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Three Player Serve Receive Formations

Basic Formations for the 3 Person Serve Receive Offense

Three player serve receive is preferred by teams that play higher level volleyball.

Passing responsibilities are more straightforward because only 3 players need to communicate when passing.

With only three passers lined up to pass, this gives attackers more freedom to line up in different areas which then allows for a more creative offense.

The three person serve receive formation is basically a line of three players formed by the three primary passers.

Advantages to the three player serve receive formation...

With fewer passers there is less gray area between passers and you'll likely have less communication problems.

Just have the best 3 passers pass. You can hide the setter and two other weak passers.

Disdvantages to the three player serve receive formation...

Each player has more court space to cover.

When just three players are passing, often the setter must start far from the net (in order to avoid the overlap). This is especially true when the same 3 players pass in all six rotations.

Three Player Serve Receive Patterns

The following are examples of serve reception patterns for the three player serve receive when running a 5-1 offense.

Setter in Position 5

Do you understand volleyball alignment?

This is the rotation order for the 5-1 setter in position 5.

three Player receive with setter in LB

Setter in Position 4

This is the rotation order for the 5-1 setter in position 4.

three Player receive with setter in LF

Setter in Position 3

This is the rotation order for the 5-1 setter in position 3.

three Player receive with setter in MF

Setter in Position 2

The following is the rotation order for the 5-1 setter in position 2.

three Player receive with setter in RF

Setter in Position 1

This is the rotation order for the 5-1 setter in position 1.

three Player receive with setter in RB

Setter in Position 6

This is the rotation order for the 5-1 setter in position 6.

three Player receive with setter in MB

Volleyball Court Dimensions Next Page-->

Volleyball Alignment Related Pages

Basic Volleyball Formations

4-2 Serve Receive

5-1 Serve Receive

6-2 Serve Receive

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Three Player Receive to How to Play Volleyball

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Three Player Serve Receive Formations Basic Formations for the 3 Person Serve Receive Offense