Directors,

I hope your season is going well. We are at 13,250 junior girls and counting! Once again, we have set another record. I want to touch base with you on a few issues as we start to wind down this year.

The IMPACT requirement from USA Volleyball has taken some people by surprise. USA Volleyball insists that all coaches have a minimum of an IMPACT certification. You won't coach in any region of the organization without the certification. Our region does more to provide this certification than almost all other regions combined. The last course is being offered in Columbus on March 29. If you have coaches lacking the certification, they must attend this course. If they don't attend, they won't coach!

Several new clubs have started since we offered the ASEP Sports Club Director course in December. I have been working on setting up the ability for our new directors to take the course on-line. It is finally available! Any directors wishing to take the on-line version should contact me at zehler@ovr.org. The course can be shipped to you within 4 business days. The cost is $85, payable to the Ohio Valley Region. You will also still be able to attend the course next December in Columbus if you wish. All clubs must have an ASEP Sports Club Director accredited director. For 2009, it must be the director, so be prepared for this.

Registrations for the OVR Girls' Championships are trickling in. We are close to 800 teams. Remember that you have to submit registration on-line by April 1 and submit the entry fees with a postmark of April 1. If you fail to meet these requirements, you may not be accepted. We are far short of our capacity of 1,280 teams, but some divisions will be over subscribed.

Many teams lost a tournament (or 2) the weekend of March 8-9. This affects the 15 Regional and 12s' divisions seeding for the championships events. We will try to give the 15 Regional teams another week or two before we set the deadline for freezing the division into two separate entities, but that may affect families' ability to change housing arrangements or be penalized by hotels. I will keep you posted.

The 12s will have 13-14 courts of play on Sunday, May 4 for the top divisions. This will include 52-56 teams. All other 12s, 11s, and 10s will play on May 3. We will announce the split divisions on April 1. If we wait any longer, hotels may not refund money.

We are going to offer a waiver for an athlete to participate with their club in more than one championship. Too many teams have to withdraw due to being reduced to 5 girls. There will be paperwork to complete and criteria to meet. Each case will be determined on an individual basis. We want teams to be able to compete, but want a fair playing field for all involved. Details will be available at a later date.

All Regional divisions except 18 Regional will have an 8-court format for the Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Copper divisions. We try to have 4 courts for all other divisions. The top National divisions will almost always consist of 4 courts and 16 teams.

Have a great spring holiday and we will see you in Columbus!

Bill Zehler
Director, Ohio Valley Region Kaepa-USA Girls' Volleyball Championships