In the Plane of the Net

[widude]

Dear OmniSpiker:
Let's start with your first question,"As sometimes when the ball touches the tape, it doesn't necessarily fall below the plane of the tape." If the ball touches the tape, some part of the ball HAS TO BE below the plane of the tape. The whole ball does not have to be below the plane of the tape, just some part of the ball.
As for attacks, no player may attack the ball on any part of the court on a serve. It doesn't matter if a back court player attacks the serve or a front row player attacks it. Remember, though, just because a player swings at the ball over his head, it is not necessarily an attack. Again, if the ball has dropped so that any portion of the ball is below a plane parallel to the floor and through the line at the top of the net, it does NOT constitute an attack. I've seen 6th grade girls take an approach and strike the ball on the serve, legally. The ref ruled that even jumping to their full potential, they could not reach a ball fully above the net. I had to agree with that. :-(
Whether blocking or serving, the important thing to distinguish in the rules is the "plane of the net", which is a vertical plane, and "plane horizontal to the floor through the top of the net", a horizontal plane. Different rule books have a different terminology for these concepts, and sometimes it gets confusing. Hope this helps.
I'm still looking for clarification on whether the ball has to stay below the horizontal plane in order to be an attack. If the ball hits the net and jumps up, can a person legally attack a serve since "at one time" the ball was below the plane of the net? You still can't block it, because you can never block a serve.