This is “Dots,” VolleyballMag.com’s weekly look at 10 things in club volleyball, past or present, that interest me and hopefully will interest you. Look for Dots every Tuesday through Junior Nationals this summer:
The 50th AAU Girls Volleyball National Championships get underway from Orlando starting on Wednesday with the youngest age groups and the 18-year-olds. There are 39 teams vying for the title in the four-day, 14 Open division. A total of 13 teams are competing in four-day. 18 Open.
Before 2010, AAU Nationals were viewed largely as a sleepy preparation for USA Volleyball’s Junior Olympic championships. Some teams and few college coaches attended AAUs.
That changed as the Junior Volleyball Director’s Association/Junior Volleyball Association (“JVA”) began to expand its influence. Several years before 2010 – October, 2006 according to the JVA website — the JVA formed and many prominent Midwest clubs broke from the USA Volleyball orbit and went out on their own. That meant no more national qualifiers for many and no more Junior Olympics.
For a time, the JVA held its own championships in early June in Louisville. Those JVA clubs would then go on to Orlando to also compete at AAUs. Several JVA club directors, seeing that its championship was being used as a warm up to AAUs, approached AAU about helping one another. If AAU would support the JVA’s April World Challenge event, the JVA would throw its weight behind AAU Nationals. An Agreement was reached and the JVA June year-end event went away.
In 2009, before the deal was brokered, AAUs had 612 total teams. In 2010, more than 1,200 participated. It has continued to grow ever since, with more than 4,200 teams registered this year, the most ever. The increase in teams has made it a “must attend” event for college coaches as well, making AAU Nationals one of the most important tournaments annually on a college coach’s recruiting calendar.
• In 2016, USA Volleyball moved its 18s championship from late June to late April. This had no impact on AAUs at first. In 2015, for example, a total of 216 18s teams went to AAUs in June. In 2017, after USAV’s move to April, 223 teams went to AAUs.
In 2019, in response to USAV’s move, AAU moved up its 18s and ran an 18s only event in May. After COVID, AAU returned 18s to its usual place on the calendar and saw participation decline. In 2021, only 168 18s teams played, only 32 in the two upper divisions.
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