Drills in Depth - 46 Challenge with Tod Mattox
Creating out of system rallies with a “big rally guy"
If you’re around volleyball for long, it’s hard not to be exposed to Tod Mattox. He’s a great person to talk volley with, to think out loud around, and to share stories with. He’s been coaching in San Diego colleges, clubs, and high schools for over 30 years. He’s currently working with an 11s team at Coast. You can see him in numerous videos and clinics at The Art of Coaching Volleyball. He and his friend Davis Ransom created a podcast, The VolleyPod. Like I said, he’s not hard to find.
What are Drills in Depth? - Read here
The Drill
Who: Tod plays this game with his high school varsity team. The biggest determining factor to decide if this game could be useful is the difference between in system and out of system. If there isn’t much difference between what your offense can do in system and what it can do out of system, then this game likely won’t be useful. Once that difference becomes meaningful, game on!
What: 46 Challenge is a (mostly) regular volleyball game, but with four players on one side of the net and six on the other. (In a perfect world, there are six players on each side, but only four on the court at one time on one side. I’ll explain below.) The side with four players has two front row (pin attackers) and two back row players (a setter and a ball control player). Play can begin in many ways, but usually with the setter on the team of four receiving the ball first. Tod prefers giving an out of system ball to the team of six. Coaches can enter a ball directly to the team of four or the team of six can serve at the team of four. The game is designed to work on out of system offense and defense as well as ways to force an opponent into out of system situations.
When: Tod breaks a typical high school/club season into three phases and he will use 46 Challenge in all three but for different purposes. In the beginning of the season, he will use the game to evaluate players, particularly in out of system situations. This evaluation isn’t just in the “tryout” sense, but to determine what direction his coaching needs to take. In the middle of the season, he will use it to work on different skills that players have been developing. (To emphasize this, he will place additional constraints on the game, like not allowing attackers to use the same shot twice in a row.) Towards the end of the season, he will emphasize things like decision-making, competing, and awareness. Additionally, he will sometimes build scouting information into the game as well.
How: There’s a lot of genius in how 46 Challenge creates engaging situations for players. With one team only having two attackers, it forces them to hit against a double block more often, just as we would expect in regular play when a team is out of system. Conversely, the team of six gets to attack against at most one blocker and three defenders but they are only allowed to attack offspeed so they have to get creative with how to either score or get their opponents out of system. To place a premium on in system attacks, the side of four scores two points if they get an in system kill, meaning that the setter was able to hand set an attacker from a fairly central position on the court. While players on the team of four may position themselves wherever they’d like, they still must play according to usual volleyball rules regarding front row and back row players.
As I mentioned above, in a perfect world, there are actually six players on both sides, even though one side only has four on the court at a time. Let’s call that side team A and the regular side of six players team B. Team A has two back row players, a setter and a ball control player, who remain on the court for the entire time. But team A also has two front row players, both pin attackers on the court (let’s call them A1). There are two additional pin attackers waiting off the court (let’s call them A2). If both A1 and A2 are present, then two scoreboards are required because each pair of attackers is keeping their own score against team B. If pair A1 begins on the court and wins the rally, they score a point and remain on the court. If pair A1 loses the rally, they are replaced by pair A2 and a new rally begins. As with pair A1, if they win the rally they remain on the court and play another point. Each pair (plus the two shared back row players) is playing a game to seven, win by one, against team B. While each pair is playing against team B, they are really competing against each other. A round ends when one of the pairs scores seven points. When that happens, the other pair has an opportunity to tie the score when they rotate on. For example, let’s say a new round begins and pair A1 wins seven rallies in a row to beat team B 7-0. Pair A2 would then rotate in with all other players remaining in the same positions. They would play until they lose a rally or they win seven rallies as well. If pair A2 doesn’t win seven in the same turn as pair A1, pair A1 is the winner. If pair A2 is able to equal pair A1’s seven points, the round ends in a tie.
Once both pairs have finished their games, then team A’s pins switch over to team B and pins from team B have the opportunity to play on team A. If a pair wins, they can opt to stay and play again on team A. While playing to seven is subject to change, Tod has found that, with his high school teams, games to seven provide the right amount of time so that players can play their hardest without fatigue becoming too big of a factor before the game ends. When he has coached teams that cannot score as consistently, he has sometimes shifted to playing for a set amount of time (5-7 minutes) instead of to a certain number of points.
Tod offered a couple examples of ways the game can be further adapted, depending on what might be of interest. Instead of forcing all of team B’s players to attack offspeed, their middle can be allowed to jump and hit at full speed, forcing team A’s pins to be prepared to block in zone 3. That can be coupled with not allowing team B’s pins to jump to attack, further encouraging team B to set the middle to score. Instead of entering a ball directly to team A’s setter to start each rally, team B can serve at team A. This encourages team B to serve with a mindset of forcing an out of system reception while it gives team A and immediate (but difficult) opportunity to score two points if they can pass in system. One last simple change can be to give two points for a successful dump from team A’s setter, inviting her to attack and keeping team B’s defenders on their toes. Of course, the game can change in lots of other ways, depending on what a particular team needs to work on.
The Depth
Who: Tod is driven to improve himself as well as the teams he coaches but he also deeply values engagement and fun. He shared that one of his top goals each season is for that season to be the most fun he’s ever had. So games like 46 Challenge, while creating great learning opportunities, are also really fun to play. Games like this are a manifestation of long-held values for teams he coaches: effort, team-ness, and attitude. Fun is part of “effort” because, for Tod, giving high levels of effort is fun.
When Tod is coaching in a high school setting, he often has multiple assistant coaches and he wants to ensure that he and they don’t end up just ball-watching and all giving feedback to the team about the same things. To do that, he keeps them “clipboarded”, giving them a clipboard with something specific to watch and check off when they see it happen. For example, the clipboard may keep track of how often the team covers their hitters or plays good off-blocker defense. This method can help coaches learn the value of focusing on one particular part of the game instead of just allowing themselves to ball watch. Tod will often “clipboard” himself and have one of the assistants play his role instead. It’s a valuable lesson for both coaches, Tod reminds himself of the importance of a narrow focus while giving the assistant important practice at being in charge and talking to the team. (I like the similarity to Rob Graham’s XONTRO in how clipboards are used to keep coaches focused.)
But when Tod isn’t “clipboarded”, he’ll put himself on team A’s endline so he can talk to the pins that are off the court. Since the game is focused on out of system attack decisions, that’s what he mainly talks with them about. He’ll ask them about what they saw in the previous rally and how their perceptions of the situation influenced their attacking choices. He doesn’t like to give the attackers solutions directly if he can avoid it, he would prefer to let them come to their own solutions if they can.
What: 46 Challenge grew out of a 4v4 game, called Kamikaze, that Tod likes to use often but Tod realized that he could alter it to better resemble out of system opportunities in regular 6v6 volleyball. Kamikaze creates a lot of out of system-like opportunities but those opportunities are usually 1v1 attacks. Tod realized that, in 6v6 volleyball, most out of system attacks will be against two blockers, not one, so he created a different game that would create more accurate representations of what pin attackers face when attacking out of system. Since a great deal of volleyball is played out of system, Tod wanted players to figure out how to score in those situations while allowing as much natural game play as possible.
I mentioned above that the main goal of this game is out of system attacking and defending but there are many other aspects of play that 46 Challenge forces players to pay attention to. By limiting team A to four players defending against offspeed, they must rely on their reading and pursuit skills more than they would if they had six players. Meanwhile, because team B can only hit offspeed and because they don’t want to allow team A to get in system, their attackers must always be thinking about if they can attack towards team A’s setter or attack in such a way that team A can’t control the ball well enough to get in system.
When: Tod had an interesting response when I asked him when he would play 46 Challenge within a single practice. Depending on what kind of pedagogy a coach relies on, Tod would suggest using 46 Challenge at different points in practice. If a coach uses a linear pedagogy, progressing from practicing parts of skills or parts of the game towards practicing whole skills or the whole game, Tod suggests using 46 Challenge at the end of practice since it is more game-like and competitive. If a coach uses a non-linear pedagogy, relying on “repetition without repetition”, Tod recommends playing the game right away or as another way to encourage use of a skill important in out of system attacking or defending. He gave the example of how he plays 46 Challenge after spending time developing players’ tipping skills and strategies as a way to continue working on those skills but in a more complex setting.
How: When Tod listed the goals of 46 Challenge, he added several after “improve out of system offense and defense.” These goals, while less technical or tactical, are just as valuable as the first goal. Tod talked about the importance of “increasing awareness, defending like madwomen, and competing.” As teams play 46 Challenge more, they increase their awareness of the situations that they and their opponents are in during a rally. While Tod does sometimes use direct instruction to tell players what they can/can’t/should/shouldn’t do in some situations, that doesn’t always create awareness in the same way as when he lets them work through those situations for themselves (but not completely on their own). He supports them by asking questions, sometimes to individuals (as I described above in the “When” section) but he’ll also ask the whole team questions like why the scoring system is designed as it is to stimulate their thought about how they might explore scoring.
What I probably love the most about 46 Challenge is how Tod has intertwined it with his values. As I mentioned in the “Who” section, Tod has long kept effort, team-ness, and attitude as the three values of teams he coaches. To me, the most satisfying work is done when the work aligns with our values in clear ways. While each team Tod coaches may define those terms slightly differently, being good in 46 Challenge means being good at effort, team-ness, and attitude. Over time, Tod commented, he noticed that those values lacked a little bit of the emotion he feels in the game. As a result, Tod has been trying out a new set of values lately, PB&J. Being Passionate, Bold, and Joyful in our efforts is a great and fun way to engage in our work. 46 Challenge offers a great way for players and coaches to be PB&J. A great example of this is a small tweak that Tod likes adding to games. In the case of 46 Challenge, when a team reaches six points and the next rally can end a round, a player on the team in the lead has to say across the net, “FOR THE GAME!” before the rally begins. What a fun way to embrace competitiveness in a passionate, bold, and joyful way.
Have questions for Tod? You can ask me here or you can email Tod directly.