David W. Smith/ Daily News Three games in Summer Sand Co-ed A Volleyball are played simultaneously on the courts at Preston Miller Park Tuesday.

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Beach volleyball is generally played before a backdrop of vast coastline and ocean.

You won’t find many surfers or boaters near the Bowling Green Parks and Recreation’s outdoor summer volleyball league, but the players don’t seem to care.

With Parks and Rec offering four separate leagues on four nights a week at Preston Miller Park, it appears interest is as high as ever.

“I started playing back in the late ’80s, so it’s been right at 20 years,” said 37-year-old Bowling Green resident Jeremy Dawson. “I was just starting at Western (Kentucky University) and just really starting playing here.

“I learned a lot from playing in the league and I’ve seen it grow up and down over those 20 years, but right now, participation’s as good as it’s ever been.”

The volleyball summer program consists of two co-ed leagues - League A runs Tuesday nights, while League B plays Monday nights. In addition, a men’s league plays Wednesday nights and a women’s league plays Thursdays.

All leagues run from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. for a six-week period. Co-ed and women’s teams cost $75 to register, while men’s squads cost $50.

According to Parks and Rec volleyball supervisor Tammy Liscomb, the arrival of high school volleyball over the past several years has brought in a whole new group of players.

“Last year, we had like 17 teams in B-league, and I’m sure a few of the numbers have cut down due to gas prices, but right now the men’s league is our most popular league because it’s been going the longest, and the women’s league is catching up,” Liscomb said. “It started to grow when high school volleyball came in and it’s kept growing.”

Liscomb said that with the spiked interest in the game over the past several seasons, a relatively diverse crowd has begun to get a little sand in their toes.

“We have a variety of different people. With high school coming in for girls, we get a lot more girls coming in now that once they’ve left high school they want to keep playing,” she said. “We’ve got all ages out here, we’ve got a couple that’s 70 years old that plays and we have a few kids who are still in high school, even a ninth-grader that plays at Greenwood.”

And while there is room for fun and recreation in certain leagues, there’s also a high level of competition.

“It’s pretty good competition. There’s a wide variety of ability out here, but Bowling Green has some very good volleyball players for the size of the town,” said Dawson, who used to coach volleyball at Warren East High School. “When the high schools picked up volleyball is when it really kind of took off.

“And since that’s come along, participation in co-ed has picked up a lot, because we used to never really even have a women’s league.”

With the interest in its own league at a high level, Liscomb said Parks and Recreation is trying to begin hosting various outside tournaments in the summer, which would bring in players from across Kentucky and even Tennessee.

“With all the tournaments in Lexington and Louisville, we haven’t really found that time where we could do it and get everybody here,” Liscomb said. “We’re in the works to be starting that though. We’re talking about funding and all that.

“We want to get some people down here from Louisville and Lexington to play, because they have some big tournaments with the Bluegrass Games and those things, and we won’t be as big as them, but we’ve got to start somewhere.”

The timing is tricky right now, but Liscomb said Bowling Green has one advantage.

“If we can do it when Louisville or Lexington or Nashville’s not doing it, it will work, but that’s the tricky part and we’re still learning,” she said. “But, we have probably the best sand court in the whole state, I don’t think anybody could touch the sand court here.

“And the interest is definitely there.”