As the volleyball player who doesn’t love volleyball got
warmed up, he dribbled. Between the legs and behind the back the
volleyball went. Then he flipped it to the setter, leapt, and
slammed it home.
Point taken.
UCLA’s Matt McKinney wants to show that he can play both
basketball ““ the sport he loves ““ and volleyball
““ the sport he likes. After only one day of volleyball
practice, McKinney the opposite hitter was ready to help the Bruins
make a playoff push. But after a summer of basketball practice,
McKinney the forward was the only scholarship player on the team to
redshirt.
“It’s obvious that I’m better at volleyball,
always have been,” McKinney said. “I know that and
everyone else knows that.”
And that’s part of the problem, part of why there is this
war within McKinney that began somewhere in between spiking his
first volleyball four years ago at Santa Ynez High School and
eventually setting the all-time school record for kills.
McKinney emerged as one of the top prep volleyball prospects in
recent years, but his stellar reputation in a sport supposedly
played by hoops rejects made him a sleeper recruit in basketball
““ his first love.
“When I play basketball, my whole body is tingling with
excitement,” McKinney said. “I don’t get that
with volleyball.”
“Matt has a vertical leap you only see once in a lifetime,
but basketball coaches got scared off and didn’t even bother
to recruit him,” said Cris Avery, McKinney’s basketball
coach at Santa Ynez. “The first thing they said was,
“˜We don’t have a volleyball program.'”
Former UCLA basketball coach Steve Lavin, who was fired last
month, originally didn’t even know McKinney was a potential
basketball recruit. It was Chris Peña, a volleyball player for
UCLA and formerly for Santa Ynez who had to clue Lavin in to
McKinney, the one-time 5-foot-10-inch ninth-grade beanpole who is
now a 6-foot-8-inch behemoth.
At Santa Ynez, McKinney was no slouch in basketball, setting
all-time marks for points and rebounds. He was recruited to play
both basketball and volleyball at UC Irvine, UC Santa Barbara and
Pepperdine, but he wanted to play major college basketball in the
Pac-10.
It had always been a dream for McKinney, who grew up a UCLA fan
on a 10-acre ranch complete with horses and sheep in the small
Santa Barbara suburb of Santa Ynez, to play Bruin basketball.
But with only a scholarship offer from UCLA for volleyball and
Lavin interested but wanting to save his final scholarship for
higher-rated recruits, McKinney was all set to go to Arizona State
for its basketball as well as its beauties.
“Most athletes make decisions using what’s between
their legs,” Peña explained.
ASU does not have an NCAA volleyball program, and this was the
closest McKinney had ever come to giving up one sport ““ the
one that many believed would ultimately take him to the Olympic
Games.
“All my life I’ve had people tell me you have to
focus on one sport if you want to be good,” McKinney said.
“The thought has crossed my mind millions of times, but I
wanted to give basketball a shot. I’m a better basketball
player than people perceive me.
“What other people say ““ whatever. It makes me kind
of angry. I had to follow my love.”
UCLA volleyball coach Al Scates made things all better. It was
he who surprised McKinney at his in-home recruiting visit by
bringing Lavin, who came bearing a basketball scholarship offer.
Scates also told McKinney that even though the two seasons overlap,
he was welcome join up with the volleyball team after basketball
season.
“We knew we had him after we took pictures with the
McKinney family,” Scates said.
It was a symbolic snapshot of McKinney, Scates and Lavin
together because both volleyball and basketball were back in the
picture.
McKinney, who had divided his time between sports for four years
in high school, was now set to do it all over again at UCLA.
Not surprisingly, it hasn’t been easy, especially with the
basketball and volleyball teams suffering through their worst
seasons in recent memory.
McKinney decided before basketball season to redshirt upon
learning he would be receiving limited minutes.
Tired of sitting on the bench during games, he showed up earlier
than expected to volleyball practice one day and played the
following night. He was in the starting lineup a week and a half
later, but even that wasn’t easy to deal with because of
veterans who saw him as the hotshot freshman basketball player
taking their playing time.
“Some guys were insulted,” Peña said.
Most recently, McKinney has been dumbfounded by his demotion to
the second team. Two matches after recording a career-high 16 kills
against defending national champion Hawai’i last month, he
lost his starting job. In the past two matches, with UCLA fighting
to stay alive in the playoff race, McKinney has failed to even make
the traveling squad.
After a good week of practice, however, he will likely start
tonight and Saturday.
“Matt was a superstar in high school and got by on
athleticism, but now he’s playing against guys his
size,” Scates said. “If I had him for a full season,
he’d be an All-American. But he needs a complete revision of
his fundamentals, and it won’t happen overnight.”
Still, Scates, who once almost resigned after secretly playing a
member of John Wooden’s basketball team, won’t be the
one to make McKinney choose between sports. In fact, Scates is
toying with the idea of redshirting McKinney next season since his
prized recruit is so far off fundamentally.
Ben Howland, who took over as UCLA basketball coach this past
week, is a Santa Barbara native who has friends that followed
McKinney’s career in high school. There has been increasing
speculation that Howland will make McKinney choose.
“Ultimately I control my own destiny,” McKinney
said. “I’m sure whatever decision I make will be the
best one.”
If McKinney is sure of anything, he is sure of that ““ even
if the decision won’t be a slam dunk.