Northridge Could Profit More From a Small Gate : Volleyball: Matador coach banking on partisan crowd for help in WIVA tournament opener.

By decree of the Western Intercollegiate Volleyball Assn., the host school of the conference’s postseason tournament must funnel all proceeds from the event to its men’s volleyball program.

Which means that Coach John Price of Cal State Northridge can be excused if images of dollar signs are dancing in his head.

But, truth be told, Price cares very little how much money is generated during the three-day, six-team tournament that begins this evening and ends Saturday in the CSUN gym.

Rather than filling the stands with fans willing to pay $10 for a reserved seat or $7.50 for general admission, Price would rather see students--preferably from CSUN--at the price of $5 each.

Forget visions of the almighty buck. Price would settle for a rerun of Northridge’s WIVA match against Pepperdine in March. More than 1,500 showed up at CSUN to watch the Matadors’ four-game victory, but only 475 tickets were purchased. Students attended free.

“Either a lot of people snuck in doors, or there were a lot of students,” Price said. “Even though students don’t help (as much) at the box office, they’re absolutely critical to our program.”

Certainly the Matadors could use any support a partisan crowd could offer. Northridge’s first-round opponent at 7:30 is second-ranked USC, which has defeated CSUN in eight of 10 games this season.

The Trojans are 22-4 overall and 12-4 in WIVA play, good for only third place in the hotly contested Wilson Division.

Northridge (13-11), which has never defeated USC in 19 non-tournament matches, lost two regular-season matches to the Trojans this season and earned a split decision in a pair of tournaments. The Matadors won consecutive games, 15-11, 15-11, against USC in the Santa Barbara tournament in January.

The winner of the CSUN-USC match will play third-ranked UCLA (22-4), champion of the DeGroot Division, on Thursday night at 7:30. The winner of tonight’s 5:30 match between Stanford (14-6) and UC Santa Barbara (13-14) will play top-ranked Cal State Long Beach (25-6) on Thursday at 5:30 in the other semifinal.

Thursday night’s winners will meet in the title match Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and the champion will receive the conference’s automatic qualifying berth to the national Final Four on May 4-5.

Sixth-ranked Northridge is a combined 1-7 in regular-season matches against its tournament opponents, having gone 1-1 against Santa Barbara. The Matadors, however, have extended Long Beach and UCLA to five games and have defeated both the Bruins and USC in tournaments.

“We’ve proven we can play with any team in the country,” Price said. “We’re good enough to win it, but then so is everyone else.”

A raucous home crowd, Price believes, could make a difference.

“At SC and UCLA, volleyball is just another sport and just another national championship,” Price said. “But at Northridge, it’s important. We’re a very young and emotional team, and when we’re up we tend to play very good volleyball. With a crowd, even when we hit a flat spot, all it’s going to take is a few good plays to turn it around.”

Northridge will start freshmen Coley Kyman, Ken Lynch and Gary Reznick, along with juniors Neil Coffman, Mark Root and Raphael Tulino against USC, the WIVA’s top hitting team.

Coffman was sixth in the WIVA in digs (2.02 per game) and seventh in kill average (5.39). Root was fifth in service aces (20) and Kyman was sixth with 94 blocks.

USC is led by Bryan Ivie, a junior who led the conference in kill average (7.81) and was fourth in hitting percentage (.411).

Former Harvard High teammates Robert Hillman and Mike Lowe will play for Stanford against Santa Barbara tonight.