Double the defense

With volleyball games and tournaments kicking off this week, a couple of rule changes from the National Federation of State High School Associations are adding a wrinkle to team strategies.

Most will not be noticeable except to eagle-eyed fans timing the length of timeouts between sets, but one that could play a factor is the rule allowing teams to designate two liberos during each set.

A libero is the player wearing a different color jersey who plays exclusively in the backrow and can count as a free substitution for any player.

The double-libero rule that has existed at other levels of volleyball, including club volleyball, before being brought to high school.

“I see an opportunity for my group of kids,” Weatherford volleyball coach Courtney Hammett said. “The last couple of years I have had a couple of kids in fierce competition for the libero position. So with this I could have the opportunity to use both of them. With it not counting as a sub against your team, if one is not on their A-game you don’t have to waste a sub.”

Aledo coach Claire Gay has her libero position locked up tight with returning senior and Texas Tech commit Karsyn Evans. However, that has not stopped her from running unofficial double-libero rotations in the past and will get an added benefit for it now.

“It allows coaches more freedom on sub count,” Gay said. “We have been blessed with wonderful defensive specialists, so we have been running double-libero systems just not with the double jerseys. I don’t think it’s going to affect the game very much. The girls are used to it from club and it will just give coaches help with their sub count.”

While teams can still only employ one on the court at a time, having another player available to sub in during specialized situations could turn a set or two during a season, especially if liberos have differing skill sets.

“I have one who is better in long rallies on defense and I have one who is better in serve-receive and helping us run better offense,” Hammett said. “They balance each other out well. There are games I need one more than the other and it’s good to be able to use them both in that uniform.”