Whitney Pavlik
U.S. Women’s Beach Player
Playing indoor in college we all had to watch video, but I didn’t really understand how beneficial it was until I started using it on the beach. The first couple years of my beach career I never used it and then this last year when I started playing international I was reintroduced to it again. It has helped me so much going into a match with the correct game plan and just being prepared. I’m able to watch the videos and see what is open in their defense and also what their tendencies are when it comes to their hitting, so I’m more prepared on my defense. I love video and it has turned in to a huge part of my preparation leading into a match once again.”
Matt Fuerbringer
U.S. Men’s National Volleyball Team Assistant Coach
“I still do some club coaching and video as a tool is becoming more important at the junior level. With the new apps and the iPads in most kids’ backpacks, you can take a quick phone video of a player and shoot him or her a quick email. You can have a shot of a proper block move and one not so good. You can ask them to take a look at both moves and the players can really benefit when they see it visually almost instantly.”
Jamie Morrison
UC Irvine Assistant Women’s Team Coach
“All young players should utilize video and have cameras on their matches as much as possible. The biggest benefit is to have video of your play connect with “how it feels” to “what it looks like” immediately. If you can make that connection and understand it, you can have some feedback and learn how to improve. Obviously, nothing is going to replace sweat and hard work, but using technology to your advantage is a smart thing.”
Nicole Welch
UC Santa Barbara Women’s Volleyball Coach
“The use of video in college volleyball has grown tremendously over the years. Now, with editing systems, it makes it very easy to show your team things quickly to help with preparing for your opponent. Here at UC Santa Barbara, we like to use video sessions with our team to show our opponents’ tendencies, or a specific strength or weakness of our opponent. It helps our players to prepare for what they should expect on the floor and also gives them a good feel of the team they are about to play.
We also take time to watch video in small groups or individually to see ourselves. Video is a huge resource for our players and allows them to really slow things down and focus on the small details of the game.”
Mark Rosen
University of Michigan Women’s Volleyball Coach
“Technology and video is an aspect of the game that is here to stay. I am not a big fan of slowing down practice to stand around and watch video and talk about it at the expense of losing reps, but in general video is a big part of our training philosophy. We are a Google university at Michigan and we’re constantly communicating with our players on their laptops, providing them with video that will help them in specific rotations and situations. In the pipeline we have plans for a new $50 million facility at Michigan where I hope to have at least three different camera angles filming our practice where we will be able to view everything going on in the gym on the seven to 10 second delay. That way a player can look up at the big screen and see what they just did while another player is getting the rep.”