Eve Rackham Watt: Training Your Setter to be an Attacker

with Eve Rackham Watt,
University of Tennessee Head Coach;
North Carolina Assistant Head Coach from 2013 to 2018;
AVCA Division I Assistant Coach of the Year in 2014;
2x ACC Champions (2014, 2016);
North Carolina Assistant Coach from 2009 to 2018;
Florida International Assistant Coach in 2008;
East Carolina Assistant Coach from 2005 to 2008;
Colgate Assistant Coach in 2004;
played for North Carolina from 1999 to 2002;
2002 All-ACC & 1st team AVCA All-Region

Adding firepower to your setter’s repertoire is going to pay dividends for your program!  Tennessee’s Eve Rackham Watt shows what it looks like in practice to create a setter with bonus skill sets and enhanced volleyball IQ that will turn them into an offensive weapon.

Coach Rackham Watt starts with a great warmup package - a 10 minute warm up drill to go over setting to dumping into various zones and ends with turn and hitting. 

She then has the setter work against a front row that develops into setter versus a team defense. Rackham Watt demonstrates techniques on six different ways and locations your setter can attack the defense. 

Rackham Watt also shares the nuances on how to communicate with your setter to train her to be an offensive setter; she has a setter demonstrate the technique and location to dump the ball with a discussion on how to communicate with your setter when and where it makes sense to dump. As she discusses the technique, she shares how and when your setter can use each option to win points for your team.

Coach Rockham Watt explains the relationship you need to build with your setter to give them the environment to learn how to be an effective offensive setter. She shares how much time it takes to build your setter’s confidence to be efficient and how to train that confidence. Then, you can communicate a strategy of how aggressive you want your setter to be as an attack option and give her the green light to score points and open up your other hitters.

Rackham Watt utilizes a drill  - your setter against blockers  - and builds on the drill until there is a full defense. By training your setter, you are also training your defense to read the setter. As your setter becomes more aggressive, your blockers will attempt to take away the setter options, which opens up your other hitters. 

Rackham Watt demonstrates how your setter can impact the defense and shares

where your defense can get too aggressive as well so you can communicate your strategy to both your offensive setter and your defenders.

While everyone loves when the setter scores, Rackham Watt shares that really effective offensive setters must be trained to recognize the good opportunities and when it’s better to set your hitters; an offensive setter can be a valuable weapon, but it takes time and patience to grow the skills and to build the relationship for your setter to be effective. 

In this excellent video, Rackham Watt provides that structure and the techniques needed to help you coach your setter to become an offensive weapon!

50 minutes.  2023.