Episode #112: Ruth N. Nelson

🎙️  Ruth N. Nelson – Pioneer, Innovator, Trailblazer in Women’s Sports 🚀🏐

When you talk about pioneers in women’s athletics, Ruth N. Nelson is on the shortlist. With 557 career wins as a Division I head coach at Houston, LSU, and Iowa—and as a U.S. National coach—Ruth helped shape the aftermath of Title IX and build opportunities for generations of athletes.  

In this episode, Ruth shares stories from coaching legends like Flo Hyman, Rita Crockett, and Rose Magers, to creating innovative programs like BYOP® (Bring Your Own Parent) and the GoKids Youth Sports Certification. She’s an innovator who continues to shape the game at every level, proving that the story of women’s sports is still being written.

Don’t miss this conversation with one of the most passionate, energetic, and visionary leaders in volleyball and beyond.

👉  Learn more about Ruth’s work at Ruthipedia.com, and find more recruiting tools and resources at CoachMattRogers.com. 

Transcript

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Welcome back to The Significant Coaching Podcast. I'm your host, Matt Rogers. First off, let me apologize. I've had a bad cold for the last four days, so my, my voice isn't the best. But I wanna warn you before we get started today. You better buckle up and strap in because we have a special guest today who I believe has more energy than the 6-year-old she works with today. After years of being the head women's volleyball coach at such schools like LSU and the University of Iowa and the University of Houston. I challenge you to keep a notebook of all the great college coach names that she drops in this conversation. She knows everyone and has somehow worked with everyone. When you talk about pioneers in women's athletics, Ruth N. Nelson has to be on the short list. She's not just a coach with 557 career wins. She's an innovator, a builder, and one of the true architects of what women's sports became in the aftermath of Title ix. Ruth spent decades shaping the game at the highest levels as a Division one head coach and as a US Olympic coach. But she didn't stop there. She's still leading today, pouring into the next generation through her BYOP. Bring your own parent program and the Go Kids youth sports certification, where six year olds are learning the fundamentals, not just of volleyball, but of teamwork, confidence, and team play. What I love most about Ruth is that she's never accepted the idea that the story of women's sports is over. She keeps writing new chapters. From coaching the great Flo Hyman and great athletes like Rita Crockett and Rose Majors at Houston, to creating programs that empower kids and parents together, her impact stretches across generations. Thank you to my friend Sue Weber, who has been on the show for introducing us. I'm honored to call them both friends, so today we get to sit down with a true trailblazer, Ruth and Nelson. Coach Nelson, so great to see you, and I'm so honored to have you on the show. It's I told you as before we click record, I have about 10,000 questions for you. I want to pick your brain on everything, but how are you and what's going on this week with you? I can tell you this, that I went. And looked for 15 minutes to make sure I had the best virtual background for you that dealt with name, image, and likeness. And you see the, these are 20, 34 kids. That's sounds so awesome. Doesn't it just break your heart that's what we're talking about right now? What can I say? Because it's funny, is my friend Russ Rose. Who retired early, which I told him he had 10 more years. He says, yeah, but Ruth, you can't compromise. And I said, okay. So Russ was in my badminton class when he was in undergraduate school and I was getting my master's degree and I did my master's thesis on passing and serving in men's volleyball in the Midwest. So it was under Jim Coleman. So it's funny, he says, Ruth, every time I hear you talk about that, your training. Nine year olds, and I know the parents have been interesting to deal with. And then he always asked me, okay, what age are you training now? Because he wanted to know how far that went down, college level parent, high school level parent. So I must admit that. I'm still training and now I'm training more of these same kids that you see behind me. Yeah. That were in my Bring Your own parent program. But now I'm training them in small group training and private training, and they're now 10 and 11 years old when they first started with me at four. Isn't that amazing? That's gotta be a great feeling. It's crazy because I have a couple former players or mentees that I, now they come and help me and they said, Ruth. You have three kids and they're analyzing each other's skills, how is that possible? And I said, you think of this, if you were a player, look back on your playing days. If you could adjust something yourself without one looking over at your parents or two looking over at the coach, but you could change something yourself or even a friend that's on the court. Just think how powerful that is with an eight or 9-year-old. That can tell you the reason why I'm passing the ball at a system or I, or if we wanna do it in a layman's term up in the air and in the middle of the court is because their arms are up not down. An 8-year-old can tell 11 year olds doing that. So you think of how powerful, because everybody talks so much about biomechanics. You don't, you shouldn't be drilling, you should. The game teaches the game. You tell that to a five-year-old. Who can't walk or jump rope or move, and the only thing they think about is swinging their arms. So how's that for a starting? Oh I love it. We're seeing that with 15, 16, 17 year olds that don't understand that and can't figure some of that out. Yep. So it's like a foreign language. The earlier you're teaching that foreign language to somebody, the more it becomes a part of their being. And if we're doing that stuff with skills and we're teaching these kids that it's fun and all the different ways they can get their fingers and their mind into it. I love it a ton. You know the former CEO Doug Beal, who, you know, 84 Olympic coach. Yeah. He once said to me, he said, Ruth, in your, bring your own parent program. Don't you think the kids could potentially get burnout if you're starting them at four and five? And I said, Doug, you've never seen what I do in a training session. So to answer your question, absolutely not. Because when I'm teaching a kid how to side skip. Yeah. Or backpedal, or even we start jumping ropes at age three. Love it. Love. So that's like coordination stuff. And then I said, Doug, think of this. 60% of my parents in bring your own parent program.'cause they're, they have to be on the court with the kid. They're not talking to kids, teaching them. Think of how educated those parents are becoming. He says, are any of those coaches coaching? I said, 60% of my parents end up coaching recreation. So you know what that's gonna do? That's not gonna only just educate them. They're gonna keep those youth coaches. So that they keep learning because they're gonna challenge youth coaches because they've been through the process. Let's jump into that. Let's talk about that.'cause that's a big issue for me. It's a big pet peeve. I live in the Denver area now. Yeah. And we've got clubs with 25, 30 teams. And it's hard for them to find five or six coaches. That can do the job with competence. I'm not talking about technique and knowing how to do rotations. I'm talking about they have experience on working with a group of kids and bringing them together and building a culture and building an ideal, and being able to teach the technique. Where are you at with that, with parent involvement and training? These coaches? We see it in Europe with soccer. They're so good at growing coaches and certifying coaches and getting them there. Is there a path for us here in the states to be more consistent with that, with volleyball? It's interesting. I've been working on a working committee with USA volleyball for the first time. I'm not sure why it took them 25 years to ask me what I thought. Because, yeah. But I'm specializing at 10 and under the 12. So think of this, if 75%, and you'll relate to this, if everybody in the country knows the top 25% of the best athletes every college coach knows the top 25. Who's helping the other 75%. Okay. Exactly. Relate this. 25% of the kids that are 10 and under are big and strong. They're playing club, right? But who's helping the other 75%? So what my specialty in the last 25 years, there's some people said, oh, I've been coaching for 39 years, and I said. I've been coaching for 56 and 25 of'em are at 10 and under. And Andy Bcast, UCLA, all time 1000 went said to me in 2003 here in Dallas, he goes, Ruth, how do you deal with those young kids? How can you do that? And I said, everybody has what Simone Biles says, a superpower. So you must find your superpower. So if that superpower for me is one energy. Innovation, creativity, and all those things involve looking at the big picture. Now, a lot of people say Ruth, can you really see the narrow? I said, yes. Are you asking me can I be focused? Yes, I can. But it's not as much fun is looking out what potentially can happen. So in 25 years, think of it this way. I started in Dallas in 1995. I'd already been here because I coached professional major league volleyball, which now uses our name from way back. But 95, there was two or three clubs, maybe five facilities, 175 clubs now in 57 facilities from 95 to now. Okay, so now who really is. Doing the youth side of it, there's maybe one or two clubs in this area that really expel on that. But why is it that more clubs are not retaining or attracting the 10 and under group? Because it takes a lot of energy and it's not everybody's gifted at that age group. It's, I started a program with Bring your own parent. Because I started that in 2013. Trademark it for all youth sports, not just volleyball. I haven't done anything but volleyball. Indoor and some a little bit in beach. But I trademarked it and I said, why wouldn't the parents? Because how much time do parents really spend with kids? Do they spend one hour every week quality where the kids in control? Probably not. No, unless the kid says, Hey mom, come over Anna, I'm doing a game, but I wanna start the game and I'm gonna tell you the rules. That doesn't last very long. So I started that and then what happened was is a lot of people said, Ruth, why can't I just drop my kids off? I said, you can, but not in my program because it's bring your own parent. And so then I got to thinking and everybody says, Ruth, we wanna learn more about what you're doing at 10 and under. So I started Go kids. Go Kids is a separate certification to certify people for 10 and under. And I got on this project Go Kids where I'm going to certify a hundred coaches by 2030 and I've had 45 now in the last 18 months I just certified 20 in Nebraska with one club. I certified seven in Connecticut with one club. And then I've done the rest in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. But the idea for me is. That I developed a curriculum, which is I try anything that I put into effect, I test with the program. I do. Okay. So I test like one of the biggest things that happen that help is bring a friend night. Okay? You okay? You know what happens? These kids don't bring the best kids of their friends. They bring the kids who don't know anything about volleyball, so they look great. So I bought that. Then I did skills contests. I added that. Then I've added all different things. I tried, I test, I tried four weeks. I tried 10 weeks. I tried 12 weeks because my background is teaching. I graduated from University of Northern Colorado up in Greeley and there, during that time you were taught all sports how to officiate. Oh, modern dance. Everything. You had to do swimming. You had to do all sports. You had to do, I had. Almost graduate level courses in psychology. So we were all educated during that period of time in the seventies with everything, right? So when you start talking about 10 and under, you're not talking about just the kids. Probably the majority really can't jump rope. It's I can tell you funny as the girl, the little girl in the yellow, her mom sent me a video. She goes, Ruth. My daughter wanted you to see the video because she can now jump 10 times. And she said, and my daughter thought it was just like winning a gold medal because she could jump 10 times. So you think of all the things we could be teaching that used to be taught in elementary school. Okay. Now in elementary school, they have 80 and a hundred kids. How do you teach anything? So right during this whole time I'm thinking. What can we do to really emphasize? So I developed two online courses with Art of Coaching, and the one course was done during COVID, but I had already started it before. And somebody says Ruth, what is it? And I said, what do all elementary school teachers want? They want to have to go to one place and get all the information. So I developed an online training course called RN in Sports Gym, and it's in just like Google Classroom and Ready is free. Set goal is a paid subscription, but it has to do with the video of the history of the sport. It has to do with some of the, but there's two elements in training any age, and that's the physical elements of performance, which you would consider, jumping, roll, hand-eye coordination, movement skills. Yeah. All those things that you need in order to perform in any sport. Not just volleyball, but any sport. Then the other one is the fundamental skills of volleyball. So I match those together and then put together that home training program. And the kids, it's kid friendly. You go in and all the questions are age appropriate. So they watch a video, they answer some questions, and then they go do the video. And. You print the pages, you put'em on the wall, and the kid keeps track of what they're doing on a daily basis. This is the thing that you have to do to train 10 and under kids. You can't just say how? How do we get that in the hands of every physical education teacher in the country? How do we get them to say. We've got these videos, we're gonna watch it with the kids. We're gonna do pe You know I still don't understand why PE has become one of those things we do every other day or every other week, or we do it once a month. That drives me crazy. But how do we get that?'cause I'm worried about, my biggest concern is not what you're doing. You're doing exactly what should be doing. But how do we clone Ruth Nelson? There's only you, there's only so many hours in the day for you and there's only so many kids you can train. So how do we get our physical education teachers and our principals and our superintendents to take a look at this and go, boy, this is great. This is, maybe this is the first three months of school every year. Nobody has a mailing list of elementary school PE teachers. Yeah, you have a mailing list of high school. Yeah. But you don't have it of elementary schools. And it's interesting is, this is a question to ask me. Where do, so that's why I start certifying coaches.'Cause by and large, everybody thinks you can go play two B, two three B three, four B you. You've gotta learn some movement skills and you've gotta have some success. Okay, so if I look at, Matt, if you think about this, success means something very different to everybody. Success in most cases in junior clubs means Winnie. Most of all winning at the national championship. Okay. But to me, success means if this kid now can jump 20 jumps. I got a kid now who's going triple under. That's her goal by December. She's 11 years old. I got my tens and nines that are doing double unders now. So it's a challenge of giving them something that they potentially could do themselves without relying on somebody else checking on them. So it's almost like one, how to get people motivated. Okay. Why did the coach in Nebraska where we, Nebraska fans are unbelievable. She certified 20 coaches. Four in Montana and 16 in Nebraska because they needed a system and she believed in the same thing.'cause she's a physical educator. She believed in the same thing I did. And that is, you have to have movement skills. You do when you, okay. When people think of high school kids, I don't think they would go to movement skills as the first thing they would think. They would think passing or serving, right? Yes. Those fundamental skills that are needed, we know that. But if you really think about it, what happens when you watch a college match? I'm wondering, I see a six foot six player and somebody says, Ruth, what do you think? And I said, oh my God, they're, they can hit it a hammer, but why don't they jump? They go they don't have to. I go, Phil Hyman jumped 28 inches. She's the best player in the world. I never had a player at University of Houston that jumped less than 28 inches. Nobody less than 28 inches. That is crazy. But they never started there. One of my guests, one of my 28 inch jumpers, started at 13. She ran, now listen to this. She ran, she's probably, she'll listen, I'm gonna forward this to her. She'll know I'm talking about it, but I don't say her name. She ran a mile in 15 minutes, ran, okay, we know I've got other players at sub six, right? So when you really think about it. Why is it that when people get to the collegiate level, and this is what's been, and it's not like I've not been at the collegiate level at the very top level and had some of the best athletes in the world. You have. So you do have time to train, but yeah, the key is this, are the players willing to make a change? Yeah. And you think of this in high school because I spend most of my time. Trying to figure out what the coach that they have is teaching them. And then I try to find other things that the coach isn't teaching, and then I try to help them make what the other coach is teaching more efficient. Because what does the young coach usually do in, they're training someone. They go that's not correct. Your high school coach isn't teaching you, correct? No, that's not correct. With your club. You can't do that. Because everybody comes from a different, okay. It's like someone says Ruth, I've been coaching for 10 years. I said I spent 10 years with Ari. Can you compare the 10 years, your 10 years with my 10 years? Can you compare? The fact is that I trained with probably six of the best coaches in the world. It doesn't mean that I do everything that they did, but I test it. Okay? Like I test. Ari and I, former, Olympic gold, silver medalist and coached three teams to the Olympic level. A lot of people in this country have forgotten about it, but he's the reason why the women won the silver medal in 1984, right?'cause he started in 75 and we trained full-time 24 7 till the 84 Olympic Games. And a lot of people don't understand we'll talk about parallel feet. I used to tell him, you know what? I think parallel feet might be better at five. And he goes. Why is that? And I said, because they step with the right and they're, then they're balanced. And he said, I never thought of that. And so I did that for a little bit. Then I thought, no, I got a line there. So I'll keep'em on the line so they can have one foot a little bit further in front of the other and then, but I'll have them switch up. But I think it's things that you test. It's for instance, the other day, three of the players who are comparing each other and correcting, and I said, you're not coaching them, you are telling them what you're seeing. The ball is going up. You said let the ball come down. We practice catch the ball lower than your knees and that puts your hands in the right position for passing. And I said, you know what I'm gonna do? I take a box, I put it in, left back, I put the player behind the box. Two of the people that helped me, they go, Ruth, I've never seen you do this. And I said I said, you they told each other what they need to do. I tell'em what to do and they still play the ball up high. I said, I've gotta come up with something different. So I threw the ball. It bounced off the top of the box. It pushed it toward them. They had to wait for the ball to come down in order to pass it forward. But the first time they passed it, they went up. I said, okay. You figure out how you're gonna get it forward. But that bounce made them move their feet, let the ball come down, and then they saw they could pass it forward even though they were passing on the left side of their body. So with little kids, I always do midline, and then as they get better. I'll let them go outside their body. But if I told a five-year-old that they could play the ball out here, you know how much swinging they would be doing and they wouldn't moving their feet. Yeah. So that's, you're right. It's amazing what their brain can process. Yep. But how we start that processing and what we give them to begin with can change. Change how they get there and how quickly they get there. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. It's interesting. Most people think I'm very rigid and I'm drill. I'm a game situation person, i'm now hearing people say, oh, we're playing six on six, but we're doing game related things. I've been doing game situation drill since 1970, so it's not like it's nothing new. Yeah. But I do a drill that. Helps them focus and like for instance, I came up with a finally A 10 U competition ball and the reason why is because the 12 U is very difficult for the little ones to set. Yeah. Alright. So I have the soft light, which is for 10 and under, but there needed to be a ball that was for competition that was a little bit heavier, but was a little bit lighter because I'm dealing with the 75% of the kids aren't big and strong. Not the 25%. So a lot of people, they don't like to buy extra balls, but yet if we care about the kids, and one of my mentors, he was in a training session and he has a 6-year-old and he brought one of the soft light balls. Yeah. And it was sitting over there and it, of course it's blue in an orange. And kid said, can I try that? He goes, absolutely. He took it and, and he says, coach David, this doesn't hurt. Okay. If it hurts, I'm not playing anymore. Or That's right. Or my mom said I'm playing, or my dad said I'm playing, but when I pass, I'm gonna what? Bend my arms because it hurts. It hurts. So when that 10 U Ball came out, which we came out in December, the most important thing was is if you're in any other country besides the United States, you're not teaching setting until probably 13. Kids could get bigger and stronger. You pass, you see the Asian passing passing. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm not someone that says I criticize other countries for what they do. I don't. I say, you know what? Maybe that works in their country and it might not work here. If it doesn't work here, then we have to adapt something. I don't say I don't criticize it because they've been successful, so when you do that with the 10 U Ball. What it does is now I can take a kid and I had them, I threw up some of'em in the bag and stuff, and someone grabbed that ball and said, coach Ruth, I can set it instead of deep dishing it because I said, watch beach volleyball when they deep dish. But then what happens is the referees don't call it. So now I'm doing this all the way through twelves. Thirteens 14. Yeah. All of a sudden now they're saying, no, you can't do that. You can splat it now and you can do whatever you wanna do with it now. And they don't call it, but they're not gonna call that. So I said I'm helping coaches at twelves, elevens, and tens to start understanding to use a 10 U ball. Yeah. Because it's only right. You have to modify some aspects of your training with different tools that make sense. Not just come up with something because someone says, Ruth, all of a sudden you're coming up with, puffers now where you can serve for float and all that. I said, do you think these kids at this age, gen Z kids, want you to tell'em more than twice? No. They want to get better, but they don't wanna hear it five, six times. So if I can come up with something that will allow them to see the feedback, if it goes over the net and it doesn't move. I did a good floater. I didn't tell'em. They know it now. That's awesome. If I jump and hit and I hit it through the net, it means I didn't reach right? So if you can, and see, everyone thinks it's so easy to train 10 and under, and it's only easy if you understand that you can't do what you do in high school. At a level of that, the progression goes and everybody says, oh, Ruth progressions is old school. I go, old school methods become new school ideas. And I said, by and large, you progress from something simple to something that's more difficult. And you have to do that at even the younger age. And most people get really bored at the younger age because they wanna do more advanced things. The way you advance'em, there's two ways to advance. One, you advance skill or you advance knowledge and all of a sudden everybody had to come up with a new name. Okay, now we got iq, right? I still not understand. Do they order a set of pins or do they order a set of antennas? But anyhow, so coming up with something so I can now work. So I had a kid yesterday, 10 years old, she's a gal that's up in the orange. She started when she was four. Couldn't jump one jump. We were setting because she's gonna be on the setting team, she's playing up and I said, catch it first because we do 10 and under. We catch and set right because I wanna catch in the right spot and use their legs and arms because they're not love that strong for a long time. So love that now. So she's setting, and I said, okay, go ahead, catch it and push it up. All right. Good. All right. Now, did you notice how the ball went up and came down? She said yes. How does that outside hitter, that's 10 years old, get all the way over to you and hit that ball? She goes it doesn't. And I said, okay, then how do you need to do it? She goes, I need to use my legs. Oh. I says, okay, could you repeat that again? So all you know, so she uses her legs, but it still goes up. I said, okay, now what do I need to do? Throw the ball or kick a ball like you do in soccer. I relate it.'cause these kids all do all kinds of sports. She goes. Coach Ruth. I see. Now I need to lean and I push it up. Yep. All right. So she was her own mechanic. Yep. And you know what, if love it, if that is what Ruth Nelson does, it's okay with me because Ruth Nelson's gonna continue to do it. Look let me ask you this.'cause somebody asked me years ago, they asked me what, when was I at my peak? I was a college basketball player. They said, when did you know you were really good? And I go, I don't know if I was ever really good at basketball, but I was at my best when I was about 24, 25 years old. And they go, really? And I go, yeah. It was about three years after I stopped playing and I was coaching Uhhuh that I started to see the game differently. I started to understand the game. I started to understand all those things my coaches were trying to tell me. I've now been outta college coaching for 12 years. You've been out for a little bit longer. If I put you back at LSU, if I put you back at LSU today, what would you do differently from day one? Let me tell you what, when I coached in the pros I had, you remember John Ralston football? Yes. Yes. Gary Carroll and him. They are the ones that started the Canadian Football League. Gary Carroll was my general manager. Okay. John Roston was a league and Banovich was the owner after I got fired from LSU. The ad said you just need to coach the national team. I go, okay, I wasn't good enough to coach here, but I'll go to the national team. Okay, so I go, they fly me to Dallas to interview first question Ro Roston, and Carol asked me, why'd you get fired at LSU? Just like bam. To the board. Yeah. Yeah. I gave, that's about right. A very simple answer. And they said, okay, you're hired. You can go back to Baton Rouge Pack and come back. Alright. So I said then, okay, what are the things. I think I need to change. Okay. Okay. I'm coaching the pros. 29 players. I never had done three person drill ever. Ever. Never. Because you always had two person drills. That's everybody in the whole world. Yeah. I had to do three person drills and I had three players from LSU and they go, coach Ruth, how come we didn't never do these at LSU? How come we didn't even do that? And I just thought, look at a lot of these angles and stuff. Make sense? Why didn't we do jump serving when we had won the national championship and club? Mary Joan, we jumped and served, but we never did it in competition. So there's lots of things we did. We swung block in this early seventies and we quit doing it. There's so many things. Everything that's coming out we've already done, that's what I was, so LSU. So I get hired in Gary Carroll. He said to me, Ruth, and he changed my life, and that's why I went back and coached at Iowa. Otherwise, I probably wouldn't have ever. I told one of my colleagues, I said, I'm never gonna coach ever again after I got fired from LSU. I don't care. I don't, no. I was done. I was done. Yeah. Gary said to me, he said, practice is where you do everything you need to do, and when it comes game time, you are a cheerleader. That's what he said. I changed my whole coaching style, my entire coaching approach, everything. Yeah. Then I went to Iowa and I took the job and I wasn't the first, there was somebody else that was offered the job, that had a lot less experience than me. I was second choice. Now I'm almost like, okay, I've been in the, top final four, twice I've been on the national team, three stars on the Olympic team. I'm going back in my head with Ari, with Jim Pullman. And I'm being picked second, so that's humbling. It is. I think everybody in their life should be fired one time because you have to readjust everything about what you think about everything. So I went to Iowa. I agree. I went to Iowa and I had, one of my assistant coaches was one of my former players that played for me at LSU. I said, okay. I just want you to know, I've been in the pros now and I'm, I do things completely different. And everybody at Iowa on the score benches, they would argue to who could sit next to me because they said they were entertained.'cause that was a complete different man. I was a cheerleader. And even when I played Steph Schluter from Minnesota, who developed the Minnesota program by the way, and developed the Alabama program. I'd say I'd do like this, to tell her she needed to sub the person out. We had fun. We, that's great. Were competitive in that. And you know what, I now see how important that is. And when I came back and started mentoring coaches, I said, you gotta quit breaking that clipboard. You just can't do that. And this is before Gen Z. You're talking, nineties, early nineties. I think that what happens if you had the question is how do you mold yourself and still be open? And most people think I'm not open about ideas. Oh, yes I am. I'm open about ideas, but you're not gonna convince me on a 5-year-old what they can do. You're not gonna convince me. Okay. You got a kid in college and they're goofy footed, they're jumping 28 inches. Do you change'em? You think in your mind? First thing I think is it biomechanically sound? Is it anatomically correct? Does it make sense? If it does, then probably you need to do it like, but everybody always says they got no time to change. But what happens if you're teaching this? I've never in Rose Majors who started for the 84 Olympic team, played three years at Houston as a setter, transferred to LSU, played her last year, went to the national team, and two years on the national team and at the Olympics, she was the best blocker. She could play right side, she'd play middle, she'd play left, she could set, and she played defense. She wasn't taken out. So we talk about this all the time, about what is it that really should be doing? Why is it that basketball, and this is a big thing I've been watching since you think of Kaitlyn Clark and Barbie. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I started watching then because of Kim Mulkey and Staley, because it's obvious they don't like each other. But when it comes to supporting basketball, they do everything to make sure women's basketball gets what they have. Yep. I look at Terry Petit started in Nebraska, but before him, pat Sullivan. Then John Cook came on, they did the event on the football. That wasn't the first one that was done. There was others done in the seventies, but that's okay. 90 some thousand people. Why isn't all the volleyball coaches just completely flooding and supporting? More about the sport because the sport is at a level. You look at, I give a friend of mine, he, Nike is their sponsor, and I said, when are you gonna start dressing up and coaching? He goes Nike's my sponsor and they tell me what to wear. I go, oh, they wouldn't tell me what to wear. Nope, me neither. No. See in. In reality, COVID caused that professionalism in all sports to drop. And volley volleyball because the beach, it's always had that flavor. I listened to somebody the other day, the coach at Arizona State, he was in this and he says, Hey, I'm in club. I'm doing khakis. I'm doing a nice polo shirt. I'm not gonna wear my flip flops. Somebody, when you think of this role models, where do we look for our role models? On podcasts? On tv. Tv, yeah. And our president. Okay. So you have to decide. I, my first role model was Coach Tom Landry, 1972. He was my role model. Pretty good one. Classy. Yep. Christian. Good. Supportive. Yes, of course. That means that you're good too, because you got a hat, not just like his, but all those things. In 1972, he was my role model. Now, Billy Jean King was,'cause I played tennis, but yeah, other role models. And I followed him all the way through of the values. And dressing up and all this. It's like some of the people in the stand says, Ruth, we just come to see what you're gonna wear. And I'm thinking of Kim Mokey, yeah. Now I did it for a different reason. Kim was doing it to support someone who makes her clothes. But to me, you have to have, you have to decide what your role model's so coach to Landry, he was my role model. Okay. Then I told you I'd got in business with him and his son. I walked in the office all the time. We're in the telecom business. We're the official telecom communication system of the Nike World Masters games. Okay. They were never in prepaid phone cards before, but I have a whole complete, I have over a thousand cards autographed by Coach Tom Landry from the prepaid phone card business.'cause I went into that after I got out of coaching in special and also with Special Olympics. And so I walked in and I go Coach Landry. He go, yes, coach. How many cards are we gonna sign today? He signed all of his fricking autographs. Nobody signed for him. He signed everything all those years. So he always would ask me, okay, how many are we gonna sign today? I says, no, I gotta important question. I really would like to know. And I said, I want you to know you're my first role model. I followed you since 1972. This is, and I said, I'm not so much a Dallas Cowboys fan now, yeah. But what is it that was the most beneficial thing that happened to you in your coaching career that made an effect on the outcome of you as a coach or your players? He says, when I was a coach player for New York, and I can make all the decisions. Right Then think of that. Yeah. Here's a statement. Daniel Scott, five time Olympian in my junior program in Baton Rouge. She says, just because I've played five Olympic games does not mean I know how to teach all the skills and know all the knowledge about coaching. And I said, but you have one thing that many coaches will never have, and that is you experienced playing at a high level, right? When you coach, it's, I always say, you've got trainers and you've got game coaches. There aren't a lot of game trainers that are, that do both really well. And I think when you really think about how do you know at certain decisions to make certain decisions, a player that played that level learned that. A coach, it takes'em five to 10 years to do it by trial and error, right?'cause Jody Conrad, one of the most successful basketball coaches at Texas, she also coached volleyball. She always said, Ruth, tell me this. How long do you think it will take to get in the final four? I said, if you have all the things that are necessary now, this is in the seventies, right before NCA took over volleyball in 1981. I said, I think it takes you 10 years. That's if you're exposing yourself to good competition, you get the recruits and all of those things, right? So my question always is, if you've never been there, then you need to get around somebody who's been there, because you need to learn what they learned when they moved into that arena. Because so many players now are coaching college, but they've never coached. They've only played and their coaching style will probably more than likely be an extension of who's coached them. Agreed. So if you have somebody like Ari, who is a, innovator that a teaching or myself, you are gonna think about skills and fundamentals and how that makes you much more effective. So think of it this way, Matt. We're gonna play cross court pepper, which a lot of colleges do. Left back to, left back. You might put a setter in, you might put one hitter in. I'm gonna play cross court pep. What if I can't even get it to you because my feet aren't, is are like this instead of like this. So what makes people think that you shouldn't be teaching some type of body mechanics to at least initiate something so you don't get injured? Yeah. How long does a baseball player's arm last when they start going way outside? Not long. Now that's not saying that once in a while you might have to be. Now, if I'm on a run and I do it, I might take a little bit more, a little less pressure off my shoulder. Yeah. But I think that what happens is when you think of the sport of anything, if if you ask Brian, Jim Aero 15 years ago, he says, 60% of my freshmen coming in were seriously injured before they even got to my college. That was 15 years ago. So if a kid's come in and they're already, you look at this. Why is it that, that so many of the women's top basketball players are injured this season? Yep. Every one of them. Yep. Why? They changed the schedule for tv. They play twice. They travel, so you think of this, okay, you come in August, if you come in further now you gotta come in. Now you gotta come in more to be a no. Why don't you just move the competition later? Yeah. Why you need to, and then, you've got off season, then you've got summer. Who's monitoring those people? So if someone thinks I gotta go get in the gym and I gotta get more what happens? Your body might need rest with your arm, but you can do stuff with your feet and everything, right? There's, I looked, I remember when they first started allowing returning service with their hands. I counted at a facility, which was the largest facility in Dallas. 12 courts was built by my friend. Castro kept his dad,'cause his dad was a doctor and he let him and his mom come to the country. He built a$42 million facility in Dallas. It was Eastern European. Wasn't great for volleyball'cause it was noisy, but basketball did their Adidas main event there. And we always talked about this is what is it that you need to be doing so that you can eliminate the injuries? Okay, so everybody's gonna return service. I counted in 16 months, 32 wrist hand. Fingers. Fingers. Yeah. So you're not thinking about, and why would I think that I need six subs at junior club level to just to play on the national team. But how many people are gonna ever play the national team? I can tell you I was fortunate because I had Flo, Rita, rose, Cheryl, I had some great player, but they also left, they didn't come back to college. They left and they just. Stayed on the national team. Oh, would I loved to have had those four together when we had beaten UCLA the year before and finished third, yep. Yeah. So I just think the injury, the overuse, and for people to think, I can tell you this, some of the kids that I train once a week, and I do it based on what they're doing. If they're doing a lot of jumping this week in jump setting, then I keep'em down. Have they practiced their left hand for hitting, maybe they gotta work a little bit on, on defense, but what happens is. That kid is practicing twice a week in club right now, and they're in high school. So why aren't we as parents? They're afraid to get behind. But if one in every 100 get a scholarship, you know this with your recruiting service. Yeah, that's, I put this up behind me because this is what people are really I put, I made this, think of this 15 years ago. These, all these four year olds. Yeah. And I was already thinking already before name, image, and likeness because my background is marketing. Yeah. And it's like anything else. And somebody says, Ruth, what do you think kids should be doing right now?'cause all these, eight, 9-year-old parents are asking me I said, I'm gonna tell you this. I know a ninth grader in Louisiana. That has 50,000 followers on Instagram and all she does is do nail penny, 15,000 followers. 50,009. Yeah, she's in high school. She's a follow, oh my gosh. She does makeup and all that kind. It's so to answer that, if you wanna monitor, okay. I have coming on my show on Wednesday, Rita Crockett's daughter, Marita, her daughter. She just came from New York style show. She's six years old. That's great. I think there's something if you allow a kid to explore. Yeah. And I would say the majority kids you see there, they did, most of'em did gymnastics sometime soccer, basketball, got one's doing softball and then volleyball. My first group of BYOP players of the eight six were cheerleaders. They practice three times a week and they were all eight years old. Cheerleaders. Love it. Six times a week. That's right up your alley. Oh my God. I don't want, you know what, lemme just tell you this. I have, somebody said, Ruth, what would you do if you had my daughter? And I said, I have her once a week. That's enough. No, because it's like. There's a difference, and I'll say this, there's a difference between being a parent and a friend. And I think right now, even with coaches and parents, there's gotta be something that has some kind of line. Because one parent said to me I won't say one parent. Oh, I have a lot of parents say, Ruth, my kid is so much better at home of doing chores and doing the things I say, since they've been in your BYOP program. And I said you know what? If you would do more at home, I wouldn't have to do as much, but no, exactly. It's, and you know what you think of this, Matt? It's not easy. To say the same thing or reinforce structure. Yeah. See everybody, even if you ask players, and I always, I mentor quite a few high school coaches and I said, you know what? There's certain things you're not gonna compromise. Like Russ said, I'm not gonna compromise on certain things. But if there's certain things that if they're late to practice or that tell'em they gotta come up with the rules. Yeah, they come up with the rules now guess what? They gotta reinforce'em, not me. So everybody wants some type of guidelines, but nobody wants to be the bad guy. Yeah. I love it. And it's you, if I go back and coach again, you've got my brain working in so many different ways today. It's gosh, why did I do that 25 years ago? All right. I could talk to you about this all day. I want to talk about one more thing in this segment, and then I want to get into recruiting with you because you are dealing with these little ones. You have seen what they've become. Yeah. 12, 15 years later. So I want to get into that in the next segment. But I would beat myself up if I didn't ask. You better ask this question. Yes. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna shape it very personally. Okay. I remember growing up, I grew up in the seventies and eighties, Uhhuh, and I remember just being enamored with the Olympics. The 84 Olympics were my wake up call to sports and what I could be and the role models that came out of that 84 Olympics were just. Amazing. I remember how important Jackie Joyner, EY Cheryl Miller and Flo Hyman were to my young brain. Because I was seeing my, my, my sister was a college basketball player. My, all my brothers and sisters were athletes, Uhhuh. But to see what they were doing and the, not just the athleticism, but the composure and how they handled themselves it shaped me. Maybe more than anything else that summer Uhhuh, talk a little bit about Flo and what that generation of athletes did and what she meant to you and what she meant to the community down there. I think everyone has to realize that things happen for a reason. Yeah. I am always, God has a plan. Agreed. And I always say, my sister says you know he has a plan. I said, yeah, but I need to be on his A-list. She goes he might be on his A-list, but he doesn't say, think the same thing you do. So my plan is this, my undergraduate degree.'cause it all started there. I had a supervising teacher in DA of Dallas, sorry, in Denver and. Her name was Virginia Mc Crimin and she was black and she taught me so much about, I come from a small town that they didn't keep black people in our town nor Hispanics. They went to the town next door to it not, and my mom always said, doesn't matter race, religion, pre you treat everybody the same. That's right. So I learned from her and she made one statement to me one time. She says, when you're, when you are playing with your dolls, we're outside running. We're outside playing games. And it was like, is that because she thought we could afford dolls and they couldn't? I never quite really understood that, but I knew that the opportunities for the black. We're not there, right? So when I went to George Williams, I had three or four black athletes on there. I learned a little bit more when I got to Houston. Flo was recruited to EPU with Mary Jo and Maryland 64 and 68 Olympians, and I was recruited from D and Chicago because to come down to set, and Flo was 17 years old, and Marilyn actually was her guardian because you had to, 17, you gotta have somebody. And we were playing together on the same team, the EPLs Unum. We became the USA national team in Pasadena, and Pat Zortman was our coach and we double dated. Harold and I, we double dated and went everywhere and Flo and I would sneak in the movies and bring our McDonald's hamburger and french fries and everybody behind us would say somebody's been to McDonald's. So we were friends and we, I taught her how to water ski. She almost killed me in surfing in Hawaii. And then I became the coach at Houston by name, whereas my first year I couldn't because of the amateur rules. They couldn't pay me and name me because I was still playing on the national team. That's when Ari came in 1975 to Pasadena, Texas, which a lot of people didn't realize. That's the first full-time training center for volleyball. Really. Then the next year was the men in Ohio, but the women, yes, mayor Harrison in Pasadena and Billy Fi, they and Al Stokes Volkswagen, they all put together. We got apartments and everything. So now I'm coaching. I'm playing. So we train four hours and we did it and I, it Flo and I say, Flo, what do you think about going back to college? Alright, so she goes and she goes back to college, she's in my classes and all that. And so we came that kind of, so it's not just she was a player of mine. She was a friend. And then she would, when she would get mad at me in training at Houston, she'd go, okay, Ms. Nelson, what's next? I could just, it's okay. So then the national team, I was assistant coach National, he moved to Colorado. I decided to stay at Houston and work full time. Okay, so now she goes to California, Colorado, back and forth, national team, Ari's training. These we're, we're doing seven days a week training. Ari. It's too bad. Most people have never read his book because he was the biggest, okay. Val Keller was first, then Jim Coleman's system, and then Ari took part of that. And then I took a part of all three of their system and Mopar and I did my own offensive system. But Flo, she would always say, oh, I can't see. Da, can you come? And so I would fly to Colorado Springs, we would work out. That was part of my speech. I'd run outside in the snow and my feet were frozen. That's a true story. I didn't make that up. We'd come back in and I'd get balls at her in the racquetball court. So back to the barracks. And shower. And then we'd be at breakfast. We never told anybody because she wanted to be an all around player, but she did not want Ari to know she was working on it. Okay. So then what happens is she goes. California, she ends up passing away. In 1986, we had, we were starting Louisiana Volleyball Club, which is a nonprofit to help low income minority athletes. She passes away right away Marvin Syndrome. They find it's, Marvin Syndrome. So the Marvin Foundation start that. She's on the front cover of Sports Illustrated. All of a sudden Maren Syndrome is now famous all over the world because of Paul Hyman. In Japan. They were on every billboard. They had songs, they had everything on the, so then I said to myself, I'm not letting Flo Hyman's name not keep on everybody's head. So I've continued her website, all her social media, since 1986, and I said, it's so fantastic. It's important. Think of this, if you play tennis, Billy Jen King, Arthur Ashe? Yeah. Why don't you know Phil Hyman? Why don't you, I mean you, why don't you know the 64 and 68? Okay. Yeah. But because the women won the first several, if the women won gold in 84, I think things would've changed. I agree. Yeah. Because all the emphasis, in this country, in, in Texas, you know that too. It's a man's world. Seriously, all my mentors are men. Yeah. Except Eunice Kennedy Shriver was my mentor too. Pretty good one. So she gets inducted? Yeah. Okay. Your friend Sue, I call her, I said, you wanna, you know that I need someone who's gonna carry on her legacy. She goes, oh my God, Ruth. Yes. I wanna be there. So to think of this, out of 210 athletes that have been selected for the United States Paralympic Committee Hall of Fame, there are only four. Cart was first, then misty, so we now we got two beach, but indoor, then Carrie and Flo, now four out of 210. Okay. Now what can be the difference between volleyball and other sports? I sat there and I looked okay. Serena was being inducted. Gabby Douglas is being inducted. Alex Flex, Anita de France, who is the most influential woman in this country in women's sports. The first vice president of the UIOC, and now her mentor is now the president from Africa. She was a swimmer at Auburn. So all of this red carpet thing. I'm not an in, in, in front person. I'm a behind the scenes, i, you notice I don't put so much of my pictures. You see all my emojis online. That's my way of saying, okay, that's me, but you're not gonna get me And to go there, I did. I didn't feel comfortable at all. Yeah. Because I wasn't the Olympian. But I had a chance to expose Flo Hyman to the world. The guy from the Washington Post wrote the article and he says, Ruth, we've never, he says, I'm shocked we had this much exposure for the article about flow, because, now women's sports is becoming more popular. It's like anything else who should be supporting those pioneers Starts from the top down. Yeah, it does. And if it's not being done. Guess what you have the responsibility of as a person, a coach, a leader, a recruiter, all of that. You have the responsibility to start telling about the history. And the history is this swing blocking just didn't come into effect. I gotta tell you one quick story. A friend of mine coaching Gen Z's doing this, he's gonna get ready, he's watching his match and he's pretty vocal and I've been mentoring him for quite a few years. And kid comes to the front court. Okay, so she goes in, okay, gets ready to go back to serving. She comes to the attack line, says, coach, I'm coming out. He goes, what do you mean you're coming out? I don't play back court. He says, okay, because he didn't know what to say and he said to me, Ruth, what would you have said? I go, you're gonna be playing front court and back court on the bench from now on. You think you listen to Tara Rossi's? What? What Gino did to her when she was a freshman boy? Yeah. Hey. No, I mean you, you have to be careful, but my point is Flo Hyman read a Crockett is the highest jumper in the World at 42 inches. Don't forget that. People don't realize just because outta sight outta mind. Now she started to read a Crockett Sports Beach Academy. She doing all sports now. She's in a brook major. She has her own facility. She's the first Olympic player to pay for it with her own money. Indoor volleyball facility, three courts in Huntsville, Alabama. But anyhow, history, I, great. I love the history because you know what? Me too. How do you know where you're going? Unless you know where you started? That's right. And too much of our history is being forgotten and too much of it is being ignored and too much of it is being brushed under the rug. And I will always promote it. I want more of you no matter what you say. I want more of you and I'm gonna have more of you if you'll have me. Yeah. Thank you for doing this. You're welcome. Can't wait to talk about recruiting with you because you're really being a big part of raising these young people. You're doing a great job of certifying coaches and certifying parents to keep this this sport we love. And sports in general, we love growing. So thanks for doing this. They can't wait to have everybody come back and listen to your thoughts on recruiting in a bit. Thank you and it's my pleasure because Sue speaks so highly of you. I love you both I can't have enough of you and Sue, and I'm so thankful you did this. But we'll be back in a little bit and we'll talk some more. All. What a great conversation Ruth Nelson has lived at the intersection of history and innovation from the earliest days of Title IX to coaching legends at Houston, LSU, and Iowa to pioneering new ways for kids and parents to learn the game together. Her story reminds us of why we play the game and why we love these games so much. She has motivated me to keep feeding my passion for coaching, leading, and mentoring. She's a role model for all of us coaches. I. If you're a coach, a parent, or anyone who cares about the future of athletics, I hope Ruth's passion and persistence inspired you as much as it did me. She's proof that one person's vision can influence generations. As always, you can find more conversations like this along with resources for your coaching and recruiting journey@coachmattrogers.com. Until next time, stay focused, stay humble, and keep chasing significance.