SOUTHERN SECTION 2-A VOLLEYBALL FINAL : Royal, Canyons Vie to Reward Coaches for Their Investments

Bob Ferguson and Ardyce Masters enjoy coaching high school volleyball so much that they have been willing to pay for the privilege.

Ferguson and Masters dug deep into their own pockets to start the boys’ interscholastic volleyball teams at Royal and Canyon, respectively, beginning with the 1988 season.

Both programs enjoyed instant success, making the playoffs in their first season. Two years and many victories later, the teams will meet in the Southern Section 2-A Division championship at 3:30 p.m. today at Marina High in Huntington Beach.

“This is the way it should be,” Ferguson said. “The No. 1 (Royal) and No. 2 seeds playing for all of the marbles. The fact that we’re friendly rivals makes it even sweeter.”

Ferguson and Masters already had established winning girls’ volleyball teams at their schools by the time they got the yearning to start boys’ squads. But the coaches were met with some resistance.

In 1987, Ferguson was turned down by the Royal administration. Masters, fearing similar feedback, started a club team at Canyons that year. She volunteered her coaching time and helped raise enough money to pay for uniforms, transportation, and other costs incurred in starting up a team.

A year later, both coaches had sold their schools’ administrators on boys’ volleyball. Ferguson persuaded Royal Principal David Jackson by promising to raise the necessary money. Masters said her school agreed to pick up the tab after seeing the success of the club team.

The Royal Volleyball Club, headed by players’ parents, raises about $5,000 a year to help pay for tournament fees, uniforms and coaches’ salaries. The school covers transportation costs.

Canyon does some fund-raising but needs less private money since the sport is school-supported.

“These are what you call grass-roots organizations,” said Ferguson, whose wife, Sandy, coaches the Royal girls’ and boys’ junior-varsity teams. “These teams were started by coaches who eat, breathe and sleep volleyball. We simply acted on our passion.”

That passion has resulted in a winning formula. In three years, Ferguson has compiled a 50-4 record, Masters a 41-5 mark. Royal, which plays in the Frontier League, has won the league title every year, as has Canyon in the Golden League. Both teams have qualified for the playoffs each season, and Royal is the defending 2-A champion.

This season, Royal is the top-ranked team in 2-A with a 19-0 record. Second-ranked Canyon is 16-1, its only loss a five-game defeat by Royal. Except for the 2 1/2-hour showdown against the Cowboys in March, the Highlanders have won all of their matches in three games.

Masters, 50, said winning the championship means more to her than to her counterpart.

“I’ve been coaching for 20 years and never won a CIF title,” she said. “Bob has won before, but I haven’t. Believe me, I’m working hard and not getting much sleep this week. This is exciting and very important to me.”

Ferguson, 42, is going for his third Southern Section title in a year. Besides the boys’ victory last spring, his girls’ squad won a title this past fall.

Masters coached the girls’ team at Canyon from 1970-88, taking her teams as far as the semifinals. She relinquished the job to longtime assistant Linda Johnston last fall because of her increasingly busy schedule.

“Coaching both teams is a grind and I’m not getting any younger,” said Masters, who also is the girls’ athletic director at Canyon. “The boys still needed someone to fire them up, but they girls already were established and not in need of that same kind of energy.”

The response to boys’ volleyball has been positive at both schools. Ferguson said more than 50 students tried out for the junior varsity and varsity teams this season. Masters said she had more than 60 kids try out.

The interest has been matched by plenty of talent. Royal graduate Dean Borth, a setter, was named to the All-Southern Section team last year. This season’s squad is well-balanced with middle blocker Kevin Hambly (6-foot-6 1/2) and outside hitter Adam White (6-2) controlling the net and setter Travis Ferguson (5-6), the coach’s son, taking charge of the backcourt.