Swing Offense

Table Of Contents

The Swing Offense

by Jim Toohey E-Mail: info@vball.com

THE SWING OFFENSE

The swing offense was developed in the early 1980's by the United States Men's National Team in order to take advantage of the skills of their personnel. The team featured the world's best passers in Karch Kiraly and Aldis Berzins - two great passers who were also mobile attackers. The U.S. team was able to take advantage of their skills to specialize responsibilities and free up other players for other roles, i.e.- Timmons hitting out of the back row. For many years this two passer system ruled the world of volleyball. However with the explosion in popularity and effectiveness of the jump serve many teams now spend as much time in a three-person serve receive pattern as they do in the two-person pattern. However this does not mean the end of the swing offense.

A swing offense encompasses much more than just the same two players always passing serves. It is a whole system of offense that combines to put tremendous pressure on the opposing team. I believe the two components of the offense which are most effective are the ability to place your best hitter against the oppositions weakest blocker and the concept of inside out attacking. Double quicks and back row attacking are also strong features of this system.

This article will tell you the basics of the swing offense and how to implement it into your high school program. I have used the swing offense with both high school girls and boys with great success. I have included a couple basic drills to assist in developing your swing hitters. My introduction to the swing offense came from Bill Neville at various clinics around the country. What I am writing is based on the principles that I learned from his presentations. I have adapted them to fit the needs and abilities of various teams, but much of what is included here I learned from Coach Neville.

Where to Begin

The bread and butter drill of the swing offense is called pass to hit. Simply arrange your team in a two person serve receive pattern with servers and a setter. The passer must pass a serve and then call for a set. You can show your players the inside out approach footwork (usually big powerful loop steps) or just throw them into the fire- you'll be surprised at how quickly some will figure it out. Encourage your players to hit all types of sets from anywhere on the court. When you have done this drill several times it will be easy to identify your potential swing hitters.

When you identify your swing hitters you will experience the first benefit of this offense-you now have a much smaller group of players to train in serve receive. You can have the rest of your team serve against your swings or you can have your swing hitters do pass to hit while including the middles and opposites running quicks off the pass.

There are a number of good books which will show you the serve receive patterns for the rotations of this offense. Most of these show the setter preceding the MB in the rotational order. I have always used a pattern where the Setter follows the MB. I encourage you to experiment (doodle on that court pad you got at your last clinic) and find what works best for you.

Training the Swing Hitter

You will need to provide some very specific footwork training for your swing hitters. Start by explaining the notion of inside out attacking and the use of disappear-reappear. After passing the ball the swing will move to the middle of the court and try to get lost in the movement and switching of the other players. They will then use loop steps to move outside to hit or move in a more linear direction for a play-set.

To begin this training, tape a large "V" in the middle of the court about 15' back from the net. This is the "Deep V" to which the swing hitter will step after passing (note: we tell our middles to get to the "V" which is in the middle of the court just behind the 10' line). You should then tape down the steps you want your players to follow in getting to each set that they might hit in your offense. Part of your daily warm-up should be footwork training (without a ball) on these approach paths. You can then do these approaches in pass to hit. When your players are proficient at making these approaches you can add in numerous fake jab steps to add further deception to your offense. Get creative with your deception- two of my favorite tricks are a back row player coming in to cover the quick hitter by approaching and calling for a play-set and the swing hitter actually bending down and hiding behind the quick hitter as they both approach the net (the best use of disappear-reappear I have ever seen)!

Creating Your Offense

Attack Corridors

With so much movement after the ball is passed you must be the traffic cop and prevent your players from piling up at the "V" and "Deep V". The general pattern is the following: The quick hitter will go first, any play-set hitter will go behind the quick, then the swing hitter will go behind the play-set, and finally the backrow hitter will move behind the swing hitter. When explaining this to your players it is a good idea to play a little ZEN VOLLEYBALL and walk through your plays without a ball, then with an easy toss simulating a serve, and then with a jive server.

Calling Your Plays

Your setter should call the sets for all front row attackers except for the swing hitter. The swing hitter should call their set after they have passed. It is important for you to provide some guidance to your swing hitters as a match progresses. For example you may say "When we are in rotation 5 you have the weakest blocker blocking right so call for a hut." If you have a very experienced team you can have your primary back row hitter call their set in the opposite direction of the swing hitter. If you have the personnel you can also designate an outlet hitter to whom your setter will give a back row call in case of a very bad pass.

The highest level of the swing offense has the setter jumpsetting every ball and five attackers in every rotation (six when the setter is front row).

Coverage

With so much movement and up to 5 players approaching for a set, it is very difficult to use any conventional 3-2 or 2-3 coverage systems. The best method is to have your setter follow the set and provide short coverage while a non-primary back row hitter provides deep coverage. Everyone else should stop and cover from wherever they are when the ball is set. I tell my players that coverage, like defense is an attitude more than a precise position on the court.

Real Life and the Swing Offense

I would like to give you a practical example of the use of swing hitting concepts with a high school team. This fall the girl's team at Harbor High had two great passers and two senior setters. Our middles were both better than average but neither had started before this year and neither was a true dominating hitter.

We based our offense around our two swing hitters in a three passer system One player was designated as the primary passer and stood in the middle of the court and passed every serve she could get to. This freed our other swing hitter to hit an amazing variety of first and second tempo sets and slides all over the court. Our back row swing would audibilize whatever back row set was available as the play developed. Our middles were used to hold the other teams middles by hitting 31's, l's, Back l's, Slides and a Pump 31 and 1/2. Our tall setter would usually run a quick while our shorter setter would usually hit a high ball. On a bad pass everyone was encouraged to call for a back row set and jump and hit.

We were able to go undefeated in league with the following statistics:
Our primary passer passed 65% of all serves and the two swing hitters hit 60% of sets accounting for 70% of our kills. Our team hit .282 for the year and placed five players on the All-County Team. I think we were successful due to our specialization of roles which allowed our less experienced players concentrate on attacking while our returning swing hitters passed most of the balls and could always call a set that took advantage of a good match-up with the opponent's blockers.

A Final Thought

I have often read about using the swing offense principles in transition as well as serve receive. I don't think I have seen a team do this effectively. My teams run a conventional transition offense, but both the swing hitters and the right side hitters are free to audibilze to any play-set they choose. I think there are two main reasons for you to consider using swing hitting in your offense:

1. It will allow you to have your best passers pass virtually every ball.
2. It will allow you to match up your best attacker against your opponents weakest blocker.

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