October 19, 2023
Inside Hitter took a look at all D3 team rosters to determine what states are leading the way in regard to fueling the college volleyball landscape. There were quite a few surprises in the results, and we wanted to share some of the specific learnings with our fans. This information is based off of the 2023 roster information hometowns and states.
New York provided the most roster spots for any state. 331 of the 1,795 players were from the Empire state representing 18.4% of the total population of players.
NY and Pennsylvania represent roughly 1/3 of all players at the D3 level. PA provides 249 players or 13.9% of the total.
There are 5 states contributing more than 100 players on D3 rosters. New York (331), Pennsylvania (249), Illinois (227), California (130), and New Jersey (115), lead the list.
Ten states have no representation at the D3 level. They are Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, West Virginia, and Wyoming.
Texas has just 2 players playing at the D3 level.
Wisconsin (93), Ohio (63), Virginia (63), and Massachusetts (53), all have strong representation with over 50 players from their perspective states.
There are 73 players from foreign countries representing over 4% of the current population.
Leading foreign countries are Dominican Republic (7), Brasil (5), Canada (4), and Ecuador (4).
There are more players from South Korea (3) than there are from Georgia (2).
State contributing less than 5 players are North Carolina (4), South Carolina (4), Iowa (3), Georgia (2), Kansas (2), Kentucky (2), Oregon (2), and Texas (2). Alabama, DC, Louisiana, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Utah each have one player in addition to the ten states noted above that have zero.
42 Countries are represented outside of the United States.
Puerto Rico is 14th on the list of states with 25 players, just 3 less than Florida.
Hawaii has 22 players at D3 and we expect much more at the D1/D2 level, despite having less than half the overall teams of D3,
The growth of men’s volleyball, especially at the high school level, has been staggering and more than any other high school sport in the country. But there appears to be ample opportunity for continued growth in so many states that are just starting programs or may not have any programs at all.
Here are some of the full details of our analysis: