‘Que it up: Triple Crown Volleyball NIT is a Kansas City triple threat

We’re going to Kansas City, where the Triple Crown NIT is in town.

For more than a decade now, the NIT has been synonymous with the best girls’ club volleyball in the country.

Bar none.

It really is a “Who’s Who” of the best the sport has to offer, with dozens of future collegiate All-Americans and certainly a couple of someday Olympians (or more) on the courts at Bartle Hall showcasing their skills.

Triple Crown, however, is about much more than three days of volleyball in Kansas City. It truly is a triple threat.

Threat No. 1: The Talent

In “School of Rock,” the iconic 2003 film starring Jack Black, the focus is on playing one great rock show.

“One great rock show can change the world.”

At the NIT, the principal focus is on the sport of volleyball and the abundance of talent playing in one venue. Every year that I have attended, I have been stunned at how the speed, skill and power of these athletes have accelerated to transform the game into the fast-paced thrill show it is. Would William Morgan recognize this as the sport he invented in 1895 for gentlemen in Holyoke, Massachusetts, as a noonday alternate to the more vigorous basketball being played up the road in Springfield?

The answer, most certainly, is “No.”

There will be 104 18s teams starting play Friday in one big division and, with the exception of Circle City and Metro VB, who anchor parallel tournaments in St. Louis and Washington, D.C., every other prominent club will send their best teams to the NIT, and, for some clubs, their best two teams. This includes, for the first time, the vaunted Sports Performance club, from the Chicago area, that for a long stretch two decades ago featured the best 18s team in the nation.

This year’s SPVB 18 Elite team will be one of 32 playing Friday in four Power Pools of eight. By virtue of their play so far this year, those Power Pool teams have earned the right to play hard matches the first day without worrying about being knocked from contention.

Sports Performance, which features OH Bella Bullington, MB Sidney Hamaker and libero Morgan Asleson; is in Power Pool 4, with the likes of NKYVC (MB Julia Hunt and OH Alivia Skidmore), OTVA Tampa (Taylor Parks) and Six Pack (Payton Petersen).

The top overall seed, TAV 18 Black, heads Power Pool 1. The Dallas-area team features many of the best pure athletes in the  country, including pins Cari Spears, Suli Davis and Jadyn Livings and MB Favor Anyanwu. Home team KC Power,…