A long day's journey into volleyball
High school teams endure marathon Saturday tournaments to get better week by week
Being in a gym for a high school sporting event isn’t that unique of an experience, but there’s something different when it happens on a Saturday morning.
For starters, it extends way beyond the gym. There’s stuff. So much of it. Everywhere. Food, blankets, jackets, pillows, hair care products. In the stands there is no band and very few classmates. It’s more where Mom and Dad and Grandma and Grandpa have come to hang out, along with little siblings who just can’t sit still.
And there is screaming. Oh, so much screaming.
Welcome to Saturday morning volleyball in gyms across Iowa, where balls fly every which way and the teams go head to head in a somewhat laid-back atmosphere and the talent can match anything you might see in November at the state tournament. Well, as laid back as 16 teams playing as many as four matches at a time in two gyms might be.
All season long there have been matches pitting Top 5 teams against each other – sometimes one match right after another. Or, you might have a team from a smaller class such as Class 1A or 2A go up against a major metro school in Class 5A – and winning.
“I look forward to Saturdays,” said Ankeny Coach Liz Baethke. “I want to see what’s out there. I don’t want to depend on film. But it’s a gauntlet.”
Early in the season, Baethke’s team indeed faced a gauntlet. First was a tournament hosted by crosstown rival (and current Class 5A No. 1 team) Ankeny Centennial on Aug. 31. On Sept. 7, the Hawks, then ranked No. 5 in Class 5A, played in the Marj White Classic at West Des Moines Valley. It was a six-team round-robin tournament in which every team was ranked except the host school, which had just fallen out of the rankings that week.
How’s this for Saturday fun? The Hawks started their day with a match against No. 7 Waukee Northwest at 8:30 a.m. (rankings are what they were on Sept. 7). They won and got a little break of about 90 minutes until they played and beat No. 9 Waukee. Their reward? They then immediately played No. 1 Dowling Catholic – and beat the Maroons.
Ankeny got a little break again before they faced No. 10 Iowa City Liberty, which had boarded a bus at 7 a.m. to get to West Des Moines, where mercifully their first match didn’t start until 9:40 a.m. After dispatching Liberty, Ankeny defeated Valley and won the tournament.
And that was just one Saturday. It’s pretty much like that on many Saturdays for volleyball players, who have dual conference matches earlier in the week. On Saturdays, though, tournaments might be four teams playing each other, six teams playing each other or maybe 16 teams slugging it out for at least four matches in pool play followed by winners’ or losers’ brackets.
While entire communities gather for Friday night football, the next morning volleyball players are up at the crack of dawn competing somewhat anonymously in intense high-caliber matches.
“We don’t have trouble with numbers but for a lot of kids, those Saturdays are hard because they want to be working or watching college football or be with their friends,” Baethke said. “There are a lot of conflicts.”
It can be tough on coaches, too.
Lauren Boatman brought her Sioux City Bishop Heelan team, currently ranked No. 2 in Class 4A, to Southeast Polk for a 16-team tournament last month filled with ranked teams of all classes. They made the 3-hour trip the night before and stayed in a hotel.
“It’s fun for the girls, but for us coaches it’s a challenge,” said Boatman, who, like one of her assistants, has two children under age 5. “The time away is tough.”
Yet northwest Iowa isn’t a power pocket of volleyball, so the road trips are beneficial.
“We get a chance to play against some really good volleyball teams, especially from central Iowa and eastern Iowa,” Boatman said. “Otherwise we wouldn’t see them except at state. It’s good exposure, it’s good experience.”
The state volleyball tournament is Nov. 4-7 at Xtream Arena in Coralville, and for the last several years has run Monday-Thursday to avoid weekend conflict with state football playoffs. That means the Saturday tournaments offer fans who can’t get to the state tournament a chance to see the best teams square off.
The all-day tournaments require trust on the part of coaches: trust that the players won’t wander off between matches, trust that they’ll eat right throughout the day, trust that they’ll behave on a long road trip.
“The older girls have a tendency to keep the others in line a bit,” Boatman said. “When you play all ranked teams, there is a tendency to stay a little more focused.”
Ankeny hit the road on Sept. 14 for a tournament at Iowa City West, leaving at 6 a.m. (and returning at 8 p.m.) Baethke said orders were placed ahead of time for Jimmy John’s sub sandwiches and a Google form was distributed for those bringing snacks to ensure there was a mix of proteins and carbs.
“Either the girls eat nothing at all or they eat garbage,” she said. “So I do talk to the parents.”
The players can be kept busy throughout the day by being put to work; teams who are not playing serve as line judges or scorekeepers for the other matches.
Coaches get the opportunity to network and share information.
“You get to mingle with other coaches, now I’ve got some allies on the eastern side of the state,” Baethke said. “When you have the opportunity to connect with those people, you don’t feel so alone out there.”
The Saturday tournaments are a commitment for players and coaches, a challenge for busy officials and a bit of an under-the-radar awesome sports event for fans.
“It can be a long day,” Baethke said. “But I still think they’re important.”
Saturday tournaments will be happening throughout the state this weekend (Oct. 5). Three of note:
Urbandale: Includes Class 5A No. 1 Ankeny Centennial, Class 5A No. 5 Waukee Northwest, Class 4A No. 6 Indianola and Class 3A No. 2 (and defending state champion) Western Christian.
Western Dubuque (in Epworth): Includes Class 3A No. 1 Mount Vernon and Class 2A No. 14 Wapsie Valley.
Faith Baptist Bible College in Ankeny: A four-team tournament that includes Class 1A No. 1 Ankeny Christian and No. 11 Pella Christian.
More tournaments, many with ranked teams, at: Union High School in La Porte City; Cedar Rapids Prairie; and Waverly-Shell Rock High School in Waverly.
Jane Burns is a former sports and features writer for the Des Moines Register, as well as other publications and websites. She’s a past winner of the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association’s Mel Greenberg Award for her coverage of women’s basketball. Over the course of her career she’s covered pretty much everything, which is why her as-yet-to-be-written memoir will be called “Cheese and Basketball: Stories From a Reporter Who Has Covered Everything.”
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