After a long day in the office on May 13, what better time on a warm evening to walk a few blocks from the Alameda Journal to St. Joseph Notre Dame High School to catch a North Coast Section first-round boys volleyball game between the Pilots and visiting Head-Royce. Colleague Scott Strain was covering the game, giving me the chance to just stand back and observe. And what I saw was great! Lots of emotion. Great action on the court. And plenty of enthusiasm in the stands. Head-Royce eliminated the Pilots, then itself got eliminated a couple days later against Drake. But the volleyball was great. And so were the fans. Maybe the California Interscholastic Federation will begin to take notice. Boys volleyball deserves a state championship playoff series on par with the girls in the fall.

Recently, I asked my 11-year-old son if he would consider joining a sand volleyball team for boys. Since volleyball was a fun part of high school PE classes for dad some years earlier, I figured he might find it fun, too.

My son’s response? “Volleyball is for girls.”

Try as I might, talking to him about the great Karch Kiraly and all of the stars of the U.S. men’s indoor gold medal Olympic volleyball teams of 1984 and 1988, I could not convince him otherwise. Unfortunately, I could not blame him for his attitude toward the game.

Take a look around. Not so much at the worldwide view of the game, but at what happens right in front of our noses. In my grade school days, the girls played volleyball in one part of the playground while the boys played either touch football, wiffle ball or kickball in another. Never the twain shall meet.

To the present day, California high schools have state championship playoffs for girls in the fall, but none for boys in the spring. And at some high schools, unfortunately, few seem to care much about the boys version of the sport.

Back to the worldwide view, volleyball in its various forms is popular among both genders. Heck, in Brazil there’s a form of the game called futvolley (or futevolei, if you happen to be visiting there). It blends soccer and volleyball as players attempt to play the ball with any part of the body except the hands (which goes a long way in explaining why Brazilians are so good at both sports). But in other parts of the world, sadly - - including some schools and neighborhoods nearby - - old stereotypes persist.

For comparison, field hockey had a 72-year head start as an Olympic men’s sport before the inaugural women’s competition in 1980. But this country has long went against the international grain, as the game has long been considered a “girls’ sport” here.

Will volleyball fall into the same trap? Like field hockey, it’s too good a sport to get stereotyped. Unfortunately, though, it’s very easy for a volleyball-for-all proponent to feel like a voice in the wilderness.

The news earlier this month that Bishop O’Dowd coach Tim Newman had stepped down from his post came as a surprise. Also stepping down with Newman were assistant Patrick Acebo and JV coach Dean Fukawa. As veterans of 16 seasons at the hilltop campus, Newman and company had become an institution at the Oakland hilltop campus after having produced 10 league titles and four NCS titles. In addition, 22 O’Dowd players went on to college programs after playing for Newman. The latest news has it that recent O’Dowd player, Ariell Cooke, now at the University of Miami, took part in U.S. national team tryouts this past weekend (Feb. 23-24). Newman, et al, indeed have built an excellent program, one with a 51-game Hayward Area Athletic League winning streak intact. Newman, Acebo and Fukawa, who began at BOD together, we’re told, decided to step down together in order to pursue other interests. Newman remains at O’Dowd as a teacher and head of the science department. He also leaves behind a reputable, respected and successful program he helped build. Whoever takes over the coaching reins at O’Dowd is going to have some big shoes to fill.

It’s May. And though the first round of the North Coast Section boys volleyball playoffs took place on a cold and overcast evening, a thought came to mind: wouldn’t it be great to take this game outdoors?
High school volleyball typically takes place during months when folks want to be outside. Boys volleyball is inhibited, some argue, by the fact that it takes place indoors in spring when people want to move into the sun and fresh air after a winter of sitting in crowded gyms for basketball games.
One practical advantage of a move outdoors comes to mind: from a journalistic viewpoint, my photographic colleagues won’t have to put up with the guff they occasionally take for using a flash during the course of a match (an aside: those who complain about flash photography during indoor or night sports are unable to see the greater good - - publishing photographs actually benefits the sport being covered. But I digress).
In reality, our high school sports plates are beyond full. Still, imagine high school beach volleyball. No beach at your school, you say? Well, just import some sand. Fun in the sand and sun.
It’s a nice dream, anyway!

When I think of U.S. men’s volleyball, thoughts of 1984 and 1988 Olympic gold medals come to mind. U.S. men also took bronze at Barcelona in 1992. But to look at boys high school volleyball nowadays, the successes of the past seem only an aberration. How was it all possible? Yes, many of the high school kids are very serious about the sport, though many schools seem to have “athletes” that turn up after the winter sports seasons. A lot of these guys seem to have little knowledge of the game, and appear to just be filling time until their main sport starts again. Also, the uniforms that players wear at many schools look like their big brothers’ hand-me-downs. In contrast, most girls teams appear more sharply outfitted in the fall. Though this might sound superficial to some, it gives an indication that somebody cares.
Back to the guys, coaches tell me that high school boys volleyball is big in Southern California. And a check of the Olympic rosters would bear this out - - the medal-winning U.S. men’s Olympic teams of the past, for instance, had a strong SoCal influence. Of course, the weather in that part of the state generally is fairer and warmer throughout most of the year, and many folks hone their skills at the beach. The same holds true for places like Brazil and Hawaii, where both forms of volleyball - - beach and court — are strong. Still, places like China, Japan, the former Soviet bloc and a number of nations of Western Europe also have shown their mettle indoors.
Volleyball is a U.S. invention, exported to the world reportedly by American GIs during the world wars and periods of occupation. But like the “British Invasion” of rock-and-roll music, volleyball needed folks from other places to bring it back to our shores.
Men’s volleyball at its best is Karch Kiraly, Craig Buck, Pat Powers and Steve Timmons. “Sideout,” a 1990 film with actor Peter Horton as an aging volleyball stud who proves he still has game, is a neat, though obscure, sports movie usually reserved, unfortunately, for late-night TV. But the enthusiasm of Hollywood and the success of the men’s national team team in past years seems to not have captured the imagination of the entire nation. Seems like high-quality high school boys volleyball exists somewhere, but you’ll have to drive a ways to find it.
While we’re on the subject of volleyball, riddle me this. Girls volleyball, in contrast to the boys, is huge stuff in these parts. High schools have a state championship and club ball thrives. Despite all this, the U.S. women’s medal take in the Olympics consists of a silver in 1984 and a bronze in 1992. Some things in sports just don’t make sense.

— Mike McGreehan

We are running a three-part series on high school coaches. The series started Monday with stories on coaches who are starting out. Tuesday’s package will be on coaches and what they endure to stay at it, and Wednesday we will close with coaches who got out. What’s surprised me is the candor of which coaches spoke of their respective hardships, especially in dealing with parents. It used to be whenever a coach told a reporter about anything in that realm it was prefaced by “this is off the record.” These days dissatisfaction with a coach is much more out in the open and thus many coaches are more willing to talk about these instances. Just checking the Times discussion boards or any other such boards demonstrates that. Another example of how life has changed in the cyber-era.

Well it’s that time of the decade again where the North Coast Section sits all its member schools down at a table and everyone reminds themselves how much they don’t get along. Cynical, yes. Out of touch with reality, no. In today’s Times, Chace Bryson explores the new proposals for league configurations. I looked at these changes this morning and suddenly the new hotbed for controversy is the Bay Shore Conference, within whose boundaries I happen to live.

First thing’s first: This is one of the most political processes you’re ever going to see in high school athletics. Why? Because it directly affects the purse strings that govern competitive equity. That’s especially true when it comes to the ACCAL and BSAL. The new alignment puts Kennedy back in the ACCAL with fellow WCCUSD schools De Anza, El Cerrito, Pinole Valley, and Richmond and also adds John Swett and St. Patrick-St. Vincent to the mix. Does anyone actually believe the Eagles are equipped to compete in any sports other than soccer and basketball in this league? No. What this does is lessen the travel costs for the WCCUSD, and that’s what dictated this move.

We have to put this proposal in perspective. Yes, money is a major factor in these talks whereas the new Valley Conference had concerns over competitive balance. The most popular dissenting opinion for these new leagues is that some schools are concerned with the fact that they can’t compete. I’m not indifferent to those opinions and I can tell you watching a blowout night after night is much less fun than seeing a good game. But the bottom line is this: We need to get these kids on the field and on the court. These moves allow teams like Kennedy and Richmond to cut costs and might allow them to establish some consistency in fielding teams. I care less about the ability to compete than the opportunity to compete and, to a large extent, these moves show that the NCS Board of Managers does too.

On Wednesday, the State Assembly voted down Bill 2312, which intended to loosen the rules of eligibility for high school athletes who transfer schools without moving. The subject long has been a controversial one in high school athletic circles. One wonders if this will be the catalyst for even more debate on transfers. Do the existing regulations keep the situation under control? Will there be any future legislation proposed, or do you expect the topic to drift away? Please weigh in with your comments.

I just got my hands on an amazing resource for prep sports: the sixth edition of CalHiSports.com’s State Record Book & Almanac. Here you can look up practically any state record imaginable, such as most two-point conversions in a season by an individual (14), most yards of total offense in a game (912), most rebounds in a game by an individual (53), most home runs by a team in a season (75).

Curious about who holds these records? There are a limited number of these books on sale at the De La Salle book store. That makes sense since former Spartans star D.J. Williams of the Denver Broncos shares the covers with luminaries as Ted Williams, Marion Jones, Jason Kidd, Lisa Leslie and Tiger Woods. All of these athletes played high school sports in California, and the sheer number of great California athletes is another facet of the book that will amaze you.