OUR KIDS
According to Gino Grajeda, president and tour director of the Southern Pacific Volleyball Committee (SPVC), this is the second year of intercollegiate beach volleyball nationwide as a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) sport. While there were already age group junior tournaments prior to this point in Southern California, the sport’s acceptance into the NCAA marks its continuing rise in popularity. “It’s going to explode, I think,” says Eric Fonoimoana, 2000 Olympic gold medalist for volleyball and coach of the Mira Costa girls’ beach volleyball team. He’s convinced that the popularity of beach volleyball, particularly amongst female high school volleyball athletes in the South Bay, will only increase. “There’s a big carrot out there for women to get a scholarship,” he says.
“THEY’RE SOPHOMORES AND JUNIORS, AND THEY’RE LEARNING THINGS THAT I FIRST LEARNED WHEN I WAS 26.”
Colleges like Pepperdine are already offering sand volleyball scholarships, now that the sport is part of the NCAA, and athletes who play indoor can now make the decision on which aspect (sand or indoor) of the sport they’d like to focus on to maximize their chances of earning a scholarship. “In the future, you’re going to see more opportunities for women, and now they can choose,” says Eric. The team is still relatively new, and the
athletes on Mira Costa’s sand team split their time between both indoor and outdoor sand volleyball, which means they can only practice a couple of times during the week. Eric believes that once more colleges start picking up beach volleyball, high school volleyball players will begin to drop indoor and focus solely on sand—which is why he’s trying to teach his athletes everything he knows about the sport. “They’re sophomores and juniors, and they’re learning things that I first learned when I was 26.” However, at Redondo Union, the beach volleyball team is facing a different issue. “It’s hard to commit to both,” says Tommy Chaffins, head of girls’ volleyball at the school. Many of their indoor volleyball players want to play sand but are having difficulty finding the time to do so. They’re often splitting their time between club indoor and the school’s sand team, and as Tommy notes, there just are “not enough hours in the day.” The time crunch puts a lot of stress on the players, so Redondo Union is still working to find more players for the girls’ sand volleyball team. For now, the school’s only testing the waters, but Tommy remains optimistic. He says sand volleyball is “still in its infancy stage, but with the sand scholarship, people will see it as a viable option.” Once the sport starts to gather more of a following at the college level, only then will high school athletes start to focus on playing sand only.
Over on the SPVC side of things, there are talks about adding a boys’ high school league later this year. And if local colleges continue to provide sand scholarships, there’s a good chance that the sport will increase in popularity for both genders at the high school level. From the beach to the ice rink, the Mira Costa ice hockey team is looking to make the jump from club sport to an official school team. “We don’t practice at all; we just play,” says Trevor Oystrick, coach of the Mira Costa club team. Many of the kids on the team have a deep interest in the sport. Some, he notes, are part of private club teams and later will go on to play at the college level. But for now, the team is mostly just for fun. He notes that while ice hockey might not be something that seems popular in the South Bay, the sport does have roots here. Dustin Brown, captain of the LA Kings, and several teammates call the South Bay home. The team’s main training facility, the Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo (Mira Costa also practices there), is also right in the heart of the South Bay. The fan base is alive and well, but the sport needs more structure and development at the high school level. “It’s hard to get funding for the program from the school,” says Trevor, “so it basically has to be self-funded.” Local hockey enthusiasts can help support the future of the Mira Costa hockey program by visiting gofundme.com/miracostahockey to make a donation. ?
16? Southbay Health 2013 | oursouthbay.com