Book Review - Coaching Volleyball Champions

I just finished reading Coaching Volleyball Championsby Mary Dyck and Ard Biesheuvel, a couple of volleyball coaches in Canada. It contains 11 chapters, each focusing on a successful volleyball coach from the US and Canada. The format for each chapter is a biographical introduction to the focal coach, the coach's answers to the same series of questions, and then 5 drills that the coach uses.

I'm much more familiar with the American coaches than the Canadian ones, but there are some great ones representing the USA: Marv Dunphy of Pepperdine, Carl McGown retired from BYU, Al Scates retired from UCLA, and Jim McLaughlin of Notre Dame (Washington at the time of publication). Dunphy and McGown are my coaching heroes, and McLaughlin and Scates have significant coaching credentials.

Each coach is asked questions like "What is a champion?" and "What are the most important ingredients of a championship team?" They are asked about psychology, motivation, goal setting, how their coaching has evolved, and thoughts on the different positions. There is a part of me that wishes the answers to each question from each coach were all in the same place, but having each chapter focus only on one coach gives a better sense of who he or she is. You can get a feel for who they are and what they do. You can see how the coach's philosophy informs the drills they use.

The selection of drills is not exhaustive, but it is a nice collection of drills used by some of the top teams in American and Canadian volleyball. There are 55 total drills and there is a handy drill finder in the back listing which drills address various desired training outcomes or topics.

Coaching Volleyball Champions is a very nice volleyball coaching resource. It can help with the practical side of coaching with the drills, and the more theoretical or abstract part of coaching with the question/answer portion. I highly recommend this for your coaching bookshelf and education.