By MARIO AGUIRRE | STAFF WRITER
Paula Gonzalez remembers a time when volleyball wasn’t offered as a high school sport, when matches were best out of three and the score went up to 15, and when the libero was only permitted to play defense.
As volleyball enters its 50th year as a UIL sanctioned sport, Gonzalez, currently the athletic director for McAllen ISD, marveled at the evolution of the sport, what it has meant to the Valley and how girls have benefitted from it.
“The techniques and styles have evolved,” said Gonzalez, who coached for 27 years at Brownsville Pace until 2006. “If I had to go back and coach now, I’d have to prepare because of how things systems change. We pick up new techniques, new offenses, new defenses. That’s how the game has evolved. The competition has evolved.”
Without divulging her age, Gonzalez said there was a time when Harlingen High, her alma mater, did not offer volleyball. By the time she enrolled at the University of Texas, however, a friend made her away of the newly introduced sport there.
Naturally, she was curious. During her time at Harlingen, sports were mostly geared to boys. Tennis, she said, was their best offering for girls.
When Congress passed Title IX in 1972, things changed. It prohibited discrimination, on the basis of sex, in any federally funded education program or activity.
“It’s not that you had to have identical programs, but when you provided opportunities for male sports, you were required to do the same for female sports,” Gonzalez said. “If you had any type of funding for boys, you had to provide the same for the girl sports.
“That was huge. And look where we are now.”
Becky Woods, the longtime coach at Los Fresnos, went through a similarly transformative time. Her high school in Iowa offered volleyball for her senior season in 1979. She played one year before going onto college, where she competed in basketball, field hockey and softball.
Looking for a job upon graduation, Woods found an opportunity in Los Fresnos. The school had a vacant teaching position and volleyball opening. She agreed to do both in 1985, and has held both posts ever since.
At the time, Woods estimates 1/3 of the Valley schools did not offer volleyball. Even then, several programs fielded three teams, not five (including two freshmen, two JV and one varsity). Gradually, the sport evolved.
Rally scoring took effect, and serves were permitted to touch the net.
By the 1990s, Valley teams started competing at the regional level more consistently, and around the early 2000s, club teams began sprouting across the Valley.
“Going to the 6A tournament used to be a really tough situation,” Gonzalez recalls. “But now we’ve gained respect, and of course that has to do with the preparation of the girls.”
As they developed, volleyball became an avenue for Valley athletes to travel out of state, and to realize their college aspirations.
When Woods first held tryouts, she had between 40-50 students in her gym. As she kicked off the season Monday, she had 110 in her program.
“To me, your main sports are football, basketball and track and field. The key sports. The ones that supposedly people go out to see,” she said. “But volleyball is very big in the Valley. You go out to a volleyball game, no matter where it is, and you’re going to have a crowd.
“It’s really taken off.”