Metro Volleyball Helps DMPS Girls Learn Ways of the Court

Metro Volleyball is helping more than 170 DMPS girls learns the ins and outs of the court.

Wednesday night the gym at Callanan Middle School looked like a pink champagne party. Volleyballs were everywhere, popping up like bubbles and the courts were wall-to-wall girls clad in the bright shade chosen for the official Metro Volleyball t-shirts.

Metro Volleyball is an instructional program for 4th, 5th, and 6th grade girls that’s offered through the DMPS Community Ed Department. Now in its 11th year, the program is being offered district-wide for the first time and has been expanded to include 6th graders.

“The first year we had 18 girls from the Hoover feeder schools,” said Community Ed Coordinator John Nelson. “We have gradually expanded each year and this year we have over 170 girls registered.”

The 5th and 6th grade girls in the Hoover, North, and Roosevelt feeder zones play on Monday and Wednesday evenings at Callanan.  Their counterparts from the East and Lincoln feeders play at Hiatt Middle School. The 4th grade girls district-wide play on Thursdays at Callanan.

The program has the full support of the district high school volleyball coaches. As evidence of that Nelson pointed to three of the coaches helping out on Wednesday night. Libby Israel and Desarea Kimpton play on the freshman volleyball squad at Roosevelt High School. Katie Halsch coaches that team.

The increased numbers prompted Nelson to hire site coordinators. The program has really stepped its game up.

Tim Lane is a member of the Governor’s Council on Physical Fitness & Nutrition and has more than 30 years of experience as a volleyball coach at multiple levels in the Des Moines area. He’s in charge at the Callanan site. Hiatt is overseen by the main cogs of the nationally ranked Grand View University men’s volleyball program; Head Coach Donan Cruz and outside hitter Pedro Cardoso, a native of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Cruz was named National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Coach of the Year and Cardoso the NAIA Player of the Year by the American Volleyball Coaching Association.

So the girls are in capable hands. The focus of their instruction is drills on the fundamentals. Every so often Lane hollers, “FREEZE!” and everyone does. He makes a point and the drills resume. “Moose!” yells Halsch, “Thumbs on your foreheads.” The antler look preps the girls for a drill on setting. The pace is peppy and there are enough ball contacts to keep everyone engaged.

It would be understandable if high school players got their fill of volleyball with their own teams. But both Israel and Kimpton swear they can’t get enough. Three nights a week they go straight from practice at Roosevelt to help at Callanan.

“Helping the younger kids is fun,” Israel said. “And when we’re showing them how to play we’re also giving ourselves reminders.”

Almost four hours into her daily ration of volleyball, Kimpton was all smiles. “I never get tired of it,” she said, and her body language convinces you. “Plus it’s kind of cool to have the younger girls looking up to us.”

The Metro “teams” are instructional and noncompetitive except for occasional choose-up-sides scrimmages. But they have symbiotic ties to the high school teams they’ll eventually supply. Next Tuesday, for instance, instead of more drilling all of the girls will don their pink T’s and go together to the volleyball match between Roosevelt and North at North.

“No question the growth of the Metro program makes it a more viable feeder system for us,” said Halsch, who is in her 6th year on the volleyball staff at Roosevelt. “Plus, having our girls involved here is great for morale both ways. They are excited to have these kids see them in action next week, and vice versa.”

Bubbly is the word.

Video of DMPS Metro Volleyball

Photos from Metro Volleyball