Foundation for men’s volleyball set in place

Four of the country’s top prep volleyball players — Tyler Cundiff, Ben Lam, Robbie McKnight and Austin Rysyk — will join USC for the 2012 season, USC coach Bill Ferguson announced on May 19.

The new class features state and club champions, players selected to be part of the national team’s pipeline of talent and a multitude of individual accolades.

“We’re thrilled to have these players join our program,” Ferguson said. “They will contribute to our team immediately by adding talented depth and they will be a big part of the future of our program.”

These new recruits will be charged to be part of a reloading process that will have to replace the efforts of four seniors that made up the country’s top recruiting class in 2007.

This time, however, the expectations are geared toward continuing a growing legacy rather than starting a new one.

When Ferguson was hired in 2006, the Trojans were fighting through a four-year stretch where they placed 11th out of 12 teams in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Conference.

Upon hire, Ferguson was inexperienced as a coach. He had, however, fostered deeply rooted connections in the high school club volleyball scene as a coach of the Southern California Volleyball Club. His skills as a recruiter were polished as he was finely in tune with the prep scene.

“I knew how to recruit, put a team together and get things going,” Ferguson said. “I always said that if there were a school that could revive themselves, it would be USC.”

As a result of the young coach’s leadership, the Trojans have been to two NCAA Final Fours in the past three seasons. This season, the Trojans paraded through the season as the No. 1 team, ending the season in a close five-set match in the NCAA semifinal.

The Trojans were under the steady guide of four senior leaders this season — the four that made up Ferguson’s first recruiting class, ranked as the best in the country.

Through the most tense moments and through tedious lulls, outside hitter Tri Bourne, setter Riley McKibbin, opposite Murphy Troy and middle blocker Austin Zahn have set prime examples of work ethic and persistence that propelled the Trojans to a No. 1 ranking throughout the season.

The four were chosen to be engines for a top-down program overhaul. Where pre-Ferguson teams were plagued by academic shortcomings and trouble on the court, his first recruits were top-notch athletes as well as high-achieving students.

The maturity and leadership skills demonstrated by the four student-athletes laid the foundation for an improved brand of USC volleyball. In the last three years, the Trojans have been to the NCAA Final Four twice, while reaching the NCAA championship match once.

The four boast seven combined All-MPSF awards and five All-American awards. McKibbin and Troy have served as co-captains for three and two years, respectively. Troy and Zahn were four-year starters and Bourne and McKibbin were three-year starters.

Cundiff, Lam, McKnight and Rysyk will be integral parts of the effort to reload and regain national prominence.

The four will add depth — and possibly replace — three of the four positions vacated by the 2007 group. Rysyk will strengthen the outside hitter position that lost two of its top three to graduation. Similarly, Cundiff and Lam will provide depth to the middle blocker position that graduated two of its top three. McKnight will vie for the setter spot vacated by three-year starter McKibbin.

As the Trojans’ season came to a close in the NCAA semifinals, the fearsome recruiting class from four years ago left the floor, never to return. They took a bottom-feeder program and turned it into a national powerhouse. They finished the regular season with a No. 1 ranking the last two years and earned a trip to the national championship match the year before that.

These Trojans have yet to bring a national championship home to the Galen Center, Ferguson’s and his first recruits’ combined effort to lead USC volleyball back to dominance during their collective stay is laudable. By building a program of successful students and excellent athletes, their legacy will live on through the success of their understudies for seasons to come.

 

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