Volleyball Hits 10 Types of Spiking Attacking And Hitting Terms 

I define spiking and 10 other terms for volleyball hits like kill, spike, tool the block, wipe the block, cross court, spike approach, free ball, down ball. 

Volleyball Hits An attack hit is made when a player on the offensive team gets the ball into the opposing team's court by either spiking, tipping dumping, or using an off speed hit.

What are the different types fo volleyball hits? 

attack, hit, spike, kill, wipe the block, tool the block, spike approach, tip, cobra, pokey, down ball, free ball, seam, cross court hit, line hit, cut shot

I Define Spiking And 10 Other Volleyball Attack Hit and Kill Terms: The wipe describes the wiping action of a spiker's arm motion when the player aims the ball for an opposing blocker's outside hand. (Al Case)

Type of Volleyball Hits: The Wipe

The wipe describes the wiping action of a spiker's arm motion when the attacker aims the ball for an opposing blocker's outside hand.

The blocking arm and hand closest to the antenna presents a target that the spiker aims for, so when the ball deflects back off the hand, it travels out of bounds, outside the sideline on the hitter's side or the blocker's side off the court.

Volleyball Hits: The wipe describes a spiker's arm motion when the attacker aims the ball for an opposing blocker's outside hand. (Ralph Aversen)

When the hitter wipes the block for a point, it means the blocker was the last person to touch the ball before it lands out of bounds, outside of the sidelines.

Types of Volleyball Hits: The Tool

Tooling the block is a slang term for wiping the block. They both describe the act of spiking the ball so that you deliberately aim for the outer hand of the blocker who's attempting to block you.

Your goal is to do this in a way that the ball gets deflected back to your court but outside of the sideline, so it bounces outside of the court, on your team's side. 

Tooling the block is a slang term that describes the act of spiking so you aim for the outer hand of the blocker who's attempting to block you so the ball deflects out of bounds. (Aversen)

This is an effective point scoring hitting strategy because it's hard for diggers to react to a ball that's been deflected by the block. 

Types of Volleyball Hits: The Tip

A tip is an attack hit a spiker uses as an option to a hard hit...by

• completing a spike approach for a hard hit then
• at the height of the spike jump and after the arm swing the hitter contacts the ball with the tips of their fingers

Volleyball Hits A tip is an attack hit a spiker uses at the height of the spike jump and after the arm swing the hitter contacts the ball with the tips of their fingers. (Arvesen)

• guiding the ball up and over the block, and
• over the net in the direction of where they want the ball to fall on the opposing court

Volleyball Hits: I Define Spiking And 16 Other Volleyball Attack Hit Terms: Penn State hitter tips the ball over the Illinois block (Richard Yuan)

Types of Volleyball Hits: The Cobra

Usually done in beach volleyball, the spiker uses their straight hand with the palm down to contact the ball with their fingertips. 

Types of Volleyball Hits: The Pokey

Usually done in beach volleyball, the spiker uses their closed fist to contact the ball with the knuckles of the index and middle finger.

This is an attack hit often used when the ball gets set too close to the net or the opposing blocker's hands. 

Down Ball

What's a Down Ball attack hit?

When a player performs a spike over the net without jumping to take a spike approach, that is called a "down ball."

The hitter has stayed down to spike or hit the ball to the opposing team's court. 

A down ball attack is usually the result of a hitter not having enough time to make an approach or some miscommunication between them and their setter in regards to a play that was called. 

Do you block a down ball?

When the blocker on one team sees a spiker on the other team hitting a down ball, then they should call out to each other "down ball" so the blockers know not to block the ball since the hitter isn't using a spike approach to hit the ball over the net. 

The blockers usually call out to their team "down ball" and transition off the net to get ready to attack.

Free ball

What's a Free Ball attack hit?

This is a ball that has been forearm passed by a player on one team (instead of hitting the ball) to the opposing team's court. 

Instead of hitting a down ball, a 'free' ball is a 'gift' from one team who for one reason or another can't attack the ball over the net, so they "give" an easy "unattacked" ball to the other team. 

When your team gets a free ball, everything possible should be done to run a quick attack or give the ball to the 'go to' spiker who should definitely score a point. 

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