Team Building

The preseason schedule for collegiate volleyball is tough.  The team is here for about 2.5 weeks doing 2-3 practices a day, film sessions, classroom sessions, individuals, weight lifting, and they fit in food and sleep somewhere!  Most college coaches do some team building throughout the preseason to get the team breaking barriers and coming together.  The mistake most coaches make is that team building ends at preseason!

We are very lucky to have great chemistry at Ole Miss!  Something this staff works very hard to keep and the team respects it enough to keep it going.  We learned a huge lesson this year and that is, it is not enough to do team building just during the preseason, we must do it all the time.

The biggest issue with any team is communication.  We are in an era where text messaging and facebook chatting is easier than having lunch with a teammate and talking about nothing.  Athletes don't talk to each other because they feel smaller issues don't want to become bigger issues so they bottle it inside and before you know it, they explode.   Athletes don't take the time with their teammates to really talk with them and get to know them.  What motivates them?  What are their biggest fears on the court?

Our lesson was learned after we played #23 Tennessee.  Our players had stopped talking to each other and let little things evolve into bigger issues and what became of that was a sweep by Tennessee!

We spent 3 hours on the bus to Kentucky figuring this out!  We did a little activity where each person had to talk about their greatest achievement, an obstacle they overcame and an obstacle they are trying to overcome at this moment.  It could be volleyball or off-the-court.  Each player listened and were allowed to ask questions.  Such an easy thing to do and when we got off the bus we broke some barriers with players and each one had a new respect for their teammates.

We encourage teams to continue to work on communication and team building.  Be proactive in the process, don't wait for the loss to try to figure it out!