 1967, the iron on codes for each player to be able to find her own sweats in the pile, and the appearance of the original first aid kit, athletic tape, vitamin C, salt and tablets. Perhaps the most memorable experience she created was the bag pipe player she hired to wake the team early enough for a crucial 9 a.m. match with Cuba that meant the gold medal.

Without many resources by today’s standards, Alice Englert used innovation, planning and organization, and dedication to create the template for all future managers for international teams.