Megan grew up playing volleyball in the Kansas City area, where she excelled for her high school by setting numerous records. She then went on to play collegiately at Arkansas State (Division 1) and had a successful 4 year career. Megan returned home to help out coaching at the high school level to eventually oversee guidance of the college recruiting process at MAVS Volleyball Complex.

Coach:

Megan Baska: Director of Team Performance and Recruitment

Topic 1: Coaching Inspiration

Megan talks about her passion for inspiring young women and helping them achieve their goals.

Topic 2: Going From Mentor to Player

Megan talks about her current role, and how she used her past experience as a college athlete to help others find the right fit.

Topic 3: Finding the Right Club

Megan gives her advice on how to find the right club to play for. She explains some new tryout rules that were put into place that have helped players focus on the current season. Megan also gives some tips on how to stand out at a tryout and the importance of developing a personal connection so you know they have your best interests.

Topic 4: Multi-sport Athletes:

We discuss the benefits of being a multi sport athlete and the local influence of Kansas City quarterback, Patrick Mahomes. Megan explains how playing other sports makes athletes more coachable and adds to them an additional skill set.

Topic 5: Positive Coaching Style:

Megan talks about how she uses the positive coaching method. She also explains how asking questions and having them ‘self-discover’ their failures so they are able to develop on their own.

Topic 6: Staying in Shape while at Home (Mentally & Physically):

Megan talks about the team organized workouts and ways her teams are staying active through their ‘MAVS Madness’ program. We also talk about keeping a game like mentality, and how watching film and game footage will help keep their mind sharp. It is also a great time to reach out to collegiate coaches since they might have more time to respond to emails.

With her background in recruitment, Megan Baska offered a world of insight to student athletes who are finding their path through the recruiting process. Tune in next time for more tips and tricks!

CHRIS GORDON  

everyone. Thanks for joining us for another edition of exact club experts. Today we're joined by MEGAN BASKA, the director of performance and recruitment for Mavs volleyball, located just outside of Kansas City. Megan shared some great stories and insight on what inspired her to get into coaching and her current role of assisting club members with recruiting.

MEGAN BASKA  

And I like to ask all the coaches that are on what led you to to become a coach and you know, how did what inspires you? First off, and then what led you to the role you're in now? Yeah, so great question Chris. Um, I love coaching I think for the aspect of kind of inspiring young women. So in the sport of volleyball we have on within Mavs a couple different entities. So we do have a voice side but we also have three girls sides to our club. And so being able to touch really some high level athletes and getting them to college and a scholarship and then all the way to debt to some select athletes that maybe play multiple sports, and I just hope to be a good influence on them and kind of through the sport of volleyball hopefully, and kind of educate them on on life skills that not only pertain on the court, but off the court as well. Definitely now now is the director of

CHRIS GORDON  

recruiting, how is your past experience through the process helped other athletes kind of get to, to where they're at not to get to the college level?

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah. And so a big part of what I do and kind of my job, as far as in the office would be just kind of being that communications person in between. So, I'm sure as you know, I'm being honest with kind of the athlete and evaluating what level they could be most successful. And then as well as communicating with the coach and what kids would fit best within their program. I think it's the biggest part or the kind of the biggest, the biggest thing that kind of helps you be successful in this role. So just being honest with the evaluations of kind of the schools that they're looking at, and the athlete and kind of helping them find that perfect fit is ideally the way they try to approach that aspect of the job. And my background, I went to Arkansas State University played volleyball there for four years. So I had an amazing experience, it was a really, really good fit for me because it was kind of a mid level D one school. So I got a ton of playing time, but I still got that feel of being a little bit more away from home. And, you know, not just being able to go home every single weekend or my parents been there every time but they were still able to come. So for me, I just found that kind of perfect fit. And I just would hope that all kids could kind of have that same experience. And so if I can help them with that, and kind of having that same really great college experience, then it's really fulfilling and I just love hearing the feedback from the girls having a good experience of playing in college, and you know, kind of working on what their next step is in their career.

CHRIS GORDON  

Yeah, absolutely. There's so much to consider when when, you know, choosing a college I feel like having somebody that that was in their shoes not too long ago is very helpful and I'm sure it's has helped a lot of athletes select the right fit, so props to you for helping them.

MEGAN BASKA  

I will say Chris, it's just so unique to each player. And, and so being kind of an average athlete, I would say kind of average to a little bit elite athlete. And, you know, I had the opportunity to play with some really high level athletes in club, but it wasn't that necessarily those colleges were looking at me. And in the beginning, they were looking at those girls that I played with. So that gave me a really great platform to work with. And I think more athletes find themselves in that same situation than not where maybe they're on this elite level team. And, and they're they're a decent player, good player, solid player, but they're not going to those top 25 D one schools, they're going you know, maybe I'm RPI like 50 to the 250 range, or even D two and D three schools but they're having these hours. opportunities and so I try to let them know that my story was these colleges were looking at other players that I got to play with and then those coaches and you know recruiting coordinators of those colleges maybe got the assistant coaching job or head coaching job at that next little bit higher level school and and so they remember those kids that they used to watch at their previous school and then maybe they would get that call and that's kind of what how I ended up at Arkansas State is that coach was recruiting for a previous school for a little bit better kid and high, really high level big 12 kid and he ended up getting a coaching job at Arkansas State so remembered me on that team and then they needed that position. So I just tried to encourage kids you never know, you know, when a college coaches watching or where that college coach could be going to next even if they're not being looked at right then.

CHRIS GORDON  

Yeah, that makes sense. It's the recruiting world I've always heard is everyone kind of knows everyone. So you're you're always trying to make an impression, even if it's not for the coach that maybe you're trying to play for some day. So, yeah, I've heard that story, a similar story and a lot of cases. So it seems like it applies on the volleyball side as well. You talked about, you know, club volleyball and having a wide level of talent ranges. You said you play between superior players in your day. And I know that tryouts are a big part of the club volleyball scene. So if I'm a player moving into a new city, and I'm trying to find a new club, what should I look for? You know, when when selecting that new club, new place to play. Once I found a good fit, what are some ways I can stand out during tryouts?

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah, so for tryouts, I would for sure. If they're not going to make you wear like a certain jersey or Penny or color, wear a shirt with your name on the back, obviously, whether it's your first or last name, wear bright colored shirt, and then just make sure you Go up and introduce yourself. Because you may be walking into a gym with 10 kids or you could be walking into a gym with, you know, 500 Kids competing for 50 spots. And so I'm just really making yourself seem confident and loud and approachable at the same time, like giving them good eye contact and actually introducing yourself. So that would go a long ways.

CHRIS GORDON  

Yeah, absolutely. And in terms of like, you know, there's so many different clubs and in each city, and it's sometimes hard to get lost, you get lost when when finding a new place to play. What are some things off the court that I should look for when selecting a new club? Who should I speak to? And what to look for in the coaches?

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah, so within Kansas City, we are a pretty high level region. As far as club volleyball goes. There's quite a bit of clubs here. And so our region actually mandates our recruiting period. So it's actually very similar to that The college even do one process of like a dead period and the communication period. So in Kansas City, the AMIA region, we actually cannot even discuss the recruiting process or discuss next year's teams until July 9. And so that and that will actually just came into effect last year in 2019. And it's really been very, very beneficial, at least for our region, because of how competitive we were. It kind of seemed like kids were, you know, our parents or families naturally, were starting to think about the next season before the season was even over. And so as coaches and especially as directors and on the staff side of club, we really appreciate these rules and have really dove into them and the fact that we get to focus on our team this year, all the way through nationals, and so nationals ends typically July 4 or fifth for us. And so there is Just no communication, no talking about next year until our season's over. And so that has been a huge game changer for the athletes, I think having more of a positive experience and for coaches to be able to, you know, it, you know, give all they have to the team that's in front of them right now. So once July 9 comes and then I think it's just about that personal relationship. You know, it's even just when you're talking with someone with anything in life, like you feel like they're being honest with you, do you feel like they're truly caring about you? Do you feel like maybe some of their philosophies may fit well with yours? Obviously, we hope that all kids are coachable and we can, you know, as an athlete, can all adapt to a coaching style. But I also think as we are coaching, you know, younger, the younger generation versus maybe adults 18 and over, it's our job as coaches to be able to get the best out of those, those kids and develop them as best we can before they go off to college. So if I was an athlete, looking at clubs, I was Definitely want just that feel of this coach cares about my development more than anything.

CHRIS GORDON  

Yeah, definitely. That makes a lot of sense. It's kind of like a feeling out process for both sides. I feel like um, so we talked about club club volleyball. I know that you played both clubbing in high school growing up, correct. So a lot of our athletes ask at our events, you know, is it okay to play High School volleyball, high school, soccer, whatever sport that we're running a campaign? Is it okay to play High School and club at the same time? Can you talk about some of the benefits of playing both and not just both of the same sport but other sports in high school?

MEGAN BASKA  

Absolutely. And so being in Kansas City right now, it's a real kind of this, this backdrop that you can have here around the city within the sports industry as Patrick mahomes. Of course, as probably the nation knows, but he had kind of that baseball background along with football, and so especially around here, kind of that being multi sport athlete has become such a positive word and name and kind of influence in aleast in the Kansas City community that shows kind of the benefits of being a multi sport athlete. So whether it's the same sport in high school and getting kind of some different training, which is every single day, a short season for two months, very similar to the college schedule, which is beneficial or if it's, you know, a different kind of sport and different kind of schedule. But then being able to do the club on top of it as well just allows you to be more coachable, it allows you to develop different skills allows you to have different hand eye coordination, and just kind of those on tangible skills that you can't work on unless you're doing multiple sports, so or being coached by multiple coaches. So we absolutely encourage that. And as I kind of mentioned before, within maps, we have two sides to our club, which is a premier side and then a select side. And so that premier side, we still have multiple sport athletes, but it's a little bit more elite level kids that play volleyball and with a few multi sport athletes involved so they practice you know, three times a week and travel all over the nation whereas that select side practices two times a week. And typically it's not volleyball is not their number one sport but it definitely gives them the opportunity to be able to play volleyball at a good level and not be as financially or time commitment as maybe the premier side would be

CHRIS GORDON  

sure, yeah, that makes sense. I feel like this, you know, our generation now it's like, you're told to stick to one sport, I feel like sometimes you're gonna get burned out if, if you're just doing one thing and, you know, you lose the joy in the game. So I feel like multiple sports definitely helps that, you know, keep things kind of fun and everybody you know, engaged so it's a good It's a good reference of Pat mahomes a

MEGAN BASKA  

very helpful to have him as kind of that, that spokesperson for that so he's he's talked a lot about it and of course that just resonates a lot in the Kansas City area.

CHRIS GORDON  

Absolutely. So as you're aware, exact background is in the mental side of of the game and really emphasizing confidence correlating with success. So can you talk about some ways that you incorporate some mental training into your coaching and how that helps a player's development?

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah. And so within Matt's really we work a lot on both physical and mental development. We've had kids in our gym from you know, seven years old all the way through eight teams when they go to college and then hopefully they come back and coach for us or kind of help, you know, play around with our teams when they can on breaks come to our practices and things like that. But for me, the mental side is just as important. And when you're working with young teenagers You know, 10 year old 18 year olds, you're going to get a wide spectrum of girls and how they're feeling when they're walking into the gym. So being able to teach them kind of how to control their emotions, sometimes it's hard to leave things out the door. And, and just kind of play and sometimes it's okay today we need to except in like, recognize what our emotions are, what we're feeling what we're thinking, what situation are we in? Are we in a deficit situation? Or are we in like, kind of that positive situation where, where everything's going, right. And so, I like to think of it as a little bit of a mental training and the fact that you can mentally change physically. So if your team is struggling, maybe, maybe you're down, you're not playing as well. That's when you want to give them maybe the most encouragement you can or as be as positive as you can. When your team's playing well, I believe that's when you should push them even harder. And so your level of play if you're playing with And you push them a little bit more, it naturally will raise their weakest part of that weakest part of the game, instead of trying to push this up in your best part of the game stays the same. So naturally, if you push them when they're playing their best, everything that you're trying to do will rise. So that's mentally and physically but we also just try and do you know, journaling or film watching and things like that always help when it comes to the mental side of training.

CHRIS GORDON  

Yeah, definitely. accountability and obviously, learning from failure and, you know, continuing to get better. I feel like that's when players start to really develop their skills is when they're learning from their failures and kind of growing each time they step on the court that starts to make them the player that they want to become so it seems like you guys are definitely incorporating that.

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah, and Chris, I believe that just positive coaching. So, and even if you're coaching added, really the fundamental aspect of it. You know, our kids that are 1011 and 12, and you're teaching the fundamentals, and instead of saying, Don't drop your elbow, that's a negative word. And so they're going to keep thinking about don't drop my elbow, don't drop my elbow, well, they're probably going to drop their elbow. So kind of talking more on the positive side of keep your elbow high, keep your elbow high, keep your elbow high, more often, you're going to find a kid doing what is actually coming out of your mouth. So if you say, Don't drop your elbow, they're probably gonna drop there. But if you say keep your elbow high, they'll probably keep your elbow high. So just working on talking on the positive and coaching on the positive reinforces what you want them to do. So then that outcome will probably be more often than not.

CHRIS GORDON  

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I really never, never thought of it that way. But I felt like I feel like I've heard if I heard that a lot more when I was, you know, playing baseball, don't drop your shoulder, your shoulder having maybe maybe they had more hits back in the day. So it makes a lot of it makes a lot of

MEGAN BASKA  

sense. Positive is huge, especially for just young kids trying to absorb everything. Another part of the mental game that we are I like to focus on is asking questions. And so instead of telling a kid something, I think, you know, as coaches our radar as we see something wrong, we have to go tell them, we see something wrong, we have to go tell them. So instead of having kind of this radar going off, we can see something right and then ask them. Why did that happen? Okay, well, it was because I did this, this and this. So they're starting to identify themselves, what they're doing right? And sometimes, you know, maybe you do that four out of five times and that one time they do something wrong. You ask them, why did that happen? So more often than not, they're identifying for themselves what they're doing right? And then that one time or two times, maybe they're identifying what they did wrong. So just kind of focusing on the positive asking your athletes questions, such as Why did that outcome happen? What could you have changed. When was your reaction time? Just asking questions to help them self kind of self discover the answer is actually where learning happens. Because when you're not with that athlete and you have, let's say, 25 kids on a court, your attention is can only be on one kid at a time where your feedback can only be to one or two kids at a time. So they have to start learning how to fix their own problems and how to fix their own mistakes, and how to identify when they did something. Right. So teaching them to ask the questions, or teaching them to answer their own questions is a huge part in the development because when you're not looking at them, they can be getting better at the same time.

CHRIS GORDON  

Got it? Okay. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Last question, I guess relating with the times. Obviously, we're all trying to find ways to stay in game shape, while we're not with our teams while we're not on the court. So talk about some ways that you're you're helping your teams In kind of game form, not just physically, but mentally as well.

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah. So we created something called mass madness. And obviously, we thought it'd be a kind of just in May, I mean, excuse me just in March, kind of going along the lines of March Madness with basketball. But we called it Mavs madness. And it's just a series of workouts every week that we're doing to keep the kids engaged. So there's a jump training a core training every day, that's the same for that week, and then that changes week to week, and then there's a different workout every day. So it's at home workout, so you could do with either your bodyweight or in your backyard, or like peanut butter jars or cans. Just to stay active because some kids you know need that motivation so we're doing it as a team. So they do the workouts individually but then they send their like designated team captain a selfie once they complete it, they put the all the selfies together, and Then they tag us on Instagram. And so it's been super super fun. It's been very successful we're really proud of all our athletes staying active and and then we'll throw in there every once in a while some sort of mental training side of it to say, you know what, today we're not doing a workout, I want you to post three positive things that you like about yourself, you know, kind of working on that self confidence, or today you're going to go watch film or today you're going to a zoom call as a team. And here's that word of the day. So mainly, we're just keeping them engaged through a man's madness challenge that's been super fun. And we created a T shirt for the winners at the end. And we just kind of try and encourage them to stay active by providing the workouts for them and then mixing in there every once in a while. The mental training side of it so

CHRIS GORDON  

yeah, that's that sounds like a good plan. I feel like it's it's easier to stay in game shape physically. I feel like the mental mental side of it. It's it's tough because you know, it's not As far as being out on the corner of your team, it's not a, you're not getting that joy of getting being around your your teammates. So I feel like if we have ways to continue to engage with our teams and stay positive, it's we're going to get through it together. So

MEGAN BASKA  

Chris is going into Week Four? Well, for us, I think Chicago was a little ahead of the curve, but for us, we're kind of technically, in week four. I've kind of at home, you know, training and quarantine. So this week, and you know, at least with my team, I encourage them really to start watching more film. You know, as this goes from there another three weeks, we need to be in that game like mentality. As much as you know, drills are super useful to break down fundamentals. The game is where you kind of you know, get those natural instincts and learning opportunities and how to win a game. So I'm watching film and watching Game footage is going to be the best, you know, benefit for them right now going into a little bit longer of a quarantine than maybe we thought it would be. So really engaging and film right now is going to be the biggest thing that athletes should be doing as we head into week four or five, six and seven. And then on top of that, while you're watching film, it's probably the best time to send to college coaches, as well because you know, they're not in the gym. So they've got a little bit more time on their hands. So make sure that they update some some footage of themselves and get that sent out.

CHRIS GORDON  

Definitely seems like a good idea. All right, those are the main questions I had. I'd like to end every every interview three fun questions. So we'll start with the first one. You probably played in some pretty cool venues playing in college growing up and you know, the KC area. Can you tell us which were your favorite volleyball stadium venue you've ever played?

MEGAN BASKA  

Absolutely. So I am in a cave basketball fan. But I also was just an any volleyball fan in general, I kind of wanted to go there. But it wasn't the best opportunity I probably would have walked on if I did. And then come my junior year we played me when a spring, a spring scrimmage. And so that was probably really cool for me just because that was one of the places that I really wanted to play, potentially. So they definitely beat us but being able to play there was was kind of fun and cool. My family came down from Kansas City and I think there's a football game going on. So everyone had a good time and got to see me play.

CHRIS GORDON  

Awesome. That sounds pretty cool. Um, okay, I've never heard this the first volleyball interview. I've done some kind of going on the fly here. If you were to pick one partner to play in a beach, those with a guy or girl who would it be? Kerri Walsh. I had a feeling it would be her but that's Yeah. One of like three volleyball players actually. beach volleyball player.

MEGAN BASKA  

Yep, yeah, for sure she's hands down just the most elite volleyball player there is. And I think what's really cool about her is she brings out the best in her partner who she plays with and obviously they're winning gold medals so um, I feel like she would probably be able to bring out the best in me and hopefully I'd be able to do a little bit vice versa but definitely Kerri Walsh is probably just that number one for most people.

CHRIS GORDON  

Who is the most famous person in cell phone

MEGAN BASKA  

I don't know. I don't know any famous people really? Honestly.

CHRIS GORDON  

I'm sure If you dug pretty deep, you might be like, Oh, I got this person's number like that.

MEGAN BASKA  

You know, I bet you some of our athletes are Tick tock, you know, influencers and so probably one of our athletes.

CHRIS GORDON  

Speaking of carry, watch, watch, I actually have misty Mays number in my phone cuz she's a coach and I like the facility. It's probably a work line, but counting Her name is in my phone. So I don't know if that counts, but it definitely counts. figure that name. Drop it. All right. Well, that's good. I think that's all the time we're going to take what we have for the for this interview, I appreciate you taking some time to talk to us. And we're going to get this information out to our players soon. And hopefully, we'll see on the court again shortly.

MEGAN BASKA  

Yeah, thank you so much, Chris. Good luck to you guys and exact sports, and hopefully we'll have a camp soon. So

CHRIS GORDON  

absolutely. Stop. That's all for a conversation today. Thanks again to Megan Ambassador for joining us. Coming up we'll have more conversations with different club coaches on all questions you may have regarding the club process. If you have any specific questions feel free to shout us out on Instagram or Twitter at exact sports, Facebook, exact soccer in our blog, exact sports comm slash blog. Catch you all again next time on exact club experts.