Serving

[Ironman92]

What's a good serving %?

To me it seems like I have seen numerous excellent ability servers....but as they get rolling they hit one long or into the net?

What would coaches deem acceptable? 5 misses a match for the whole team? 90%?

What's the highest % you've heard of by a player?

[lovevball8]

I consider 95% and above excellent. SW's setter serves at 97%.

[cobweb]

I believe it depends on the server and the serving objective. If a servers objective is simply to put the ball in play, then the percentage should be very high but if the serving style is aggressive, then a drop off in percentage would be expected and tolerated.

To me, aggressive serving is an important winning tactic. A player that is successful (high serving percentage) at simply putting the ball in play with a soft, high floater over the net only puts the team in a "free ball" defensive posture, allowing the receiving team an easy serve return pass that sets the offense in motion resulting in the serving team at a disadvantage. The aggressive server will not have as high of a percentage but if the receiving team has issues passing the ball then their offense is weakened increasing the opportunity that the serving team will be able to pass effectively toward getting a kill.

If I were a coach, my team would serve aggressively and reasonably lower serving percentages would be tolerated.

I cringe win I see the easy pass serve go over the net, a good team will, much more often than not, gain point scoring momentum when given an easy serve return.

[crashnburn]

I agree with Cobweb.
It depends on what your goal is. If the only objective was to get the ball in the court, most of our players would have very close to 100%. However, we take the risk of serving aggressively, and it usually pays off. We usually have more aces than errors, and serving tough allows us to get the other team out of system. Also, most of the time our girls are serving to a spot that the coach tells them. When you do this, you take the risk of having more service errors.

If you aren't serving tough, there is no reason to miss a serve, IMO.

[ManitouDan]

great post cobweb... IMO (a very limited opinion lol) our team (ND) is really good but our serving leaves a lot to be desired , more often than not we just lob it in. We have a couple girls that try to go hard/low but not much. We have no jump servers and the one girl who did do it must have got discouraged or the coach told her to stop , she doesn't do it anymore. All I know is we have to return a lot of guided missiles and we sure don't offer up any. MD

[lovevball8]

There has to be a balance. It does you no good to serve aggressively if you can't be consistent. The server from Webster scores a lot of points because she places the ball well. Webster also has two young ladies who jump serve; their % is around 87 and 85%, but their aces are double the rest of the team. Like I said, it's a balancing act. I can't stand watching a match were it's one missed serve after another.

[cobweb]

DD's teammate served 25 in a row a couple weeks ago. It was terrible to see a team get beaten that badly, but watching this young athlete serve 25 aggressive serves in a row with no miss was outstanding. The feat was not only a great display of serving but, each being a jump serve, a testament to conditioning.

[favabeans]

Having a team that can serve different types of serves is alway key for a good team. SW has girls that use hard jump serves but can still drop in a short serve that rattles the other team. The girls that don't jump use deep serves or floaters that move up and down as they come across the net. Most of the team also spot serve and really use that to pick on the weak passers.

[cobweb]

Digger, those are great service line attributes, it is no wonder that SW is such an accomplished team. It seems that some coaches do not understand the details that affect a better overal serving performance nearly as well as others.

Service line performance is just as important as the front line performance for a well developed volleyball team.

[Ironman92]

Good points. I just wondered what the more involved thought. As a parent in the stands it's easy to see that the slow LOB serve that should be 98% just does not get it done versus anyone decent. Now if your team is just superior defensively to the opponent that just doesn't have much of an attack...well that's 8th grade-ish but ok.

On the flipside a kid trying to hit a near maximum speed serve without the skill or necessary repetition is very irritating...especially when the misses are about the same as the aces...to me that's not the best strategy to beat any team and can keep a lesser team in the game.

To me hit it with movement and place it....BUT, if you miss the placement, miss it towards the center and not OB.

[Esully63]

There has to be a balance. It does you no good to serve aggressively if you can't be consistent. The server from Webster scores a lot of points because she places the ball well. Webster also has two young ladies who jump serve; their % is around 87 and 85%, but their aces are double the rest of the team. Like I said, it's a balancing act. I can't stand watching a match were it's one missed serve after another.

I agree you have to have effective serving not just high percentage serving. I saw one of those Webster jump servers go to the service line down 23-17 and continue to serve aggressively and they pulled out the win 25-23. The other jump server they have is a low and accurate sever. I've seen her put in in the net on occasion but when she is serving "Listen". I have heard her serve and nick the tape 7 serves in a row and is known to hit the tape and roll over and drop multiple time a night. With that kind of serving I wouldn't worry about 85% serve percentage. They also utilize spot serving and if you can spot serve effectively at, I think someone said, 95% thats awsome. I don't think Webster has a non-aggressive server. My definition of a non-aggressive server would be a server that has one goal..over the net. Your better teams will serve with a plan, one might spot serve while another power serve or maybe send a hard floater. Some of them might use several tactics but a good serving team will not serve just to get it over the net

[Bastogne]

...nothing wrong with the lob serve if used effectively..spot serving...especially to poor passers...if it wasn't effective you wouldn't see college servers using it all the time. a good mixture is best...especially a good mixture from the same server...