This is “Dots,” VolleyballMag.com’s weekly look at 10 things in high school volleyball, past or present, that interest me and hopefully will interest you. Look for Dots every Tuesday until the last high school state championship in November:
• Last Tuesday saw the first release of what’s expected to be several entities attempting national high school team rankings this fall. Scorebook Live was first to publish in its initial attempt to cover the scene nationally.
As someone who ranked teams nationally for more than two decades, I can say definitively that it’s better to be thorough than fast. Scorebook Live’s initial attempt at rankings lack one main ingredient: EFFORT to make the pre-season list as accurate as possible.
Exhibit A: San Antonio’s Cornerstone Christian is listed as No. 1 with an 8-0 record even though the Warriors LOST to California Mira Costa THREE DAYS before the rankings were released!
Exhibit B: Kansas’ Washburn Rural, Arkansas’ Fayetteville and Indiana’s McCutcheon all made the top 25 even though all three graduated generational talents.
Indeed, what Scorebook Live’s ranking appears to be is a regurgitation of last year’s standout teams without regard to the impact of graduation, transfers, club success or young talent on these rosters. That’s a shame, when a little bit of effort could have produced a much more credible list …
• Florida’s Viera High opened its 2023 season with a 25-19, 25-21, 25-14 sweep at the hands of Osceola. Viera is the 2022 6A runner up, while Osceola made it to the semifinals of the 7A tournament.
Cate Palmi, who averaged almost six kills per set last year as a freshman last year, had 22 kills for the victorious Kowboys, while Alex Liggeri chipped in with 40 assists.
What makes this result even more interesting is that Izzy Starck, a 6-2 senior S/OH committed to Penn State, and the reigning Colorado Player of the Year, transferred to Viera for her senior season after her father took a job in Florida. Starck did not play in the match, however, as she is currently competing with the USA U21 Women’s National Team at the World Championships in Mexico.
Starck should fit in well with a Viera team that graduated both its kill leaders but returns everyone else. Starck, who played for Rampart in Colorado Springs last…
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