2025 was another record-breaking year! $221,852 raised for St. Baldrick’s (UP $10K from ’24 – INCREDIBLE)! We now look forward to 2026 and see if we can top ourselves once again!
Given the above, the unofficial title/theme for this year is “Rally to 222K“
The new St. Baldrick’s site is up, and once your captain gets your team page set up, please go create your individual player page here: 2026 St Baldrick’s site – https://www.stbaldricks.org/events/growler2026
We aren’t planning any real change in 2026 related to how the tournament runs (beyond the standard promotion and relegation of teams among the divisions). Just like most years, the plan is to “Run it Back”!
- We are HOWEVER going to implement a volunteering “floor” and move up the deadline to meet the team donation/raised funds minimum and adjust who plays in the First 4 games based on these “floors”.
- Basically, if you haven’t met the $1500 minimum by August 14 at midnight or your team does not have more than 5 hours of volunteering COMPLETED as of that date and time, then your team is automatically in the bottom 8 (playing Monday night). If more than 1 team meets this unfortunate reality, the team furthest away by combined percentage will take the 36th spot, and the next 35th, etc. Hoping this is no one.
- WHY? We just need to make sure a few teams aren’t pulling all the volunteer weight to make this event happen and that every team is active in fundraising because if not, it might just be time to allow some new blood to start a team. Most of our new teams are EXCELLENT fundraisers. If you look at last year, we would have had teams in the bottom eight for missing both the minimum 5 hours of volunteering and less than $1500 raised as of the final weekend before the Growler finale. This change will also help administratively, as it takes extra babysitting to get the $ number in by the old date of August 30th. NOTE: This year you won’t lose your team if you can’t raise the $$ by August 15th (you will have until the end of the month). No double jeopardy. Next year we go with the revised date for both and are considering a few other changes to this area we’ll discuss at the Captain’s meeting. For those proposals, I want to get broader feedback before we implement anything. Early reminder: given these proposals, I will need the captain or a rep from every team this year at the Captains meeting. NOTE: This tweak to who makes up the bottom 8 was instigated by the GROWLeadERship Team.
All teams met their fundraising goals in 2025, so we expect to have the same 36 teams battling for the title again this year. Let me know if that isn’t the case ASAP. Registration will open June 1st. Registration cost will stay at $85 this year as long as it’s completed by June 21st. We’ll bump to $100 if completed after June 21st.
Other Tournament Items:
- We once again will have four divisions of nine teams. Nine teams per division will allow each team to play a true round robin in its division and crown a champ.
- We will be acknowledging Division Champs after Week 3 in addition to the Tourney Champ after Week 4. Each will get a trophy to enjoy until the next year’s Growler. We hope this will entice all divisions to drive for a title.
- Cross division games will be held Week 1. Each team will play one team from the other three divisions. Example: Each A team will play a B, a C, and a D team; each B team will play an A, a C, and a D; etc. This will allow for Weeks 2 and 3 to be 4 games against all of the other teams in your division. The tiebreaker will be head-to-head record and then point differential within division games.
- All teams will evenly play three weeks at Springdale and one week at a satellite location (either Lake Park or Greystone). Specific dates will be available once the schedule comes out, but e.g., Week 2 – B teams at LP, A teams at GS and Week 3 – C teams at LP and D teams at GS (swapping locations this year). All teams will play on grass for 1 game on Night 1 at SARC, like last year.
- Assuming all teams return and stay the same from a competition perspective, this will be the division breakdown (yellow highlights are the changes in divisions related to promotion (last year’s division champs) and relegation (worst record in the division)). Again, this is done to represent the consistent strength of teams within each division.
NOTE: We had an interesting dilemma with the Tourney Champ being a B team last year and yet not winning their division, so I am letting the captains of both the Division Champ and the Tourney Champ decide who will move to A this year. They are discussing and will make the call by June registration. Regardless, with a multi-time champ moving to B from A and either the returning champ or the defending Division Champ also in the mix, the B division’s strength continues to build!!
| Springdale | $et for Life | A |
| Lakepark | Air Vectors | A |
| Greystone | Swamp Setters | A |
| Seven Oaks | Kiss My Ace | B |
| North Raleigh | North Raleigh Legends | A |
| Crabtree | Spikological Warfare | A |
| Springdale | Volleywood | A |
| Harrington Grove | Swingrays | A |
| Springdale | Sand Diggers | A |
| Springdale | I’d Hit That | B |
| Greystone | Safe Sets | C |
| Lakepark | Pass It Around | B |
| Greystone | Sand Gators | B |
| Lakepark | Block You Like a Hurricane | B |
| Seven Oaks | Team Kona | B |
| North Raleigh | Hit That Thang | A/B |
| Lakepark | Will Play for Sets | B |
| Lake Park | #DoBetter | B/A |
| Lakepark | Bumpn’ Uglies | C |
| Springdale | Dirt Devils | C |
| Lakepark | How I Set Your Mother | B |
| Springdale | Big Dig Energy | C |
| Springdale | Sets on the Beach | C |
| Springdale | Notorious D.I.G. | D |
| North Hills | That’s What She Set | C |
| Greystone | Overserved | C |
| Greystone | Swamp Thangs | C |
| Greystone | One Hit Wonders | D |
| Springdale | ChewBlocka | D |
| Springdale | Mojo Risin | D |
| Springdale | Raleigh Brawl | D |
| Crabtree | Sand in Strange Places | D |
| Crabtree | Volley Llamas | D |
| Springdale | Mizfits | D |
| Greystone | El Toro’s Revenge | C |
| Springdale | Here for Beer | D |
More information to come in the months ahead, but one last time the GROWLeadERship team wanted to thank you for your tremendous response in regard to both St. Baldrick’s fundraising and the smoothness with which the volleyball events were carried out in 2025. The template is set for continued success. Let’s get it!
Summer is Coming!
Bill Speri
If anyone wants to get more involved in event operations, please let me (wmsperi@gmail.com) know. Otherwise, there’s no time like the present to start organizing your team fundraising creativity (I heard a Seven Oaks pickle ball tourney is also scheduled) and your own individual fundraising drives to make 2026 the best yet! We have a tall mountain to climb following 2025, but I know we can do it! If anyone needs help creating an email to send to your friends and family or creating a post for social media, please reach out! We have MANY talented people doing these things, and I am sure they would share any tips or content for all of us to use.
Also, Unrelated to Growler, but since Growler helps make everyone feel at home on the SARC courts, this is a friendly reminder to ensure you have a SARC member present if you are coming to SARC to play volleyball on a non-growler date when the pool is closed. If no member is present, please play on courts 3 and 4 (I’ll have them up and running within the month – one is playable now, but I need to get some new lines). If the pool is open and you want to play on the courts, please again be with a member and pay the guest fee.