Guerrilla Warfare at the Net

At best, he is a volleyball coach in limbo. At worst, he is the volleyball coach from hell, making life miserable in some of the highest offices at the university that is still paying his salary.

He is Jim Huffman, Cal State Fullerton’s resident pain in the athletic department, and proud of it.

He was at it again Thursday, using the occasion of National Women In Sports Day to call a press conference, thumb his nose, tweak some others and promote a cause that is headed to court barring a pre-Feb. 20 settlement--the restoration of his recently guillotined women’s volleyball program.

Huffman is suing Cal State Fullerton on the grounds that the school violated Title IX and state education code provisions when it announced women’s volleyball, along with men’s gymnastics, would be dropped from the 1992-93 athletic budget. His day in court arrives in less than two weeks. In the interim, Huffman has launched a promotional campaign that is best described in the terminology of his sport:

Set, spike and kill.

Huffman doesn’t defer reporters’ questions with a flip “Talk to my attorney,” although he does have one, the very eager Kirk Boyd, who says things like “I’ll litigate this to the Supreme Court and enjoy the whole process.” Huffman takes a reporter’s question, soaks it in gasoline, stuffs it inside a bottle, lights it and lobs it back, usually in the direction of university President Milton Gordon.

“I’ve never met the man,” Huffman says of Gordon. “I’ve never had the chance to shake his hand and say, ‘I’m Jim Huffman, coach of your volleyball team.’ He walked by my office the other day and gave me the stink eye, and I don’t even know if he knew who I was.

“He might’ve been in a bad mood and looking at everybody like that. The guy’s pretty upset with me because I’m making his life miserable for something he should have thought through a lot more before he did it.”

Case in point: Gordon was tending to some light presidential type work during halftime of Tuesday’s men’s basketball game, presenting a letterman’s jacket to a generous booster, when a voice from the crowd rang out, “Bring back volleyball!” Gordon stopped in mid-sentence, looked over his shoulder, said, “No, we’re not going to bring back volleyball,” and promptly resumed the ceremony at hand.

Case in point II: In an effort to spread the word, Huffman had flyers printed and had team members post them all over campus. Gleefully, Huffman reports that when his players reached the administration building, “This one lady walked by and said, ‘Come with me,’ and took them up to Gordon’s office. They plastered flyers on his door, where he comes out of the elevator, all over the administration building and out to his parking space. I’m not going to mention the lady’s name, but this shows how furious women are about this.”

Huffman insists he’s merely invoking the squeaking-wheel theory--”It’s like everything else, if you don’t scream about it, nothing’s gonna be done about it”--but the coach is screaming himself out of employment, win or lose the injunction.

This Huffman has already accepted.

“(Athletic Director Bill) Shumard told me that if it was up to the president, he’d renege on my 30 days (severance pay) right now,” Huffman says, laughing. “What does that tell you? And the way he bit back at the basketball game the other night about volleyball, I think he’d just as soon cough up a lung than have me around.”

You want a working definition of Pyrrhic victory, there you have it.

“People have called me and said, ‘Jim, I’m concerned about your career. If you’re going to stand up for this issue, how is this going to affect you in the future?’ ” Huffman says.

“That’s not the important thing. That’s not something that’s even being considered. The thing to be considered right now is: If you’re right, you’re right. That’s all there is to it. And that’s something Maryalyce Jeremiah, one of our athletic directors, told me a year and a half ago. No matter what, if you believe in your heart you’re right, you’re doing the right thing.”

Besides, Huffman says, he has friends--most of them without Fullerton business addresses.

“I’ve had a lot of friends, other coaches, call up and say, ‘Hey, I’ll make a spot for you’ or ‘My assistant may be leaving and I’ll get you in a second,’ ” he says. “I’ve got 30 days, and after that, I’ve got about another month of vacation coming. So I figure I’ve got a while to think about it. Maybe I can strike up an old pro career.”

In the meantime, it’s guerrilla warfare. More flyers, more inflammable material, until the other side accepts a cease-fire--a settlement, with volleyball restored at minimal funding--or a Feb. 20 engagement in West Orange County Municipal Court.

“You know Dr. Gordon loves getting letters,” Huffman told a handful of students as they walked out of the press conference. “I’ve got a stack of 60 letters already. I’m going to walk over to him this afternoon and give them to him.”