RebKell's Junkie Boards

[ClayK]

We might want to cool the jets on the "growth of women's basketball":

NFHS Participation Surveys

2022-23: Basketball – 373,366
Volleyball – 470,488

2018-19: Basketball – 399,067
Volleyball – 452,808

2012-13: Basketball – 433,120
Volleyball – 420,208

_________________
Oṃ Tāre Tuttāre Ture Svāhā

[summertime blues]

You tooting that horn again? Why don't you go to "Other Women's Sports" then?

_________________
Don't take life so serious. It ain't nohows permanent.
It takes 3 years to build a team and 7 to build a program.--Conventional Wisdom

[snlMINAJ]

come back with results of survey in next 2-3-4 years

[GlennMacGrady]

Two things can be true at the same time.

Surveyed student participation in basketball at the high school level can be declining, which may presage a near future decline in student participation at the college level, while at the same time surveyed fan viewership of WCBB and (maybe) WNBA can be increasing.

_________________
http://www.youtube.com/MagicBusBasketball

[tfan]

[Ex-Ref]

I don't know how anyone can watch vball anymore. Rally scoring has completely ruined the game. They may as well put in a mercy rule.

That would speed up the games!!!

_________________
"Women are judged on their success, men on their potential. It’s time we started believing in the potential of women." —Muffet McGraw

“Thank you for showing the fellas that you've got more balls than them,” Haley said, to cheers from the crowd.

[tfan]

[tfan]

[snzuluz]

Having coached high school basketball myself, your top players are usually playing on the AAU circuit and some of them have been convinced by their AAU coach not to play for their high school team, rather play for a top level AAU team where you get more exposure and college coaches get to see you play against the best competition. I had this happen when I coached on the middle school level.

For the average basketball player, basketball is the only sport that you have to give up both your Thanksgiving break and Christmas break and even most of your summer playing in summer leagues for your high school. If your player 9 through 15 on a high school team and you don’t get to see much playing time you’re not going to go out for basketball at your high school anymore. Many feel it’s not worth their time if they’re not going to see minutes on the court for their high school team. Let’s be honest, most of us as head high school coaches or even those of us who have been college coaches have an eight to maybe nine player rotation.

Finally, student enrollment numbers are going down in almost every school in the United States. There are fewer babies being born thus there are fewer kids enrolled in high school. Fewer numbers of high school students overall mean the numbers will drop overall at the national level.

Finally, most states are not funded enough by their state governments in education; therefore, schools are having to drop multiple levels of teams thus having fewer students play that sport. 10-15 years ago, large high schools would have three possibly four different levels of basketball (varsity, junior varsity, sophomore, freshman and that might include freshman A and freshman B teams ) for girls to participate in at the high school level. Due to lack of funding, many high schools have cut those four teams down to two. You usually only take 12 to 15 basketball players. If your high school has been forced to cut down to two teams that’s only 24 to 30 girls who are playing basketball at a given high school. That also is a direct reflection of the numbers going down overall across the nation.

[ClayK]

All good points, yet volleyball continues to go up in participation, and so do other girls' sports (lacrosse, water polo and in California, flag football).

And here in NorCal, many schools have frosh, JV and varsity volleyball and soccer, but most have only JV and varsity basketball.

_________________
Oṃ Tāre Tuttāre Ture Svāhā

[summertime blues]

Volleyball simply requires more players on the court. Take this discussion to Other Women's Sports please, instead of trying to whine about it or derail the discussion here.

_________________
Don't take life so serious. It ain't nohows permanent.
It takes 3 years to build a team and 7 to build a program.--Conventional Wisdom

[Howee]

[Michael]

[elsie]

shouldn't we be happy that young women have sports to play?....volleyball, basketball, what difference does it make....its all good..

[elsie]

shouldn't we be happy that young women have sports to play?....volleyball, basketball, what difference does it make....its all good..

[summertime blues]

[quote="Michael"]

[summertime blues]

[summertime blues]

[Ex-Ref]

No doubt, volleyball is big. All we need to do is look at the tourney in Spokane last month (800 teams) to know that.

Question is, why are there so many more athletes playing volleyball vs. basketball?

I know a guy whose daughter is in volleyball. They are going to tournaments almost every weekend. Texas, Florida, Missouri, everywhere.
They take her almost two hours away, at least twice a week, to practices with her club team. All year long!!!! Even during the school year!

The guy made a comment the other day that they didn't know how they would pay for college if she didn't get a scholarship because they have a couple of other kids that would be in college at the same time and they didn't know how to pay for it. (Uh, maybe if you weren't spending all of that money dragging your one kid all over the country, you could invest it and pay for all of your kids to go.)

Something else I learned is that she will maybe only get a scholarship for a year or two and then be expected to use any NIL money to pay for the other years. At least that is what one school that she is interested in told her.

_________________
"Women are judged on their success, men on their potential. It’s time we started believing in the potential of women." —Muffet McGraw

“Thank you for showing the fellas that you've got more balls than them,” Haley said, to cheers from the crowd.

[scullyfu]

I read long ago that many young women chose volleyball over basketball bc they were fearful of being labeled lesbians.

_________________
i'll always bleed Storm green.

[ClayK]

Volleyball is attractive for a number of reasons, but it all starts in middle school.

Middle school is when girls decide what sport to play in the summer -- that is, the sport they will take most seriously. And the major influence on middle school girls is other middle school girls. In short, what are their friends doing?

It's not about what sport an elite athlete is best at, necessarily. She's 12 and isn't thinking about scholarships or her future that much. She wants to play with her friends. (Of course there are exceptions ...)

Her friends are not elite athletes and maybe not even very good athletes. So what do they choose?

Volleyball has no running, no contact, no screaming parents and spandex shorts.

Basketball has running, contact, parents yelling from the stands and less attractive uniforms.

Which sport is an average middle school girl going to choose?

(And this post isn't about volleyball -- it's about the future shape of women's basketball.)

_________________
Oṃ Tāre Tuttāre Ture Svāhā

[GlennMacGrady]

Clay's OP is manifestly about girl's basketball. The "sobering numbers" he reports are the declines in annual high school girl's basketball participation, contrasted for emphasis with another sport's increases, all in the context of an increasing overall national population.

When I said earlier that this decline in high school basketball participation might presage a decline in WCBB participation, I meant a decline in the percentage of female college students who are interested in or try out for basketball. Tfan accurately points out that there still will be an over-abundance of high school players to fill all the WCBB scholarships available.

I wonder if the declines in basketball participation could be related to the sharp demographic increases in the Asian and Hispanic populations this century. Maybe I'm completely wrong, but I have a vague impression that basketball is not the most popular of sports in Asia or in Mexico and Central America, for example.

_________________
http://www.youtube.com/MagicBusBasketball

[pilight]

[summertime blues]

[summertime blues]