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Playing sports my entire life has taught me a lot of different lessons, but in volleyball I feel like communication is especially crucial to a team’s success. While in other sports one player can dominate the game if their skill is vastly superior to their competitors, volleyball is so much more reliant on the team’s ability to work together. As a result, being able to communicate effectively can be the difference between a good team and a great team. On top of this volleyball, in my opinion, is much more of a psychological game than other sports. I know this may sound like I’m just bashing other sports, but that’s not at all my intention. I love other sports and have played most of them longer than I have played volleyball. However, I believe my opinion has truth to it. A simple miscommunication can result in someone not going for a serve receive and your team instantly losing a point. Even though the real issue may have just been because the two players didn’t clarify who should have gone for the ball, one if not both of the players could internalize what happened and take the blame for it, instantly putting them ‘on tilt’ and causing them to overthink the situation. This can then turn into another missed pass. Suddenly you feel like you’ve single handedly lost your team two points. That’s one of the reasons volleyball is unique, often times if a player makes a mistake, it directly costs their team a point whereas in basketball, for example, you can miss a shot or mess up a pass and it doesn’t immediately translate into a point for the other team.

Today in practice, for example, I wasn’t getting set the ball as much as I feel like I should have and as a result I went silent. This was not how I should have handled the situation but I was extremely frustrated and consequentially took out my frustration in that way. It’s no surprise that of the 3 scrimmages we played, that was the only game we lost. Even if I’m not responsible for a lost point, being able to communicate with my teammates and boost their morale is something that I pride myself on and when I go silent, it can have a serious impact on the team’s performance. This goes beyond myself as well, when teams communicate more effectively, they operate better. I know that this isn’t some crazy revelation, but I felt like it was a cool insight and am appreciative for the sport and everything it teaches me.