Topic: Volleyball fans ignored by Newsday

     Boys Volleyball fans need to unite, as well as all high school sports. Parents and coaches need to demand better from their editors, not just for V-ball but all high school sports. Newsday's coverage of volleyball is disgraceful, and in the fall too. No spring preview. Out of 149 photos in April, a couple pictures of 2 lesser teams. No coverage of any kind of perennial champions like Plainview, Long Beach and Chaminade. (By the way, my kid does not go there, no ax to grind). The excuse that the season is split and so the lack of coverage is bunk! There are Newsday blogs on elite sports that probably have less than ten teams in two counties, fencing and gymnastics. Where's the balanced local high school sports coverage they advertise? The excuse that such a "noteworthy" paper like Newsday can't cover local sports like other regional papers do is blind and short-sighted.

     Newsday, do you realize no one is buying your paper to hear trash about Isiah Thomas potential firing or to hear your opinion of A-Rod's personal life? That manure is all over the net. Why don't you wake up and realize what may cause kids and their parents to buy your paper is local coverage? Pick up a paper in FL, PA or TX and you'll see how they publicize high school and college sports to help it grow, hence, helping their kids get into colleges. This is what happens when you have one paper monopolizing an area like ours of millions of people.

     16.7% increase in boys volleyball nationwide in last two years despite the enactment of Title IX which forced many universities to cut mens volleyball. My son has worked hard like hundreds of other boys playing this sport for 4 years while keeping his grades up. He didn't play club team either. And guess what, without any exposure from Newsday, he'll receive scholarship next year to play against D-1 competition. So there is interest in this sport despite Newsday's blind effort to minimize high school sports. Newsday should be ashamed how they cover local high school and college sports. Supposedly this is a "pro town". Garbage, have you seen attendance at Islander games, and have you forgotten why the Nets left here a long time ago. How about covering your amateur programs and maybe they will grow? This letter is going their editors so if you don't see it there, you know why.

What are you on crack? Is boys volleyball really a college sport? I picked up my newsday today and i counted at least 6 pages of HS sports. Plus tey do a great job of posting stats of every game. (rare for a local newspaper). I forgot to mention the online covergage and blogs.

16% increase in Volleyball gives that sport a grand total of ...100 players. Stop your belly aching.

You said 

"And guess what, without any exposure from Newsday, he'll receive scholarship next year to play against D-1 competition. So there is interest in this sport despite Newsday's blind effort to minimize high school sports."

I Say 

Just becuase your son is getting a scholarship to play volleyball does not mean that there is any intrest in the sport. BTW I know it wasnt a full ride scholarship so how much was the scholarship 600 bucks?

The lack of any post on this forum clearly demonstrates there is no intrest in Boys Volleyball.

Boys volleyball what a joke!

I though I was done with this. I said in my post that Newsday does a great job of posting the stats of every game. Travel much? Please I have been to almost every state and numerous countries. Newsday daily circulation is 350,000.00  it is a local newspaper. Are you saying that your son is being offered a 20,000 per year scholarship? I'm sure you mean he his being offered grant and aid of 20,000.00  . I know there are only 100 men's scholarships available split up over a 4 year period.

I know that that boils down to 4.5 per team to split over four years. I know that id highly unlikely  your son  has received scholarship offer for $$20,000.00 .Grant and aid yes.  20k scholly..no way

You say

Zip coverage=zip interest=no kid wants to play for local colleges.

I say

There are only 21-23 div 1 men's volleyball teams, none in NY. Impossible for local kid play locally in Div1. 

Unfortunately title lX has totally eviscerated men's volleyball. Mens VB has fallen and cant get up!!

     Just curious, are you a student, coach, or neither? We agree on more than we first thought. For any prospective student athletes out there, if you have strong enough grades, or strong high school reputation like a private school, they offer you other aid first. They save their athletic money in all sports for last. That's why your 7500 scholarships for women v-ball sounds out of whack. So for example when someone says they got a free ride say for basketball, chances are it wasn't mostly athletic scholarship, it was a combination of academic scholarship and BS grants, even at the highest level of teams. My son will be playing out of the area but can't go into it because the final commitment letter hasn't been signed yet. So did my daughter because v-ball gets no exposure here college or high school. Never said full ride. That rarely happens for any sport. But it's not a couple hundred dollars (LOL). He had many schools contact him including one who was in the D1 national finals last year on ESPN, down to D3 schools like the one who offered him a single blind grant for 20k per year. He is not going there but you probably know, D3 don't offer athletic scholarship. But this was to play volleyball, he didn't qualify for academic aid at this school as it was not easy to get into.

     For anyone else wanting to know more, look at EIVA website to see what schools play v-ball. Nationally, the sport is growing despite the coverage here. Universities are being offered grants from the national level to use for scholarship if they are willing to start a mens team. This is to offset the lack of funds due to Title IX. Most eastern colleges with volleyball play mixed schedules so you take lumps against bigger schools. No D1 programs in NY but then again there are not really many good D-1 programs for any sport in NY unless you want to go all the way to Syracuse. There are excellent D3 V-ball teams in NY like NYU and Vassar, and then alot of also rans in the tristate area who are trying to build their programs.

Long Island's population is about 2.75 million . Newsday is not a local newspaper. It is a huge newspaper, full of mostly ads, politically correct news stories that does not serve local interests. If it did, maybe it's circulation would be alot higher.

If Newsday is not a local paper then why are you ranting about their lack of coverage local high school volleyball? I am not even going to breakdown the reasons for you, not worth my time. Gotta to go to school.

I told you it was not going to get any better.  You can do what we did here in the fall:  if you are a parent, write a letter to Newsday describing the lack of coverage online and in the print paper and have it signed by all the parents on the team.  During games go to the parents of the other team with a unsigned copy of the letter so they can sign it and send it out also.

If you are a coach, when you are reporting scores mention when are they going to cover vb.  Do not give them every team and game to cover because they won't but give them the 1 vs 3 match or 2 vs 4 etc. 

Do you have a local newspaper?  At least get it started from there and work your way up to Newsday.  I looked at the other blogs and it looks like track and field is getting more coverage because that blogger gives them good background info and the reporters only have to show up once on the weekends.

your pathetic you obviously don't play volleyball so what are you doing on the blog trashing it. get outta here and get a life 

pshhh hahaha "gotta to go to school" are you stupid. Get the hell out of here. obviously your a huge tool bag who has nothing better to do then bash other sports, even before you go to school.

Okay so I'm goign to give u the standpoint from a girl player point of view. 

I personally don't see much coverage of volleyball by Newsday outside of reporting stats( and even then they are often incorrect and with misspellings) I appreciate that Newsday takes the time to cover High School sports but they should all be covered equally. I would like to see a preseason prediction for volleyball seasons like they had years ago when my sister was still playing.