This is usually the most exciting time of the year for volleyball dorks like me. The NCAA tournaments are ongoing, and there are massively parallel showings of the matches during the four days for two weekends, culminating in the Final Four weekend. We usually have our TVs on, as well as any number of laptops and desktops tuned to the online streaming, trying to catch as many matches as we can find.
All that has changed thanks to COVID-19, but it is as it is.
While some conferences played in the Fall, many conferences
did not. The NCAA, doing the best they can while dealing with more uncertainty
than certainty, has decided to move the tournament to April and has adjusted
down the number of teams invited to the Spring tournament. I will definitely
miss my annual ritual, it has been the focus of my existence for more years than
I care to recall, what I will miss more than anything is the chance to see,
speak to, and hug my coaching friends at
the AVCA convention. It is the one time during the season where we are all more
or less on the same page: relaxed and looking forward to socializing.
Even though most people take the opportunity to learn and get
better at their craft at the convention, the best part of the four-day run is
the ‘tweens’: Between sessions, between matches, between speeches during the
banquet, between the practices, between the exhibition booths, and all the
other between’s you can imagine. This is where old friendships are renewed and
new friendship kindled. There are friends that I see once a year at the
convention, since we are from different parts of the country and we don’t all
attend the same tournaments in season. They are club coaches, college coaches,
former players who played for and against my teams, past and present colleagues
on the same clubs, past and present rivals from different clubs, mentors and
mentees, the famous, the infamous, the legends of the game, the everyman who
makes up most of the coaching community, and the people who had shared more
than a few ignominious but hazy memories of conventions from the past. I once even
ran into a guy who used to supply us with uniforms from many years ago. The passage
of time did not matter, the prior differences did not matter, we were together
to celebrate our common obsession: volleyball.
The equalizer was the convention, we all roamed the
hallways, looking for a conversation, a point in common. Of course, we all are
searching for an advantage, in the classrooms, on the practice courts, in the
exhibition booths, in private audiences with the gurus of the game, or in
swirling conversations with the rebels of the game, but the common thread
holding it all together is the game. For it was time.
"The
time has come," as Cecile Reynaud said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes—and volleyballs—and knee-pads—
Of at-large bids—and automatic qualifiers—
And why the server is boiling hot—
And whether pin hitters have wings."
I will miss all of this.
I will miss getting together with
people that I have met with annually for the last decade or more.
I will miss the good times at the
matches, whether we are sitting in the nosebleed seats, the designated coaches’
seats that the NCAA so generously allows us to purchase, or the luxury boxes
that allows us to chit chat without reservation as we missed play after
glorious play.
I will miss the experienced sages dispensing
their wisdom as well as the young thinkers challenging us with their creative
energy; both generously spending their time with us in order to share.
I will miss the spectacle of the coach’s
tournament, watching my friend, who is older than me playing a mean old man’s
game and loving life.
I will miss the long sessions dawdling
over libations with some randomly aggregated group in some anonymous bar whose
only salient distinction is that it is located close to the convention center,
the arena, or the hotel.
I will miss going out with my closest
cohorts to consume massive quantities of big slabs of meat, consuming more
calories, fats, and spending more money on one meal than anyone would normally spend in a week of meals.
I will miss seeing all the All-American
players dressed to the nines and sashaying to their seats walking on their seven-inch
heels at the All-American banquet; some precariously, some with beaming
confidence, making them even taller than they already are; I will miss seeing
their pride and joy as they reap their hard-earned recognition and their moment
in the limelight.
I will miss recognizing coaches who
sweated all the details in a long career as they celebrate their successes, their
longevity, and finally breaking through the obscurity and having their moment
in the sun among their peers, with all due attention on them for once.
I will miss trying to figure out which
booths hands out the best freebies.
I will miss talking to my exhibitor friends,
reminiscing about the deals that brought us together.
I will miss telling tall tales of our
glory days when we all used to play. Of course, as a short fat guy playing a
tall person’s game, I had no glory days to speak of, it was just my imagination,
running away with me.
So my friends, just to let you know: I
am missing all of you already, but I will miss you even more when the convention
dates rolls around this year. I will have your visage in my mind, your humor
and your tall tales in my ears, and my
heart hurting for not having a chance to meet this year.
Alas, hope springs eternal. Here is to
2021, may we all see one another in person next year. For those who will have
the opportunity to play in the Spring, in college or high school: good luck and
be careful out there. May you and your
teams stay healthy and well.
Love you all.
