Gulf Shores has reaped the rewards from jumping on board the emerging popularity of beach volleyball by hosting national championship contests at the Public Beach since 2012, four years before the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) sanctioned it as a championship sport.

Over 10,000 spectators – a record for the beach volleyball tournament – showed up to watch last year’s championships, and countless more viewed the contests on ESPN.

Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Tourism estimates the championships last year brought in over $1.5 million in economic impact, and a boost to its brand reputation from the national broadcasts. This year’s event will draw 17 teams from across the country, and hundreds of other teams competing in the nation’s largest junior qualifying event occurring at the same time as the NCAA contests.

But the city is losing the championships in 2025 and 2026, when the event moves to California. Gulf Shores officials want to have it back, and they are pushing for the rest of Alabama to support them. The fast-growing sport is the only collegiate national championship held in Alabama that is broadcast each year on national TV.

“Hosting a championship is a huge deal,” said Shawn Weaver, director of the Pleasure Island Volleyball Club (PIVC), which has played a role in growing beach volleyball in coastal Alabama. “I don’t think (state officials) see that. This thing has been held here since 2012 and … it represents our state hugely. I think they are missing out on an opportunity for these kids to participate in things like this and to gain more notoriety to our state that this is a big event that is held here.”

Generating exposure

Gulf Shores and beach volleyball championships were connected about 11 years ago through a grassroots movement by multiple coastal leaders who wanted to showcase the city’s beaches to a national TV audience as proof that Alabama was recovering from the oil spill following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Women’s beach volleyball gave Gulf Shores a sporting hook, and the TV cameras followed.

The American Volleyball Coaches Association hosted its sand volleyball national championships from 2012-2015, helping establish Gulf Shores as the nation’s home collegiate beach volleyball. A year later, the NCAA sanctioned beach volleyball as its 90th championship sport.

“It was the perfect marriage of timing, vision and resources,” recalled Kathy DeBoer, executive director of the American Volleyball Coaches Association who is retiring in June after 17 years.

CBS Sports broadcast the initial contests, before the games moved to the ESPN networks. The championship game this week will air at 11 a.m. on the flagship ESPN on Sunday.

“The NCAA beach volleyball championship has put Alabama’s beaches on a national stage through a sports lens since 2016,” said Beth Gendler, president and CEO with Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Tourism.

Grant Brown, director of the recreation and cultural affairs department with the City of Gulf Shores, added, “They broadcast all of these events on national television, and it’s so rewarding to see the site and know that is Gulf Shores, and where we get to live every day.”

High stakes

The NCAA sanctioned beach volleyball in 2016, at a time when 868 student-athletes were participating throughout the country. Close to 1,500 women are now participating, representing a 72% increase in seven years. Almost 100 NCAA schools sanction the sport, up from a mere 15 when the first tournaments were held in Gulf Shores.

Automatic bids will go out to nine conferences for this year’s tournament. For the second year in a row, a play-in game will take place on Wednesday, allowing one team to squeeze into the weekend tournament that culminates with a pre-noon championship game on Sunday.

Powerhouse squads from UCLA and USC will arrive to Gulf Shores hoping to outmuscle the rest of the nation. Since 2016, the Californians have dominated the sand courts – USC has four championships, UCLA has two. No one else has won it.

Other schools will try to bump off the California squads, with top-rated TCU and Florida State trying to win a championship. LSU also has a team, and the Tigers are hoping to show up and make an impression as well.

Fueling the intrigue is that this year’s event is a single-elimination tournament, bringing the atmosphere of March Madness to the beach in April.

“There are no more second chances,” said DeBoer. “This raises the stakes considerably and makes the tournament much less predictable.”

The stakes are also raising for Gulf Shores, which loses the tournament in 2025. Though the event has become synonymous with the city, the NCAA decided in late 2020 to rotate it to Huntington Beach, California, for 2025 and 2026.

Future tournament host sites are up for grabs in 2027 and beyond.

A decision for those host sites is expected to be made next year, and Gulf Shores is preparing its bids. This year, the City of Gulf Shores, and Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Tourism each agreed to spend $190,000 to host the event. The Gulf Shores City Council approved its expenditure during last Monday’s meeting.

The two sides are expected to angle to have the city as the permanent host for the NCAA beach volleyball championships, joining a rare list of Oklahoma City has the permanent host of the NCAA softball championships and Omaha, Nebraska as the permanent home for the College World Series.

“It would help us with the planning we do,” said Brown. “If we know we will have the beach volleyball championships for the foreseeable future, instead of borrowing things to put on the fields (like the bleachers), we can make larger capital investments.”

California vs Alabama

Brown and DeBoer said they were a little surprised Huntington Beach received the championships in 2025 and 2026, saying the advantages in Gulf Shores are plentiful:

• It’s a short walk from beach rentals to the Public Beach where the tournament is held.
• It’s adjacent to The Hangout entertainment venue.
• The soft sand has been praised by coaches from Hawaii and beyond.

Another plus is that the nation’s largest junior qualifying event – called “BeachFest” — is occurring simultaneously, with more than 400 teams competing across 50 sand volleyball courts adjacent to the NCAA championship events.

The synergy is apparent as participants during the junior events will crowd into the bleachers to watch the NCAA championships.

“We don’t feel there are any deficiencies at all,” said Brown.

A similar vibe is unlikely to be replicated in Huntington Beach. The junior qualifying events will continue to be held in Gulf Shores, according to Weaver.

“If anything, we can make our tournament larger because the NCAA will not be there,” said Weaver, a special education teacher at Gulf Shores Middle School who started up PIVC about 20 years ago and who is on the board for USA Volleyball for the Gulf Coast Region.

“We run a really great tournament,” Weaver said. “Unfortunately, we won’t have the NCAA here. But there is a small college championship that we’ve talked about partnering with.”

Kristin Fasbender, the director of championships and alliances with the NCAA, heaps praise on the area, saying it’s the “perfect location” for beach volleyball.

“The decision to move the championship to Huntington Beach in 2025 and 2026 is not a reflection of the work Gulf Shores has done over the years,” said Fasbender. “We have been thrilled with our time in Gulf Shores, but as part of the bid process for almost all NCAA sports, we were open to new locations to bring this great championship to other parts of the country.”

She added, “We have little doubt Gulf Shores will be in the mix for future years as part of the NCAA bid process.”

Political decision?

DeBoer said politics did not play a role in the NCAA’s decision, despite a threat from the association in 2021 to remove championships from that adopted anti-LGBTQ+ laws.

The announcement to have the 2025 and 2026 tournaments in Huntington Beach came in late 2020, and before Alabama lawmakers ushered in two new laws that criminalized healthcare providers who offer gender-affirming care to transgender youth and another that required students to use bathrooms that match the gender of their birth certificates.

DeBoer said the NCAA’s beach volleyball committee made its decision to go to California six or seven years ago.

“It was solely the bid/selection process and was not politically motivated,” said Ally Dorrough, spokeswoman with Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Tourism. The NCAA did not respond to a request for further comment.

“The NCAA teams love having the event in Gulf Shores – we have a great long-term relationship with them,” said Dorrough. “We will be ready to host the championship again if given the opportunity.”

Where is Alabama, Auburn?

Weaver and Brown said it would help Gulf Shores in its future quests for secure beach volleyball for the long haul if the rest of Alabama was cooperative.

That’s proving to be difficult. Though the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) is a crucial partner and serves as host institution for the NCAA championship, it’s one of only two Division 1 beach volleyball programs in Alabama. The other is the University of North Alabama.

The University of Alabama, Auburn University and nearby University of South Alabama do not have programs. None of those university’s athletic departments responded to requests for comment for this story.

“It would help if the SEC had a program,” said Brown. “We are not sure why Alabama and Auburn haven’t jumped on board yet.”

DeBoer foresees the SEC adding beach volleyball as a conference sport within the next five years, noting that South Carolina, LSU, and Texas have squads.

“From my biased perch, beach volleyball is a no-brainer for every school, both colleges and high schools, in the Southeast and Southwest,” she said. “It involves a lot of kids, courts are cheap, the team-sport aspect of the scoring is compelling, there are thousands of kids eager to play.”

She added, “Beach volleyball is one of the growth sports — along with (indoor) volleyball, soccer, and lacrosse — of the next 30 years.”

High school hopes

Alabama high schools are also not on board, frustrating Weaver who says he has seen more beach volleyball scholarships issued to students than those who play indoor volleyball.

Arizona, Florida, and California have high school state championships for beach volleyball. Louisiana added one last year.

An opportunity arose in Alabama in 2020, to add beach volleyball to the sports sanctioned by the Alabama High School Athletic Association (AHSAA). But not enough schools committed to hosting a team, and the proposal fizzled.

AHSAA spokesman Ron Ingram said for any sport to receive a championship sanction in Alabama, it would have to have at least 10% of the AHSAA’s member schools participating in a sport or emerging sport to be considered.

“None have declared it as an emerging sport,” he said.

Matt Akin, superintendent at Gulf Shores City School, said his school’s athletic director “personally contacted schools around the state asking for support” in adding beach volleyball in 2020.

“Unfortunately, there was not the 10% of schools that were planning to participate, and it did not pass,” he said. “We are 100% in support of adding beach volleyball and my guess that many of the high schools in our area would also be supportive. I believe that the challenge is having enough schools in the central and northern areas of the state that would be willing to participate.”

Brown said he believes Title IX requirements requiring equal participation opportunities for girls and boys sports should spur more interest in beach volleyball.

Weaver said some of the more rural schools in Alabama have complained about the expenses of moving sand, and alleging that it is cost prohibitive.

He said there is some interest popping up from clubs in Birmingham, Mobile, Dothan and Huntsville.

But he said the message needs to be more widespread in Alabama that the NCAA and Gulf Shores have a strong relationship, and a rare opportunity for the state in hosting a national championship broadcast on ESPN.

“I remember being in Dallas and talking to a guy from Texas who, as soon as I said I was from Gulf Shores, said ‘the NCAA is there,’” Weaver said. “When you talk to people in our local areas where beach volleyball is not as popular as it should be, they don’t realize (the popularity of the national championship).”

He added, “We’ve been hosting the championships since 2012. Because of that tournament, we run the largest junior tournament … the largest national qualifier. I got teams coming from Canada, Washington State, California, New York. They know where Gulf Shores is because of this. It has had had a big impact and is a great investment for our area.”