Rynn Oliver, left, and Katie Smith, will start school volleyball with a jumpstart after attending the Barons Volleyball Camp held at College Park School last week. About 60 kids from the area and regional public and Catholic schools took part. Geoff Lee Meridian Source
You can’t teach height, but you can compensate with skills.
That’s what 6 ft. 7 volleyball instructor Jordan Silzer said during a three-day Barons Volleyball Camp last week at College Park School. It was also the theme for young players.
Barons students at Lloydminster Comprehensive High School are among the first to apply new skills on Thursday during the first day of classes when tryouts take place for seniors.
Doug Smith, vice principal at the Comp, says overall the camp helps players hit the ground running with the resumption of volleyball in September.
“Volleyball season is upon us,” said Smith on the final day of the camp.
“It’s good to get into the gym and touch a ball and get a feeling for it and head into tryouts and hopefully make the team.”
Smith says the Middle schools will probably get going the second week of school with elementary tripleball (a form of volleyball) heading off in the middle of September.
His own daughter Katie was at the camp hoping to get a quick start to her season at Bishop Lloyd Middle School with great instruction for Silzer and Shae Little, another former Huskie player.
“We’ve been learning the basic skills, defending, passing, hitting. It gives me a head start,” she said.
Ditto for her friend, Rynn Oliver, who plays volleyball at E.S. Laird, and added spiking to the list of skills that will get her off to a good start this season.
“I’m going to start volleyball tryouts at E.S. Laird so it will probably help me there,” she said.
A total of 60 kids took part in the camp, including about 35 girls and 25 boys, who participated in daily skill development sessions and scrimmages.
“We have kids from the Catholic division, Neilburg—all over the place,” said Smith.
“With our young group it’s the very basic skills –passing, setting, but this group is a pretty high-level group so our scrimmages actually look like volleyball, which is really neat,” said Smith.
The older students on the other hand get a lot of ball touches and reps and drills from the coaches.
Little, who is actually a pilot now, explains the aim is to help the younger kids to get the basic skills down while the older kids work on more advanced techniques and specialize in the area they are good at.
“We were here last year and there seems there’s a lot of skill here— a lot of people trying hard so it’s going good,” he said.
Silzer is going back to U of S this fall to get a masters in engineering and describes himself as a well-rounded player.
“I’m a tall guy, I like to be good at everything so I like to try and inspire the kids to learn every skill as well,” he said.
He says the camp is good for himself and Little, and for the kids.
It was moved at the last minute to College Park with construction activity going on the Comp with its expansion program.
“We have lots of contractors going in and out. We have some renovations going on inside as well,” explained Smith who can’t wait for the new gym to be finished.
“The gym that we’re going to have there hopefully next spring is going to be spectacular. We can host a lot of things there.”
