Sophisticated Coaching: Empowering Team Performance in Practice & Matches

with Shelton Collier,
Nebraska Pro Volleyball Head Coach (Pro Volleyball Federation);
2022 AVCA Hall of Fame inductee;
Wingate University Head Coach from 2002 to 2022;
1150 career wins;
2013 AVCA National Coach of the Year;
11x South Atlantic Conference Coach of the Year;
8x AVCA Region Coach of the Year;
USA Volleyball Youth National Team Head Coach/USA Junior National Team Head Coach from 2002 to 2014;
Georgia Tech Head Coach from 1991 to 2001;
Pittsburgh Head Coach from 1980 to 1988;
4x Big East Champions;
1987 Big East Coach of the Year

Good intentions can get in the way of accomplishing what you want with your team.

Shelton Collier has tremendous knowledge about the sport of volleyball as a player, youth coach, assistant coach and head coach. In this video, he discusses his observations, analysis and evaluation of effective and ineffective coaching behaviors in a practice session as well as in a match environment. Key points include effective coach-player communication in training drills, influential coaching behaviors in matches, methods to improve coach-player interaction, and more.

Effective Coaching Skills

Coach Collier spends a great deal of time talking about effective coaching skills. He demonstrates how "not" to be a good coach and what some of those characteristics are. He then goes into detail about what traits a good coach has. Collier shares methods for:

• Staying out of the way to help your team progress faster.
• Connecting with players.
• Encouraging players to give maximum effort.
• Calling out individual players in practice to gain a better team effort.
• Letting players run drills so the coach can coach.
• Getting your players comfortable running plays out of system.
• Not chasing errors, but reaffirming the positives.
• Complimenting players on effort or intent.
• Not over-coaching, but creating a comfortable training environment.
vBuilding a learning environment.
• Building trust with your team.

Build a Bridge between Training and Competition

It should be your goal to create an environment where you reward players for growing their talent and skills. You'll learn to use drills that simulate game-like situations. Collier discusses how to bridge, or morph, the drills towards your team-oriented drills.

• Work on libero passes being out of system - force the setter to set the ball from off the net.
• "Around the World" hitting drills that require all positions to put up a good set with the setter being the passer.
• Learn fun practice drills that create opportunities for your players to learn, such as the net drill and dog pile.

This session will help you teach your players to raise their level of confidence. It also teaches the coach to not have to address everything - in return, the athletes naturally performs better, faster, and become more comfortable together in the drills.

Collier also includes some team building ideas for situational play that give opportunities to players that have been working hard, but not getting on the court as much. This creates a culture where you can naturally create the support needed for everyone on the team.

A great self-evaluation tool for any coach, this video will make you take a look at your coaching style and think about the verbal feedback you give your players.

Produced at the 2016 AVCA Annual Convention in Columbus, OH.

56 minutes. 2017.