Smith, the first player to win 100 open beach volleyball tournaments, has been suspended since May 31 and may not participate or attend USA Volleyball sanctioned events, according to USA Volleyball’s suspended list.

The reason for the suspension is listed by USA Volleyball as “U.S. Center for SafeSport administrative hold.”

When asked if the listing of Smith suspension was accurate and what was the reason for the suspension, Liani Reyna, USA Volleyball manager for SafeSport, said: “I have no comment.”

USA Volleyball communications manager B.J. Hoeptner-Evans also declined to comment.

Smith, in a series of telephone interviews and text messages since October 10, said he has “no idea why” he has been suspended by USA Volleyball.

Smith said he was unaware of the suspension until he was informed of it by SCNG more than four months after it went into effect.

“I’m not sure why you are hell bent on trying to mess with me?” Smith said in a text Thursday in response to a question about when he was last a member of USA Volleyball. “I think it is time to stop trying to find a way to tarnish my career. You must have better things to do?”

Smith on October 12 said he spoke with Reyna “who knows nothing.”

Smith said he is no longer a member of USA Volleyball. Nineteen persons on USA Volleyball’s suspended members list have “U.S. Center for SafeSport administrative hold” cited as the rule or code violation for their suspension. All 19 were suspended after their USA Volleyball membership had lapsed.

Smith said he does not remember when he was last a member of USA Volleyball.

“Don’t know,” he said. “Haven’t kept track.”

On Oct. 12, Smith also said he spoke to an official at the U.S. Center for SafeSport after speaking with Reyna. Smith said he did not recall the name of the U.S. Center for SafeSport official he spoke to.

The SafeSport official told Smith “they have no reason to investigate because I am not a USAV member,” Smith wrote in an Oct. 12 text. “She said USAV had no reason to post my name on their suspended list as I am not a member (of USA Volleyball). There is no suspension of non members. If I was trying to become a member, then they could open an investigation. I don’t have a reason to become a member.

“If for some reason there was a serious offense reporter, I am sure I would have heard something from other sources (of course there is not).

“If I decide to become a member of the USAV, I may find out what the issue is but like I said, no reason to do so at this time. Still, my curiosity is peaked!

“The gal at safe sport said there is a range of potential offenses that could be reported including verbal abuse all the way to much worse stuff which I think is listed on their site.”

Smith said the SafeSport official encouraged him to check back with USA Volleyball to see if they would remove his name from the suspended list. More than three weeks ago he said he contacted USA Volleyball again about the suspension. Smith said on Monday he still had not heard back from USA Volleyball.

A U.S. Center for SafeSport spokesman declined to comment on Smith’s status as suspended.

Hoeptner-Evans, USA Volleyball’s communications manager, initially declined to comment on the Smith suspension in early October. On Wednesday SCNG contacted Hoeptner-Evans again detailing Smith’s comments and asking for the reason for the suspension and if the national governing body would confirm that the suspension is still in place. Hoeptner-Evans said she would relay the questions to her bosses at USA Volleyball. In an email Thursday, Hoeptner-Evans wrote, “we do not have a response for your article.”

Smith, 66, has been involved in coaching and putting on clinics since retiring as a player in 2001. He coaches the Sinjin Beach Club, an age-group program based out of Santa Monica, adjacent to the Annenberg Beach House.

“Beach volleyball isn’t just a sport, it’s a lifestyle,” reads the Sinjin Beach Club website. “Our club embodies this by giving our players the tools to compete at the highest level and to have fun while doing so. We achieve this by offering elite coaches and drills that have been tested and proven by King of the Beach, Sinjin Smith. The most important thing to us is growing the sport and bringing it back to what it used to be.”

Smith has also run camps for the past 21 years. This past summer, Sinjin Smith’s Beach Volleyball Camps (BVC) operated camps in nine Los Angeles County communities.

Smith is the third current or former U.S. Olympic volleyball team member to be suspended by USA Volleyball in recent years.

Scott Touzinsky, a 2008 Olympic gold medalist with the United States volleyball team, was suspended by USA Volleyball in July 2018 in response to allegations of sexual misconduct involving an underage female athlete at a camp or clinic in Canada, according to U.S. Center for SafeSport and USA Volleyball documents obtained by the Southern California News Group.  

Beach player Taylor Crabb was suspended by USA Volleyball in 2017 for misconduct involving a minor-aged girl, according to USA Volleyball documents obtained by SCNG. USA Volleyball’s board of directors voted unanimously in May 2019 to extend the suspension through Sept. 28, 2021, after Crabb breached a settlement agreement for the first suspension by coaching at a camp for junior girls.

The decision was made with the clear realization that it would prevent Crabb from competing in the Tokyo Olympics, originally scheduled for 2020. An arbitrator later reduced Crabb’s suspension, clearing the way for him to compete in the 2021 Olympic Games. Crabb, however, missed the Tokyo Games after contracting COVID just days before the Olympics. He most recently teamed with Taylor Sander to win his first Manhattan Beach Open on Aug. 20.

Smith, a 1996 Olympian, led UCLA to NCAA titles in 1978 and 1979 and was a member of the U.S national team indoors from 1979 to 1982 before focusing on the beach game.

Smith won AVP International titles in parts of three decades. He was so dominant that the International Volleyball Hall of Fame called him the “King of the Beach” when he was inducted into the hall in 2003.

Smith even inspired an Electronic Arts video game fittingly called “King of the Beach.”

Smith was also influential off the beach, playing a leading role in the creation of the AVP, eventually serving as president and on the board of directors for the group. He was also a driving force behind the creation FIVB World Tour. Smith also served as president of the Beach Volleyball World Council.

All alone.

He was full of run and confidence. The injuries and ulcer that had hounded him for the past 18 months were behind him. So here he was in the inaugural conference championships attacking the first in a series of climbs, the runner who had captured global attention for the second half of the 1960s, a grown up version of the scrawny teenager from Spokane who had upset the Soviets at the Coliseum in 1964, the world record-holder, already the winner of a record 10 NCAA titles, Gerry Lindgren, American distance running’s king of the freaking hill once again flying solo.

“When I ran cross country I would always take off like mad and get a big lead and then I could just coast and do whatever I wanted because it was over already,” Lindgren said in a telephone interview earlier this month. “So the first mile of the race I remember taking off like mad, being all by myself and going up this long hill and then I get almost to the top of the hill and then that damn Pre sprints by me. I can’t believe it. Nobody’s ever been there.”

Over the remaining miles of the 6-mile race Lindgren and Oregon freshman Steve Prefontaine would take themselves and the sport, the conference to places they had never been before, repeatedly attacking each other mile after mile, hill after hill, with a series of relentless bursts, both courageous and reckless, testimonies to their pride as much as their talent, until they crossed the finish line totally spent, literally shoulder to shoulder, colliding in combat and exhaustion in what remains the greatest cross country race ever held on American soil.

Lindgren and Prefontaine were so inseparable in the end, E. Garry Hill, the longtime editor of Track & Field News, recalled that it took “forever to adjudicate the finish picture.”

Eventually Lindgren was declared the winner although the outcome remains the source of debate in running circles more than a half-century later.

What remains clear is the epic nature of Lindgren and Prefontaine’s battle and the transformative impact the race had on college cross country and American distance running.

Hill covered 11 Olympic Games and 15 World Championships for Track & Field News, the self-proclaimed Bible of the sport. But in 1969 he was a former Washington State triple jumper who happened to be in the Bay Area interviewing for a statistician job with the Los Altos-based magazine.

“From the vantage point of today,” Hill said of the 1969 Pac-8 race “it remains in a three-way tie with a pair of Olympic races” as the greatest footrace he has ever witnessed.

The other two?

The 2000 Olympic Games 10,000-meter final in which Ethiopia Haile Gebrselassie, the defending Olympic champion and world record holder, came from behind in the closing meters to edge Kenya’s Paul Tergat, winner of five consecutive World cross country titles, by nine-hundredths of a second for the gold medal, and the 2004 Olympic 1,500 final in which Kenya’s Bernard Lagat pulled ahead of Morocco’s world record-shattering Hicham El Guerrouj halfway down the final homestretch only to have El Guerrouj to fight back to claim by twelve-hundredths the one major title that had previously eluded him.

End of a Pac-12 traditiond

The Prefontaine-Lindgren showdown was the opening act of an unprecedented more than half-century run by the conference that comes to a close with the breakup of the Pac-12 and the final conference cross country championship Friday morning near Tacoma.

“The Conference of Champions is no more,” Meb Keflezighi, a Pac-10 and NCAA cross country champion at UCLA and the 2004 Olympic marathon silver medalist. “It’s hard to imagine.”

“The history that has been written with all those great athletes and those great teams and coaches to a certain degree will be lost because when you had the conference meet every year it brings back those memories to everybody and now that’s gone,” said longtime UCLA coach Bob Larsen. “Or will be gone.”

The 1969 race would awaken a sleeping giant who would in turn provide a wake-up call for the rest of the nation, forever changing the autumn landscape, shifting the sport’s balance of power to the Pac-8 and later the Pac-10 and Pac-12 from the East Coast and Midwest, and in the process pushing American distance running to new heights.

“That Pac-8 in ’69 opened a few eyes to ‘hey, there’s some great runners out there and let’s get them all to nationals and see who can win,’” said Don Kardong, who ran for host Stanford in the 1969 race and later finished fourth in the 1976 Olympic marathon.

And for most of the next decade, the winners wore the iconic lemon yellow with green lettering singlet of Oregon or the maroon and silver of Washington State.Conference teams and runners would dominate college cross country for the next decade and beyond.

Pac-8/Pac-10 runners won eight of the next 11 NCAA individual titles, Lindgren in his final collegiate race, winning his third national cross country title, his 11th NCAA championship overall, 10 days after his duel with Prefontaine. Prefontaine and Washington State’s Henry Rono by the end of the coming decade had also joined Lindgren as the then only three-time NCAA champions. Oregon’s Edward Cheserek became only the fourth man to claim three NCAA titles, winning the 2013, 2014 and 2015 races. Stanford’s Charlie Hick’s victory last November clinched the 22nd NCAA title by a conference runner.

Pac-12 schools have won 12 NCAA men’s team titles.

“We were able to up the ante a little bit,” Lindgren said. “You had to run better in cross country to win than you ever had to before.

“It changed everything.”

How Bill Dellinger changed the sport

But perhaps the most transformative figure in the conference’s rise to national supremacy was Oregon coach Bill Dellinger.

The recent reflection on the conference’s history has shown a fresh light on a man who for too long was cast in the shadow of his mentor, iconic Oregon coach Bill Bowerman, the co-founder of Nike.

“He had immense influence on distance running in general and highlighting cross country and making it a more high profile sport in the United States especially on the West Coast,” Larsen said of Dellinger.

“He was a game-changer,” said Pat Tyson, Prefontaine’s Oregon teammate and roommate who has built his own national caliber program at Gonzaga.Dellinger was Oregon’s first great distance runner under Bowerman. Dellinger was a three-time Olympian, claiming a bronze medal at 5,000 meters in the 1964 Olympic Games. By 1968 he had returned to his alma mater to work as an assistant to Bowerman.

Between 1954 and 1962, Oregon runners won six NCAA mile or 1,500-meter titles. But Bowerman was not motivated to chase similar success through the autumn. Oregon had never sent a team to the NCAA cross country meet until 1962, a year after Oregon State won the national individual and team titles.Oregon finished second at NCAAs in 1963 and 1964. But in 1965 the NCAA increased the race distance from 4 to 6 miles and the Ducks finished a disappointing eighth place. Oregon wouldn’t send another team to NCAAs until Dellinger took over the cross country program in 1969.

“Bill Bowerman was not a fan of cross country, going to the nationals. It was rarely something he wanted to do,” Tyson said. “He wanted to use all fall as base training for outdoor track. But now that Bill Dellinger was in command and they had Pre. … Bill Bowerman gave the leash to Bill Dellinger to go with cross more at the national level.”

Dellinger guided Oregon to NCAA titles in 1971, 1973 and 1974. In the mid-70s he raised the stakes further by recruiting nationally to counter the pipeline of older Kenyan runners at Washington State, attracting schoolboy superstars like Rudy Chapa (Indiana) and Alberto Salazar (Massachusetts) and Manhattan transfer Matt Centrowitz to Eugene.

“Dellinger realized if you’re going to stay competitive you can’t just get guys that are 4:15 (mile) guys down the road and win against world-class competition,” said Rick Riley, a Pac-8 mile champion for Washington State and teammate of Lindgren’s on the 1969 team. “The game was really changing as far as high school times getting better and better and you had to reach out and look for talent. Oregon got Salazar, Rudy Chapa, all these guys. If you were going to win, that’s what you had to do. Plus in the scheme of things Dellinger upped the ante a bit of Bowerman’s training philosophy of alternating hard, easy days.

“There were more miles and the harder was harder and the easier was harder.”

Said Tyson “There was cross country before Dellinger but Dellinger was the first guy who made it honest. If we’re going to compete then we’re going to have to recruit. You bring Rudy in, you bring in Alberto and it just exploded.”

Jaw-dropping times

With a core group of runners that won the 1977 NCAA title and finished second to UTEP teams made up of predominantly older African runners in 1978 and 1979, Dellinger put together the greatest squad of North American college runners ever. Five members of the 1977 Oregon squad made Olympic teams and that doesn’t include Chapa, an NCAA champion at 5,000 meters and the American record-holder in the 3,000, who was hampered by injury in the Olympic year of 1980. Four of the first seven U.S. men under 13 minutes, 20 seconds for 5,000 were on that 1977 Ducks team.

“It would be hard to argue anything better honestly,” Washington coach Andy Powell said of the Oregon group. “That was next level. I think that has got to be the best” North American group.

That Oregon team had to run jaw-dropping times just to keep pace with rival Washington State.

In the early 70s, WSU coach John Chaplin opened up a pipeline of Kenyan runners.

“That changed the dynamic a lot,” Riley said. “That changed the whole character of the sport. Henry Rono was from another planet. I mean he did crazy stuff.”

In the space of 80 days in 1978, Rono set world records at 3,000, 5,000 and 10,000 meters as well at the 3,000 steeplechase. The previous world record-holder at 10,000 was his teammate and countryman Samson Kimombwa, runner-up to Rono in the 1976 NCAA cross country race. Rono repeated in 1977. Salazar won the 1978 NCAA race and then finished second to Rono in 1979.

Until 1983 the conference held Pac-12 Northern Division and Southern Division races two weeks before the league meet.

“Just to be good at the Northern Division meet you had to be world class,” Chapa said. “If you wanted to finish in the top four, top five, you had to beat a couple of world record holders.

“My position always was and it was Alberto’s position also was that (the Kenyans) made us better. You could not be a top three finisher in the the Northern Division cross country or the Pac-8 or Pac-10 meet unless you were world class. So they actually hastened our development to the point where by the time we were sophomores or juniors we were considered world class. The competition required that you had to be that good. And so I looked at it as a real benefit.”

But the optics of Oregon’s homegrown North American squad versus Washington State’s older, already established runners further fueled the sport’s most intense rivalry.

Chapa and Salazar made their college debuts against Rono in the 1976 Pac-8 Northern Division race at Seattle’s Green Lake.

“I remember that race very well. That was my first college race and we had all heard about Washington State and the Kenyans,” Chapa said. “First college cross country event ever and at the start of the race (Oregon’s) Terry Williams and Josh Kimeto (a two-time NCAA 5,000 champion for Washington State) got into it and they actually started fighting and the race started.

“That’s what I remember the most. It took already what was a tense situation being the first race and I knew I wasn’t in Kansas anymore. This was big time, this was not an Indiana high school cross country meet.

“Terry had certain issues … they were international athletes. Terry was a very vocal kind of guy and Kimeto took offense to it. And literally started pushing each other at the starting line.”

It wasn’t until Larsen’s UCLA squad won the 1980 Pac-10 race led by individual winner Ron Cornell that the individual or team conference champion didn’t come from Oregon or Washington State.

“It was a golden age, it truly was,” Riley said.

There would be other golden teams.

UCLA head track coach Jim Bush was so upset with the Bruins fifth-place finish in the 1969 Pac-8 meet that he vowed to never recruit another distance runner.

Over time Bush reconsidered but only slightly. Larsen and UCLA defended their conference title with just two scholarships.

Stanford All-American Greg Brock recalled a discussion he had with teammate Brook Thomas after the inaugural Pac-8 meet.

“Stanford could be really good in cross country,” Brock recalled Thomas saying. “And it took a guy from the East Coast to figure that out.”

Vin Lannana, a graduate of C.W. Post, coached Stanford to NCAA men’s titles in 1996, 2002 and 2003. Lannana and Powell, a middle distance standout at Stanford, guided Oregon to national titles in 2007 and 2008, the latter team featuring two-time Olympic medalist Galen Rupp and future Olympic 1,500 champion Matthew Centrowitz.Colorado won national titles in 2013 and 2014. In the 2014 race, Oregon’s Cheserek and Eric Jenkins went 1-2 and six of the top nine finishers were from the Pac-12.

“When you’ve got six of the top nine,” Powell said. “When you have a good school like Stanford, and Oregon and Colorado that was as dominating as it gets.”

The greatest cross country race

Prefontaine remains the most dominant distance runner in American history. He was the first athlete to win four NCAA outdoor track titles in the same event (3 mile/5,000). At the time of his death in May 1975, killed in a car accident, he held all seven American records at distances between 2,000 and 10,000 meters.

Nearly a half-century after his death, Prefontaine is still perhaps American track’s most transcendent superstar, the subject of two Hollywood feature films and countless marketing campaigns by Nike, the Oregon company he made world famous.

The 1969 Pac-8 race signaled Prefontaine’s arrival.

“It was the transition from when Lindgren was dominant as the best distance runner in the country and then Pre was taking over and they ended up essentially tying after battling each other all the way through,” Kardong said. “It was quite a spectacular race, an amazing battle between the two superstars.”

Lindgren was an unlikely superstar.

He was small with a squeaky voice, no match for his distant, sometimes violent father Myrl.

“My father rejected me because I was weak,” Lindgren later told Sports Illustrated’s Kenny Moore, a college rival at Oregon. “He was the tough drinker. I couldn’t be his son.”

The problem was that Lindgren grew to view himself the same way his father did.

“I never did have the confidence in myself,” Lindgren said in a Runner’s World interview. “I would always look at myself in the mirror, I would see that same wimpy kid that I hated as a child.”

So Lindgren ran, trying to put as much distance as he could be between his father, the broken home, the wimpy kid in the mirror.

“Running was the escape,” Riley said. “That’s what filled the hole in Gerry.

“Running was the vehicle for his self esteem and his escape from a terrible home life.”

He would claim to run as much as 50 miles in a day, 200 miles a week.

Or was it 300?

“He was just such an interesting guy,” said Kardong, who moved to Spokane after graduating from Stanford . “It was hard to tell when he was being serious and when he was just kind of clowning around because he had that antic way of approaching life. So he would tell stories that couldn’t possibly be true. Or he would tell you he had done things, ‘Well, you didn’t do that Gerry.’ It was just hard to figure him out. And yet he was such a spectacular runner.

“(People would say) ‘Oh, yeah, used to see him run by three times a day.’ It might have been true. It was a lot. More than anybody else was doing. If Gerry told you he ran X number of miles, I wouldn’t believe him.”

No matter how far, how fast he ran Lindgren could not shake his demons.

He spent 10 days in jail in Pierce County, Washington in 1978 for failing to pay child support after losing a 1976 paternity suit filed in Ventura County. In 1980 he vanished, leaving behind a wife, three young children, and a financially troubled running store in Tacoma. He remained under the radar until Moore tracked him down in Hawaii in 1987.

“His friends would basically say Gerry was damaged goods,” Riley said. “But there was never a kinder, more generous guy in the world for someone who had so little.

“I roomed with him my freshman year, I hardly ever saw him. He was very much a loner. A very different personality. I always said his problems later in life you had to separate his running from his personal life. “

Lindgren first emerged on the national scene just days before Christmas 1963. Competing against an all-star high school field In an indoor meet at the Cow Palace near San Francisco, Lindgren, a 17-year-old senior at Spokane’s John Rogers High School, shattered the national prep indoor 2-mile record by 21.9 seconds, clocking in at 9 minutes, 00.0 seconds and lapping the entire seven-runner field during 22-lap race including future world mile and 1,500-meter record holder Jim Ryun, who finished 22 seconds behind Lindgren.

A few weeks later Lindgren was back at the Cow Palace to take on Australia’s Ron Clarke, a world record-holder at multiple distances, in an open race.

“He was so little he couldn’t have looked more than 13 years old,” Clarke said later.

But the kid, all 5-feet-6, 118 pounds, was already world class, pushing Clarke all the way to the finish before finishing second but lowering his own indoor national high school record to 8:40.0, a record that stood stand for 49 years until Cheserek, running for New Jersey’s St. Benedict Prep, was clocked in 8:39.15.

That summer Lindgren set a national high school record at 5,000 meters (13:44.0) that stood for 40 years until finally broken by Rupp (13:37.91), then stunned a crowd of 50,519 including U.S. attorney general Robert F. Kennedy at the Coliseum by winning the 10,000 in the U.S.-Soviet Union by nearly a 150 meters in 93-degree heat. It was the first time an American had won the event in the U.S.-Soviet series. Kennedy, it was reported, was moved to tears by Lindgren’s victory.

“I still think it’s too bad that they didn’t do a big documentary or a movie of Lindgren’s coming up through high school and winning the Russia-America meet,” Kardog said. “Because that was an unbelievable performance. Just totally out of the blue. It was one of those things that kind of ignited the distance running scene in the United States.”

Lindgren went on to win the Olympic Trials 10,000 on that same Coliseum track.

“He knocked the world on its ear with his indoor times and then when he beat the Russians,” Riley said. “And then there was a thought that he might pick up a medal or even win the Olympics” in Tokyo later that year.

Instead, battling illness and a sprained ankle, Lindgren finished ninth in an Olympic 10,000 won by another American, unknown Billy Mills, in one of the biggest upsets in the Games’ history.

“When I was in high school, I wanted to go to Oregon and everybody wanted to go to Oregon,” Lindgren said. “But Bowerman wanted nothing to do with me.”

Bowerman and Washington State coach Jack Mooberry were good friends.

“And there was pretty much a gentlemen’s agreement between Jack Mooberry and Bill Bowerman that they kind of left each other’s guys alone (in recruiting),” Riley said.

So Lindgren headed 75 miles south on U.S.-195 to Pullman and Washington State. Freshmen were ineligible to compete in college competition under NCAA rules at the time. But the NCAA, engaged in a turf war at the time with the Amateur Athletic Union, then track’s national governing body, also prohibited college athletes from competing in the U.S. Championships. Lindgren, ignoring an NCAA vow to strip him of his college eligibility and dozens of death threats, defied the ban. He lost to Mills in the 1965 U.S. Championships 6-mile by a margin so small that both men were credited with the world record (27:11.6).

A year later he just missed breaking Clarke’s 3-mile world record, running 12:53.0 in the wind and rain on a muddy track in a nearly empty Husky Stadium in Seattle. His 11 NCAA titles were the most ever by a track and cross country athlete, eclipsing Jesse Owens’ eight national crowns, the previous record. He won the 1966 and 1967 NCAA cross country titles and then redshirted during the 1968 season to focus on the Olympic Trials that fall.

“I don’t think people appreciated the world-class running that Gerry did,” Riley said. “I don’t think people appreciate, A) he won 11 NCAA titles. The only one he lost was when Ryun outkicked him indoors (in the NCAA Championships 2-mile). He could not run as a freshman. There’s another three (NCAA titles) at least. The 12:53 was unbelievable, he just missed the world record, running in the vast empty, windy, crappy track at Washington. He just was the guy who did not have the personality that engaged people like Steve Prefontaine.

“He did not engage the public or excite the public like Pre.”

There was a buzz surrounding Prefontaine even before he landed on the Oregon campus in the fall of 1969.

Stanford’s Brock recalled cooling down with Oregon runners after beating them in the 3-mile in a 1968 dual meet in Palo Alto .

“All the Oregon guys could talk about was this kid Prefontaine,” Brock said.

Two Oregon runners, Arne Kvalheim and Roscoe Divine, joined Dellinger on a recruiting trip to Prefontaine’s hometown of Coos Bay on the Oregon Coast. Kvalheim had just set the collegiate 2-mile record. Divine was a world-class miler. But on a run on the beach, Prefontaine charged ahead of the two Ducks stars.

“Am I going too fast for you?” Prefontaine asked looking back at the pair. “I’ll slow the pace down. Can you keep up with me?”

Riley encountered that same confidence when he called Prefontaine in the spring of 1969 to make a recruiting pitch for Washington State. Three years earlier, Riley, running for Spokane’s Ferris High School, set the national high school outdoor 2-mile record (8:48.4).

“He was a little full of himself,” Riley said recalling the phone conversation. “Very confident, very confident and I appreciated that. He didn’t mince any words about what his goals were and what he wanted to do and what he thought he could do.”

Before hanging up, Prefontaine told Riley “I’m going to break your national high school record.”

“I remember thinking this kid is a confident kid, man,” Riley continued. “But most of the time he could deliver.”

True to his word, Prefontaine ran 8:41.5 in April 1969 to break Riley’s record. That July Prefontaine raced Lindgren in a 2-mile race in Honolulu, the WSU star winning 8:45.6 to 8:48.8.

They would meet four months later in Prefontaine’s collegiate debut at the Pac-8 Northern Division Championships in Corvallis.

The rain-drenched, leaf-covered 6-mile course at Avery Park was a soggy, sloppy mess. The course had several stretches of pavement so WSU coach Mooberry instructed his runners to wear racing flats. Prefontaine wore adidas spikes.

“Pre was a teenager, 18 years old still but fearless,” Tyson said. “Total 100 percent confidence, but total respect. I wouldn’t say Pre worshipped Lindgren but massively respected him.”

The Oregon freshman led early only to have Lindgren build a 60-meter lead in the second and third miles. But then the course hit a treacherous stretch and with Lindgren, already nursing a sore ankle, slipping and sliding, Prefontaine pulled away for a 29:13.8 to 29:41 victory.

Two weeks later they met again at the Pac-8 meet at Stanford.

“Lindgren wouldn’t say much,” Riley said referring to the Northern Division race. “He wouldn’t say I’m going to kick Pre’s ass next time. He just withdrew into himself. He did not like to lose. He was not demonstrative when he won. He’s a pretty humble guy. But you knew with Gerry that week, if Pre was going to beat him this time it was going to be a bloodletting. It was going to be one hell of a race, because Lindgren was that kind of guy.

“He didn’t exude confidence like Pre. He didn’t talk about himself like Pre, but you knew that during the week, you knew that he pushed his foot a little harder on the acceleration during training. He pushed the pace a little bit more. We ran our harder stuff a little harder. You basically knew as his teammate that he was going to go after it.

“You knew something special was coming.”

Prefontaine and Lindgren covered the first mile in 4:23 reducing the rest of the field to spectators.

“Just crazy pace,” said Kardong, who finished 14th that day. “Each of them was trying to put the other one away right from the gun.”

Riley, Brock and Oregon’s Steve Savage, later a 1972 Olympian in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, led the rest of the field.

“I was in the chase pack at 4:29,” Brock said. “My fastest ever through the mile on that course was 4:40. I thought, ‘Oh, boy, I just have to hang in for dear life.’”

As Lindgren started up the first hill he thought he had dropped Prefontaine.

But “all of a sudden I got up to that hill and I wasn’t ahead of everybody and that was something new to me,” Lindgren said. “That was something new to me. I was out of my element.

“So I had to hustle up to the top of the hill and then back down again and I got ahead of Pre and Pre’s fighting me off and I’m thinking my goodness this has never happened to me in cross country.

“And he kept me out of my element the whole race. Not once would he let me go. The whole race we were neck and neck. I’d go by him and try to get a little bit of a lead and he just wouldn’t let me have it.”

At one point the course took a U-turn.

“And you could glance across and see Lindgren and Prefontaine and it was epic,” Brock recalled. “They were shoulder to shoulder. They were so close together they bounced off each other a few times. You knew you were watching greatness.”

On they attacked.

“He kept me out of my element the whole race,” Lindgren said. “Not once would he let me go. And I sprinted several times as hard as I could go just to get away from him and boy did he fight back. The most I ever got away was three steps.”

Said Riley, “Lindgren and Pre were out front just hammering on each other.”

At the top of a final hill, Prefontaine led.

“Went up that last hill, he was a good step ahead of me and I thought it’s all over because he’ll just take off and then he didn’t,” Lindgren said. “He was tired. I was tired.”

Said Riley “when you got into a race and the chips were down, I would always bet on Lindgren. I don’t care who he was running against, I’d bet on Lindgren.”

So they battled on into the final 400 meters, through a gauntlet of screaming fans, neither giving an inch. In the closing meters they collided, their shoulders and elbows crashing into each other.

“My indelible memory is of the two of them in lockstep coming down the long finishing straight at the Stanford golf course,” Hill said. “And them leaning into each other in the closing strides.”

They crossed the finish line leaning into each, still inseparable, forever bonded together by a race for the ages. After a delay that seemed almost as long as the race, officials finally awarded Lindgren the victory. They were given the same time, 28:32.4 which shattered the course record by 74 seconds. Oregon’s Savage outkicked Riley for third (28:58.4 to 29:02.0) with Brock fifth (29:08.0).

“He was strong, using his arms to push me into the crowd on the left side,” Lindgren said. “Because he was using his strength that way instead of going toward the finish line I was able to get my nose to the finish line just before his did.

“It was that close.

“It was my toughest cross country race for sure. It was a real wake-up for me. Because I had never been challenged when I was feeling good and all of sudden this little guy is challenging me.”

Lindgren would go on to win his third NCAA cross country title at New York’s Van Cortlandt Park.

“I was scared, really scared,” Lindgren later told Prefontaine biographer Tom Jordan. “So I wanted to lead the whole way.”

Prefontaine, still feeling the effects of the Pac-8 race, was third. He would never lose a cross country race again.

He took the 1970 NCAA race and thought he had led the Ducks to their first team title as well. “We had the (first place) trophy with us on the plane home,” Tyson said. But after a protest, a controversial review of the finish resulted in Villanova being awarded a belated victory.

Prefontaine repeated in 1971 in a race he almost didn’t run. After Oregon finished second to WSU in the Pac-8 race Ducks athletic director Norv Ritchey decided to only send Prefontaine not the team to the NCAA meet in Knoxville.”Pre said if the team isn’t going, I’m not going,” Tyson recalled.

Ritchey gave in and Oregon won its first national title.

Bowerman, still dismissive of cross country, didn’t make the trip to Tennessee. A week after their victory the university took a photo of the national champions.

“It wasn’t a big deal and then we started winning trophies and it was a big deal,” Tyson said. “Bowerman actually popped in the photo of the NCAA championship team.”

The U.S. Center for SafeSport said it will investigate allegations by multiple parents that Colden Raisher, 35, has engaged in one-on-one texting with minor-aged girls he coaches at The Klub Gymnastics, a club in Los Angeles’ Silver Lake area, in violation of the U.S. Center for SafeSport and USA Gymnastics policies, according to SafeSport, USA Gymnastics and club documents.

SafeSport’s decision to investigate Raisher comes after USA Gymnastics referred the case to the Center last month citing the nature of the allegations, according to SafeSport and USA Gymnastics emails.

U.S. Center for SafeSport officials declined parents’ request to implement restrictions that would have prevented Raisher from having unsupervised contact with minor-aged athletes in the gym and elsewhere.

Raisher, director of the club’s girls competition team, was placed on paid leave by The Klub Gymnastics on Thursday pending the results of the gym’s own investigation into the allegations against him, club owner Mike Eschenbrenner told parents in an email.

“We are moving the case forward to our investigation’s (SIC) unit,” Jennifer Smith, U.S. Center for SafeSport intake coordinator, said in a recent email to a Klub parent. “A decision was made to NOT implement any temporary measure at this time, to include a no contact directive.

“For this reason, Mr. Raisher will not be notified at this time that we are investigating him, what the allegations are or who is talking with the Center. If he has heard there’s an investigation and reaches out, other than being told there is an open case, he will not be given any information at this time. Meaning, while the case proceeds, he will not be told right now that you and your daughter have anything to do with it.”

A USA Gymnastics investigator also confirmed in an email to another Klub parent that SafeSport has taken over the Raisher case.

“Due to the nature of the allegations, this matter was referred to the U.S. Center for SafeSport (the Center), an independent non-profit organization with exclusive jurisdiction over allegations of sexual misconduct, including child sexual abuse, as well as the authority to have discretionary jurisdiction over any alleged violations of the SafeSport Code for the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Movement,” April Clark, a USA Gymnastics investigator, wrote to the parent.

In addition to being a method to engage inappropriate conversations and transmit sexually explicit images, texting and other electronic communication are widely regarded as a way for predatory coaches or officials to groom young athletes for inappropriate relationships and contact.

The U.S. Center for SafeSport and USA Gymnastics have “prevention policies” stating that all one-on-one electronic communications between adult participants and minor athletes must be open and transparent and include another adult participant, whether it be another adult coach or parent or participant. Those communications include texts, emails, phone or video calls, social media, direct messaging and gaming platforms.

The Klub Gymnastics has a similar policy, Eschenbrenner wrote in the email to parents.

“One or more of our kids have been engaging in one-on-one text messaging with other their coach(es),” Eschenbrenner said in the email. “One-on-one text messaging is when your child/gymnast has a texting/DM conversation without at least one parent or adult coach on the text chain. Let me be clear, this is a violation of SafeSport policies and a violation of our TKB Team Policies.”

It is not clear whether Eschenbrenner or Klub employees were aware of the U.S. Center for SafeSport’s decision to investigate Raisher.

Raisher and Eschenbrenner did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

“I have not had the opportunity to review any possible text messages as of yet,” Russell Prince, an attorney for Raisher, wrote in an email to SCNG on this week. “However, it’s my understanding that the club requires the team coaches to provide their personal cell numbers to the families through the Team Handbook. It’s important to remember that if text messages do exist, they may not violate the one-on-one communication policy – and I am certain if any messages do exist they are not ‘grooming’ in nature. Certainly, I would expect that if inappropriate messages did exist the person who contacted you with their complaint would have provided them to you to elevate the nature of your reporting on it. If there are indeed text message exchanges between the family, athlete, and coach, they will be produced for review by either USA Gymnastics or the U.S. Center for SafeSport.

“It’s coach Raisher’s understanding that a complaint has been filed, but it remains unclear where that complaint was filed. We have reached out to the USAG and the Center to seek their assistance in determining who has jurisdiction of the matter and what investigator will be assigned to review any formal documentation related to the complaint. Finally, those text messages are confidential under federal statute and the release of the text messages publicly would likely be a proactive violation of the Code at the Center. It’s unfortunate coach Raisher can’t produce any potential messages outside of the formal investigation. It’s fundamentally unfair for the rules that govern sport to allow complainants the latitude to do as they wish in circumstances such as these, but disallows a coach the ability to publicly disseminate any exculpatory evidence that exists. In this case, that would likely be the text messages themselves.”

USA Gymnastics first received complaints from Klub Gymnastics parents about Raisher over the summer, according to USA Gymnastics documents.

A U.S. Center for SafeSport investigator has not been assigned to the Raisher case at this point, according to a SafeSport document. Such an assignment might not be made for up to 12 weeks, Smith wrote in an email to parents.

Raisher was suspended by USA Gymnastics in 2018 while he was being investigated by the national governing body for alleged inappropriate behavior. Under terms of the 2018 suspensions, Raisher was allowed to continue to coach but was prohibited from having any “unsupervised contact with minors.”

The Klub Gymnastics employees said at the time they were unaware of Raisher’s suspension or the allegations against him until they were questioned by SCNG about the investigation and sanction.

Raisher, in a brief interview with SCNG at the time, said he didn’t have time to go into the specifics of the allegations against him. The USA Gymnastics by-law his suspension is based on stated that his “continued participation could be detrimental to the sport or its reputation.”

“There was no physical or sexual abuse,” Raisher said. “I’ve never done anything questionable. I’m one of the good guys in the sport. USA Gymnastics is trying to cast a very wide net. They’re trying to catch a lot of bad guys. I agree with that. But now anybody can report anything.”

He said in 2018 that the allegations were made by officials at another gym. He previously worked at Golden State Gymnastics in Burbank.

“This has nothing to do with Safe Sport or anything sexual,” Raisher said. “I changed gyms a couple of months ago and they’re retaliating against me.”

Golden State said in a statement in 2018 that it “has not made any complaints against Colden Raisher.”

Raisher said in 2018 he would be willing to talk about his case and explain why he was innocent of the allegations when he had more time, but did not respond to subsequent requests from SCNG to do so.

A USA Gymnastics hearing panel in November 2018 chose not to extend Raisher’s suspension. “After four days of testimony, released a formal decision finding there was no reasonable cause to withhold or encumber Mr. Raisher’s professional membership,” Prince said in an email. “Mr. Raisher was asked to complete additional education regarding coaching techniques that USAG had just begun to use. The requirement was timely completed.

“That document is confidential under the rules.”

Raisher regularly posts coaching technique videos on YouTube that show him working with gymnasts.

“This is a very tough decision and one that we did not take lightly,” Eschenbrenner wrote in the email to parents last week. “There have been enough accusations that we feel this is the best and only direction to go in until we get more clarity.

“To be clear, Colden is innocent until proven guilty and yet I know it looks otherwise since he is on leave. For that reason, I am also asking for you to share your support for his return. You can do that by clearly communicating what you know of your daughter’s own one-on-one text messages especially if you find no issue.”

Cal Poly swimmers were informed of Yoshida’s leave and the university’s investigation by Mustang athletic director Don Oberhelman on September 6, according to two people familiar with the meeting and investigation.

Yoshida was notified by the university’s human resources department that he was placed on leave on August 26, according to two people familiar with the investigation. Athletic department employees were informed of the leave and investigation on September 6, according to people familiar with the investigation.

Oberhelman has told Cal Poly team captains to tell parents not to send him emails about the investigation or complaining about Yoshida to him and that any questions regarding the matter and the swimming program should be directed to the team’s captains, according to a parent of a Mustang swimmer.

Yoshida and Oberhelman did not respond to requests for comment.

Yoshida, a longtime Cal Poly assistant coach, was promoted to head coach after the 2020-21 season.

As many as 40 swimmers on the 2020-21 roster have left the Cal Poly program before completing their collegiate eligibility, according to a review of rosters, interviews with current and former Cal Poly swimmers and athletic department employees and university documents.

Oberhelman has received a steady stream of complaints about Yoshida’s alleged abusive behavior from Mustang swimmers and their parents since Yoshida’s first season as head coach, according to five people familiar with investigation, including current and former university employees, and university documents and records, and emails to and from Yoshida and other athletic department employees obtained by SCNG.

Oberhelman dismissed the allegations and at one point threatened to cut the men’s program if the male swimmers continued to complain against Yoshida, according to four people familiar with the investigation, including current and former athletic department employees.

A group of swimmers met with the university vice president for student affairs in March, according to a person familiar with the investigation. A few weeks later, in May, the university hired a San Luis Obispo human resources consultant to investigate the allegations against Yoshida, according to four people familiar with the investigation. The consultant began interviewing current and former Cal Poly swimmers in May.

A report based largely on the interviews of 40 current and former swimmers and their parents was completed and presented to university officials in June, according to two people familiar with the investigation.

Yoshida was placed on leave after the university received additional allegations that Yoshida had retaliated against an athletic department employee, according to three people familiar with the decision.

Harris routinely sexually harassed players at practices and at school and in late night telephone calls in which he encouraged them to masturbate, pressured them to share details about their sexual relationships with their girlfriends, and provided them with alcohol, marijuana and pornography in attempts to induce them to having sex with him, according to the lawsuit filed against Harris and the El Segundo Unified School District in Los Angeles Superior Court.

A former player who attended El Segundo High between 2005-09 alleges in the lawsuit that a parent of another student complained to the school’s principal about Harris’ continued sexual harassment and grooming, but that the school district took no action “to monitor, supervise or otherwise investigate Harris and prevent the kind of harassment and abuse (the player) was subjected to as a result of his being under the control of” Harris.

Harris, according to the lawsuit, “used his position of trust and authority to repeatedly sexually harass and abuse his students, including (the three players)…by engaging in acts that include, but are not limited to: inquiring about his students’ teenage romances and sexual activities, including whether they were still virgins; suggesting his students engage in specific sexual games and activities with their girlfriends; making explicit requests for sexual activities from his students; carrying on lengthy phone conversations to groom his students for future sexual abuse; serving his students alcohol and marijuana at his private residence as a seduction technique; and engaging in sex acts with his students, including but not limited to manual stimulation of genitalia to orgasm.”

Harris retired unexpectedly shortly before the start of the 2009-2010 school year. At the time, Harris and the school cited health concerns for his stepping away.

“Due to whatever the condition is, he has opted to take the semester off,” El Segundo athletic director Steve Shevlin told the Daily News at the time. “The good news is that George is back home and resting, and that’s a good sign that he’s on the road to recovery.”

Harris did not respond to a request for comment.

El Segundo Unified School District superintendent Melissa Moore issued a statement in response to the lawsuit.

“The El Segundo Unified School District is aware of the pending lawsuit. The district takes all allegations of misconduct very seriously; however, we cannot comment on the specifics of the lawsuit or the associated allegations as this is an ongoing legal matter. The El Segundo Unified School District fosters a culture that promotes the health, safety, and well-being of all students and staff. Creating a safe and respectful environment is our number one priority. We appreciate your understanding at this time.”

Harris, a 23-year employee of the El Segundo Unified School District, joined the El Segundo High water polo coaching staff in 1991. He took over as head coach in 1997 and led El Segundo to the playoffs in 10 of his 11 seasons, reaching the CIF finals three times.

Harris also served as the USC football press box announcer for more than 20 years.

A former player who attended El Segundo between 2002 and 2006 alleges in the lawsuit that Harris invited the student to Harris’ private residence on or around New Year’s Eve and provided him with Old Crow whiskey, pouring the drink into a Gatorade bottle so the underage boy could carry the drink in public.

After giving the student a gift and continuing to provide him with alcohol, Harris propositioned the player according to the lawsuit. Feeling “trapped,” the student eventually agreed to manually stimulate Harris’ genitals using a sex toy, according to the filing.

All three players claim in the suit that they were subjected to lengthy late night telephone calls in which Harris asked about their sexual relations with girls and encouraged them to masturbate, even suggesting various techniques.

The suit also alleges that El Segundo water polo players were required to inform Harris of when they lost their virginity.

But Stewart will be best remembered for a brief statement he made regarding the Court’s decision on a 1964 pornography case. Obscenity, Stewart said, was hard to define but added, “I know it when I see it.”

The phrase, widely repeated at the time and in the years since, would haunt Stewart for the rest of his life.

“In a way, I regret having said what I said about obscenity — that’s going to be on my tombstone. When I remember all of the other solid words I’ve written,” Stewart said in 1981, four years before his death. “I regret a little bit that if I’ll be remembered at all I’ll be remembered for that particular phrase.”

Among those thousands of solid words from Stewart was this: “Censorship reflects a society’s lack of confidence in itself.”

The latter Stewart quote came to mind Sunday afternoon as I sat in the seat I purchased in Section 107, Row 23, Seat 16 at the SAP Center for the USA Gymnastics Championships.

Normally I would be sitting on press row, just as I have through the last seven Olympic Games gymnastics competitions, World Championships, U.S. championships in parts of three decades and NCAA Championships dating back to the early 1990s. I covered 16-year-old Simone Biles’ first U.S. title in Hartford in 2013.

But earlier this month USA Gymnastics unexpectedly denied my credential request to cover Biles’ record-setting  eighth U.S. all-around title.

When I reached out to USA Gymnastics, assuming the rejection was some kind of mistake, I was told by Jill Geer, USA Gymnastics’ chief marketing and communications officer, “We are over-run with media requests and having to make some tough decisions on credentialing. We can’t accommodate you this year.”

Geer’s explanation didn’t ring true since a number of major American newspapers with long histories of covering the sport chose not to join the media stampede to San Jose. From Section 107, directly behind the media section, there were plenty of empty seats on press row. This isn’t the first time Geer’s attempt at spin hasn’t held up and I’m certain it won’t be the last either.

In fact, the Southern California News Group and our readers are being punished, censored by USA Gymnastics for nearly 20 years of relentless reporting that has repeatedly exposed an organization that continues to place money, branding, and marketing over the safety and well being of the young athletes it has been entrusted to protect.

This reporting predated the Larry Nassar scandal by a dozen years and has continued since USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee reached a $380 million settlement with the survivors of Nassar and other predatory coaches and officials.

Indeed, since the Nassar settlement, SCNG has revealed a series of U.S. Center for SafeSport investigations of two of the sport’s most famous coaches for years of alleged abuse, and we’ve reported USA Gymnastics’ response to these and other probes, reporting that has embarrassed the national governing body’s CEO Li Li Leung and undercut the organization’s claim that it has changed the culture of abuse within American gymnastics that allowed Nassar, former Olympic coaches Don Peters and John Geddert to sexually abuse young girls.

Leung, Geer and USA Gymnastics know they haven’t taken the steps to create real culture change in the sport and don’t want someone in San Jose pointing out their failures and wrecking NBC’s fairytale.

Leung’s idea of change is changing the organization’s logo, which USA Gymnastics did last year, a move, Leung said was, “symbolizing the organizational and cultural transformation we have pursued since 2019.”

In reality, all Leung and Geer did was create a new seal of approval for American gymnastics continued culture of abuse.

“Since that time,” Leung told reporters in San Jose, referring to the logo change, “almost every bit of good news related to the sport of gymnastics – from legend athletes returning to the sport to new corporate partnerships to a new feeling of fun and celebration – is a direct reflection of the work that the entire gymnastics community has done to define and cultivate a new culture that prioritizes athletes and their safety, health and wellness.”

The problem is that Leung and USA Gymnastics don’t want to do that heavy lifting that creates true cultural transformation. They just want potential corporate sponsors to think they have. Leung revealed as much in her state-of-the-sport comments last week.

Corporate sponsors like Kellogg’s and Proctor and Gamble dropped USA Gymnastics like it was radioactive in the wake of the Nassar scandal. USA Gymnastics hired Leung, the NBA’s former vice president for global partnerships, to get Corporate America back on board.

Leung’s hiring “was cooked up by a bunch of people from Madison Avenue,” John Manly, an attorney for more than 100 Nassar survivors, said at the time.

“For the business of USA Gymnastics and our mission of supporting athletes, it has manifested itself in a series of new partners joining us,” Leung gushed to reporters in San Jose. “We were so fortunate in the last few years to have long-time partners renew, and since January, USAG has welcomed five brand new partners, including, most recently, Core Hydration, Comcast, and Nike.”

Leung has had a series of tone-deaf moments during her tenure and this was another one.

Nike?

So you’re so serious about changing the culture of a sport that has abused young women for decades that you partner with a company whose track record for treating women is only slightly better than USA Gymnastics?

Nike, the company that offered Olympic champion sprinter Allyson Felix, long one of the most recognizable female athletes sponsored by the Oregon company, detailed in a New York Times piece, a 70 percent pay cut during December 2017 contract negotiations? Felix, who was pregnant at the time, also said Nike failed to put clear guarantees in the contract for maternity protections she had requested.

Nike, the brand that then asked Felix to participate in a female empowerment ad for the company, during the maternity protections negotiations?

The Nike that withheld a quarter of distance runner Kara Goucher’s $325,000 salary because she was pregnant and unable to compete even as the company built a widely popular marketing campaign around the future mom?

“I had worked my butt off for the entirety of my pregnancy while they marketed me as a mother-athlete to consumers, yet they were effectively telling me that none of that work had any value,” Goucher wrote in her recent memoir “The Longest Race.”

The Nike that reportedly for a time paid the legal fees for Alberto Salazar, Goucher’s former coach, who the U.S. Center for SafeSport later ruled had sexually assaulted her?

That Nike?

“I don’t think it rings true at all,” Reshma Block, the Orange County mother of a young gymnast who was repeatedly abused by her coach, said of Leung’s comments in San Jose. “If there’s been change it’s not because of USA Gymnastics. Simone Biles has raised awareness about mental health, but as far as USA Gymnastics changing anything, no.”

Instead, Leung’s tenure has been marked by a series of missteps. Only weeks after being hired, Leung, who competed for the U.S. at the 1988 Jr. Pan American Games, was widely criticized for comments she made related to the Nassar scandal during an interview with NBC’s “Today” show.

“I was seen by Larry Nassar myself, but I was not abused by him, and the reason why I wasn’t abused by him is because my coach was by my side when he saw me,” Leung said. “I was seen by him in a public setting and so I understand what the setting needs to be like in order to ensure safety for our athletes.”

Leung later apologized for the comments, acknowledging that they were “insensitive.”

Leung also drew criticism from former U.S. national team members and their supporters when Olympic champion Mary Lou Retton said in a television interview that Leung was consulting with her. Retton was on the USA Gymnastics board of directors during the Nassar scandal and, according to published reports, was an early defender of the former U.S. Olympic and U.S. national team doctor.

Leung’s first big move at USA Gymnastics was to hire Edward Nyman Jr. as the organization’s first ever sports medicine and science director in the spring of 2019.

“The director of sports medicine and science position is integral in addressing our top priorities of athlete health, well-being and safety,” Leung said at the time of Nyman’s hiring. “Making this hire early on in my tenure was important because it is critical for our becoming more athlete-centric. Ed’s collective professional experiences make him uniquely suited for this role.”

But Nyman was fired after just one day on the job. USA Gymnastics told SCNG that Nyman was fired for failing to reveal that his wife was under investigation by the U.S. Center for SafeSport for emotional and verbal abuse. USA Gymnastics documents obtained by SCNG, however, revealed that top USA Gymnastics officials had been aware of the investigation of Nyman’s wife and her Ohio gym since at least the summer of 2017 and had in fact referred complaints it had received to the center.

One of Leung’s other big hires was Geer, a move that raised more than a few eyebrows given that she was brought on board while the organization was still in federal bankruptcy proceedings.

As USA Track & Field’s chief marketing and communications officer, Geer spent more than a decade as the organization’s chief spin doctor, defending naming a previously banned doper to Team USA’s coaching staff, the NGB board’s decision to override an overwhelming vote of its membership, and the $1.2 million salary and lavish travel of the group’s CEO while many American Olympic track hopefuls struggled to make ends meet.

Geer was paid $208,862 by USA Track & Field and received an additional $29,092 in compensation from a related organization, according to Internal Revenue Service filings. In other words, Geer was making annually nearly 10 times the $25,000 bonus USATF at the time gave to Olympic gold medal winners.

Another person Leung has given a leading role in creating culture change is Kim Kranz, USA Gymnastics’ chief of athlete wellness.

USA Gymnastics in November 2020 found dozens of allegations of physical, verbal and emotional abuse against three Orange County gymnastics coaches “disturbing” and “credible and substantiated.” The USA Gymnastics investigation and ruling were prompted by an SCNG report that revealed that Vanessa Gonzalez and other coaches at Azarian U.S. Gymnastics Training Center allegedly routinely physically, emotionally and verbally abused, bullied and belittled, and pressured young female gymnasts to continue training and/or competing while injured.

One of the gymnasts abused was Block’s daughter.

Gonzalez and other Azarian coaches allegedly slapped gymnasts, hit them with objects leaving marks, threw shoes at them during training, and pulled them by their hair, according to formal complaints to USA Gymnastics and interviews.

Another Azarian girls head coach, Perry Davies, on a regular basis tickled young female gymnasts after pinning them down and sitting on them.

Instead of suspending or permanently banning the coaches, Gonzalez and Davies were given provisional suspensions and Gonzalez was back in the gym just two days later after completing an online SafeSport training as part of a settlement agreement signed off on by Kranz.

Leung and USA Gymnastics were on the verge of hiring Valeri Liukin as the women’s national team high-performance director last year, despite Liukin being under investigation by the U.S. Center for SafeSport for multiple allegations of verbal and psychological abuse of young gymnasts, according to three people familiar with the hiring process

Leung and USA Gymnastics officials were aware of the allegations but only chose to go another direction after an SCNG report made the U.S. Center SafeSport investigations public. Since then a U.S. national team member has filed a complaint alleging she was verbally abused by Liukin, according to two people familiar with the complaint.

Yet there was Liukin standing on the SAP Center competition floor Sunday, hands on his hips, shaking his head in exasperation when one of his gymnasts misstepped.

From my seat, I could also see Al Fong, one of the most successful and controversial coaches in American gymnastics for parts of five decades. Fong has coached two Olympic silver medalists and six World champions at the Great American Gymnastics Express in Blue Springs, Missouri, 20 miles east of Kansas City.

Two gymnasts coached by Fong have also died.

Julissa Gomez, a gymnast coached by Fong, broke her neck and was instantly paralyzed while attempting a difficult vault skill at an international competition in Tokyo in May 1988. Fong had pressured Gomez to attempt the skill, according to multiple published reports.

Gomez died in August 1991 from an infection related to her paralysis.

Christy Henrich, another gymnast coached by Fong at GAGE, was fourth at the 1989 World Championships on the uneven bars. A year earlier she missed making the U.S. Olympic team by a hundredth of a point.

Fong allegedly pressured Henrich to train and compete while injured and encouraged her to lose weight, according to multiple published reports.

“He was absolutely insane,” Jack Rockwell, an athletic trainer, said of Fong’s coaching of Henrich in the 1995 book “Little Girls in Pretty Boxes: The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnasts and Figure Skaters.”

Henrich developed anorexia nervosa and died in July 1994 from multiple organ failure related to starvation. She weighed less than 60 pounds at the time of her death.

Her family blamed Fong in the media and barred him from the funeral.

Fong is currently being investigated by the U.S. Center for SafeSport for physical, verbal and emotional abuse, according to confidential SafeSport documents obtained by SCNG.

The investigation of Fong, which was first reported by SCNG in February, has been ongoing since at least June 2020 and is in response to approximately 40 allegations of abuse, according to four people familiar with the investigation and U.S. Center for SafeSport documents.

Still Fong was credentialed by USA Gymnastics to coach in San Jose this weekend.

A few yards away, directly across the arena floor from where Leung sat, coaches walked by Liukin and patted him on the back and high-fived him. Fong received a similar reception, like Liukin, still firmly in the embrace of the sport, the culture.

Whether from press row or Section 107, Row 23, Seat 16 the scene was obscene.

“I’m not sure what has exactly changed,” Block said Sunday.

At the time of USA Gymnastics 2020 ruling in the Azarian case the organization’s “Safe Sport Investigations and Procedures” stated that “USA Gymnastics will give notice to, and consult with each person reportedly harmed by the misconduct if USA Gymnastics enters into the agreed-upon resolution.”

USA Gymnastics’ decision on the extent and nature of the coaches’ suspensions and to allow them to return to coaching was made without the survivors and parents like Block (as many as 30 of whom complained) being formally interviewed by USA Gymnastics officials or the organization holding formal hearings where victims and family members could testify.

Thirty survivors and their parents silenced, censored by USA Gymnastics and a society afraid of the truth.

Not quite the media stampede I was promised pic.twitter.com/5r9bBLJQl5

— Scott M. Reid (@sreidreporter) August 28, 2023

“I was trying to gauge it today at serve and pass and I was walking around and talking to the guys, ‘how are you feeling? What do you think? Are we going to be able to go full speed?’” Speraw recalled.

The answers came late in the second set of Team USA’s Volleyball Nations League match with reigning Olympic champion France on Saturday night at the Anaheim Convention Center.

In a scenario that eerily resembled the U.S.’s meltdown, the pivotal fourth set of Friday night’s upset loss to Argentina, the team dropped a trio of set points before nailing down the second set and rolling to a 25-23, 27-25, 27-25 victory.

The win was a tribute to the resiliency of a veteran squad that found a way to bounce back after wasting five match points before losing Friday’s fourth set, 43-41, and then, shell-shocked, dropping the fifth of the 2-hour, 26-minute match.

The Americans close out VNL pool play against Bulgaria on Sunday at 8:30 p.m.

“I don’t know if there was one difference,” Speraw said. “There wasn’t a change in some mentality. It’s just that we made that play tonight.

“I still don’t think we were perfect. Some of the issues that hurt us last night hurt us tonight as well but we just made a couple more plays. I was really impressed with how we came out even though we were battling some obvious fatigue.”

The match was also a reminder of the parity within elite men’s international volleyball.

“Ten of the 12 teams at the Olympics next summer could win a medal,” Speraw said.

France, the gold medal winner in Tokyo and last year’s inaugural VNL champion after beating the U.S. in five sets last July, won’t be among the eight teams advancing to the VNL final eight later this summer in Poland.

Not that France didn’t give Speraw and the U.S. some nervous moments, even in the third set when the Americans couldn’t close out the night on two match points late.

“If it had gone four, it could have been anybody, it could have been anybody on the court,” Speraw said. “I was looking back there and I almost told everybody on the bench to start warming up, just because I wasn’t sure how that was all going to end. But it worked out great.”

• 

  Team USA’s T.J. DeFalco shows his frustration after they lost to Argentina in five sets in a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. Argentina won, 25-18, 23-25, 23-25, 43-41, 15-12. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

• 

  Team USA middle blocker Maxwell Holt, right, spikes the ball as Argentina’s Nicolas Zerba defends during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

• 

  Argentina middle blocker Agustin Loser Bruno, left, spikes the ball as Team USA’s Maxwell Holt looks to block during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson passes the ball to a teammate during their Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson, right, goes up for a block against Argentina’s Luciano Palonsky during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter T.J. DeFalco slides as he reaches to save the ball during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Argentina opposite hitter Bruno Lima celebrates after scoring a point during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Team USA on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson looks on during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson, top, spikes the ball as Argentina’s Luciano Vicentin, left, and Agustin Loser Bruno defend during their Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA coach John Speraw looks on during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Thomas Jaeschke celebrates a point during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson serves during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Argentina opposite hitter Luciano Vicentin, left, scores past Team USA’s Micah Christenson (11), Jeffrey Jendryk II (4) and T.J. DeFalco during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker David Smith serves during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson celebrates after a point during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson serves during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA oppposite hitter T.J. DeFalco, right, tips the ball as Argentina’s Bruno Lima defends during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson sets up a shot for a teammate during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson serves during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson, left, and setter Maxwell Holt try to block a shot during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA libero Erik Shoji celebrates after they won the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA fans cheer during the second set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson serves during the fourth set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson (11) spikes the ball during the fourth set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA’s Erik Shoji misses a ball during the fourth set of a Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA’s Erik Shoji reacts after Argentina scores during the fourth set of their Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson returns a shot during the fourth set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker David Smith (20) elbows the ball during the fourth set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Argentina players celebrate after defeating Team USA in five sets in their Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Argentina players react after defeating Team USA in five sets in a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Argentina’s Manuel Armoa celebrates after they defeated Team USA in five sets in their Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Argentina players and coaches celebrate after defeating Team USA in five sets in a Volleyball Nations League match on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  A ball boy with autographs on his jersey is seen during the first set of a Volleyball Nations League match between Team USA and Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson serves during the fourth set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

ANAHEIM — In the end, Team USA wasted so many opportunities in a pivotal fourth set of its Volleyball Nations League match against Argentina on Friday night that U.S. coach John Speraw couldn’t keep them all straight.

“I don’t remember all of them off the top of my head,” Speraw said.

The U.S. blew five match points in a marathon fourth set that ultimately proved soul-crushing and let a series of early leads slip away in Argentina’s 25-18, 23-25, 23-25, 43-41, 15-12 victory at the Anaheim Convention Center.

“Certainly disappointed to have some of those swings and not finish it off,” Speraw said after the 2-hour, 36-minute match. “And so we’ll have to go back and try and learn from it.”

The U.S. players will need to be fast learners. Up next is a Saturday night match against France, the reigning Olympic champion.

“I thought of that in the middle of the fourth set. This is where this tournament gets really, really hard,” Speraw said. “I’m looking at some of our players and I just don’t know if we can roll out the same team tomorrow.”

Team USA was never able to find its rhythm in the opening set but seemed to take control of the match in the second and third sets.

“They came out pretty hot,” U.S. libero Erik Shoji said. “They were just crushing side out and also transition. They played great that first set, then we kind of settled in a little bit and started to slow them down a little bit and so they made some changes and we played well.”

The shift in momentum was due in part to Speraw’s decision to replace Jeff Jendryk with David Smith at middle blocker.

“We were looking for a little more offense,” Speraw said. “Jeff is a really offensive player and he was hitting .125 when I took him out, just hasn’t scored well enough. So I was looking for Dave to come in, maybe look for a little bit more of a serve, look for a little bit more experience against a team that runs a pretty unique offense, has a pretty unique setter. I think Dave did do that. He stuffed a bunch of really nice out-of-system balls. He killed some really nice balls but unfortunately had some errors I wish he could get back.”

Smith wasn’t alone in a fourth set that got away from the hosts.

The U.S. led 21-17 in the fourth before the wheels came off. Argentina had six service errors in the set only to be outdone by Team USA’s 12 errors.

“When we’re up on a team, especially late when they’re making mistakes we can’t mirror that. We can’t give them their points back that they gave us,” U.S. opposite hitter Matt Anderson said. “Those are the opportunities that great teams take advantage of and I consider us a great team. Unfortunately, we let ourselves down with those mistakes. The good thing to take away is (if) we get rid of those mistakes, we win these sets and we win these matches so that’s on us and that’s completely controllable by us.”

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  Team USA opposite hitter Aaron Russell, left, spikes the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA libero Erik Shoji returns a shot during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA setter Micah Christenson (11) blocks a shot from Cuba’s Marlon Herrera Yant, left, during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA libero Erik Shoji, center, returns a shot during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker David Smith, left, scores past Cuba’s Octavio Javier Rojas Concepcion during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker David Smith, top right, celebrates after scoring during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker David Smith celebrates after scoring a point during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Cuba’s Angel Miguel Castro Lopez, left, hits as a trio of Team USA players look to block it during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker Maxwell Holt hits as Cuba’s Angel Miguel Castro Lopez defends during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  The Team USA bench reacts to a point during the first set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA head coach John Speraw looks on during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson hits against Cuba’s Angel Miguel Castro Lopez during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson serves during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson scores past Cuba’s Marlon Herrera Yant (23) during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson serves during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Cuba’s Angel Miguel Castro Lopez hits as a trio of Team USA players look to block during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA middle blocker Maxwell Holt goes for a kill as Cuba’s Octavio Javier Rojas Concepcion defends during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA libero Erik Shoji celebrates after they won the first set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter T.J. DeFalco spikes the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. DeFalco, a former Huntington Beach High and Long Beach State star, helped the Americans to a 27-25, 25-17, 25-15 victory. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson (1) chases the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Aaron Russell, left, spikes the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson serves during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Cuba’s Roman Yonder Alvarez Garcia chases the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Team USA on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter T.J. DeFalco spikes the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson prepares to serve during the second set of their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Aaron Russell spikes the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA head coach John Speraw looks on during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter T.J. DeFalco spikes the ball during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson prepares to serve during their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Aaron Russell hits over the net as Cuba’s Octavio Javier Rojas Concepcion (5) defends during their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA players celebrate after they swept Cuba during a Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA players celebrate after they defeated Cuba in a Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson, left, celebrates with libero Erik Shoji after they swept Cuba in a Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA opposite hitter Matthew Anderson (1) reacts after they swept Cuba in their Volleyball Nations League match on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Team USA players listen to the national anthem before their Volleyball Nations League match against Cuba on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

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  Cuba players stand together during their national anthem prior to their Volleyball Nations League match against Team USA on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

ANAHEIM — Team USA outside hitter T.J. DeFalco seemed to be only half-joking when he outlined the squad’s daily routine leading up to the Volleyball Nations League this week.

“Our routine after 8½ months playing internationally, our routine is to get to this coast as quickly as you can and to the beach,” the former Huntington Beach High and Long Beach State standout said.

Team USA’s 3-0 victory against Cuba – 27-25, 25-17, 25-15 – in the teams’ VNL opener on Wednesday night at the Anaheim Convention Center wasn’t exactly a day at the beach, but it was the kind of gritty match the U.S. needed as it builds toward the Olympic qualifying tournament in Japan later this year (Sept. 30-Oct. 8).

Struggling with Cuba’s serving early, the Americans, playing their first match on U.S. soil since 2019 and their first in Southern California, the sport’s talent hotbed, since 2016, trailed as late as 24-23 in the first set before capitalizing on a couple of breaks to clinch the set. Cuba was able to hang with the U.S. through the middle of the second set before outside hitter Matt Anderson gave Team USA some breathing room with a pair of kills and then closed the door on the Cubans with back-to-back aces to end the second set.

After that, the third set was a mere formality.

“We didn’t start that well in the first set and it kind of put us in a tough position because they were serving well and that put a lot of pressure on our side out,” said Anderson, who finished with a match-high 13 points. “But we held onto it and toward the end it just got to the point where we had to make the play. Fortunately for us, we did and trusted our system of play out there and returned a couple balls late in that first set to give us the set and kind of a deep breath, sigh, let it all out and move forward. If we can play like that and still win, let’s focus on a couple more plays and that second set we returned more and in that third set we kind of ran away with it.”

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  David Smith, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, serves during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  Erik Shoji, left, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, digs the ball as David Smith, right, prepares to serve during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  The U.S. national team volleyball player Erik Shoji talks about his career at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  David Smith, right, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, takes a drink during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  Erik Shoji, a volleyball player with the U.S. national team, at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  U.S. national team volleyball members Erik Shoji, left, and David Smith listen to their coach during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  Erik Shoji, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, digs the ball during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  Erik Shoji, center, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, stretches during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  David Smith, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, serves during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  Erik Shoji, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, digs the ball during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  David Smith, a member of the U.S. volleyball national team, stretches during a morning practice at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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  David Smith, a volleyball player with the U.S. national team, at the training facility in Anaheim on Wednesday, June 28, 2023. The U.S. team will play during the 2023 Volleyball Nations League competition held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim on July 4-9, which will include teams from: Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, France, Germany, Iran and Serbia. (Photo by Mark Rightmire, Orange County Register/SCNG)

He was born into a world that did not understand him.

Hearing impaired since birth, he spent much of his young life searching through the silence and all its uncertainty, through his frustration, for a sense of place, a chance to be heard, for the most basic of human of needs: connection.

In sports, he found a place where the world could not ignore him.

On a court or field or playground he could not be avoided, dismissed.

Between the white lines David Smith found a home.

“For me, sports was who I am,” he said. “For me, especially growing up, it was a way to get on a level playing field. It doesn’t matter how well you speak or how well you can hear, you can go out there and you can kick a ball, shoot a ball, throw, run, hit whatever, you’re going to be accepted by kids. That’s all they care about at that age – can you hang with us?

“For me, sports was a way to show, hey, I can and I can even do it better than you sometimes. So to me that probably was the easiest way to connect with people and be part of a group and community.”

Smith, the former UC Irvine All-American and longtime middle blocker for Team USA, and his wife Kelli are still trying to level playing fields.

David Smith, now 38, is playing the best volleyball of a career that includes three Olympic Games as the U.S. heads into this week’s Volleyball Nations League at Anaheim Convention Center (July 4-9). Smith in May was named the most valuable player in the European Champions League Super Final after leading his club team, Poland’s Zaska Kedzierzyn-Kozle, to a third consecutive Champions League title.

Kelli Smith, meanwhile, with her grassroots fundraising and relentless problem solving has impacted hundreds of Ukrainian refugees who have flooded into Poland since Russia’s invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.

“My wife was especially moved to help those people because she knew as a mom and as a wife it’s tough to go to a country where you don’t speak the language, you don’t know a thing about the people around you, it’s scary,” Smith said. “So she wanted to give them some comfort, she wanted to give them some dignity.”

And a sense of connection.

A sense of belonging.

A SPARK

In the German tongue, in the Polish town

Scraped flat by the roller

Of wars, wars, wars

–”Daddy.” Sylvia Plath

At least once a month Kelli Smith, a cross country and track and field standout at UCI, runs through the thick forest that surrounds the village of Slawiecice near Kedzierzyn-Kozle.

David Smith played professionally in Germany, Spain and France before moving to Poland in 2016 to play for Czarni Radon in 2016 and eventually joining Zaska Kedzierzyn-Kozle in 2019.

“There was a sadness (in Poland) and I remember thinking, is it like this? Is this how Polish people are?” Kelli Smith said, recalling the family’s move to the country. “And instead of trying to judge them, I began reading more history, World War II and also Communism.”

She would also find the answer in the secrets of the woods.

In April 1942, the Nazis built a forced-labor camp for Jews known in the forest around Slawiecice, then part of Germany. When 120 workers contracted typhus they were transferred to Auschwitz where they were murdered. The remaining prisoners were moved to Blechhammer, a subcamp of Auschwitz concentration camp, built in April 1944 on 10 acres.

At least 5,500 prisoners from 15 countries would pass through Blechhammer, part of a network of Auschwitz sub-camps that contained 48,000 prisoners including 2,000 British POWs.

Prisoners at Blechhammer were housed in wooden barracks that had no toilets or running water. Prisoners determined unable to work by the SS were transferred to Auschwitz where they were murdered. Fifteen-hundred prisoners died at Blechammer and were burned in the camp’s crematorium. Healthy prisoners at Auschwitz were moved to Blechhammer.

With the Soviet arms fast approaching, the Nazis abandoned Blechhammer on January 21, 1945, and sent 4,000 prisoners on a 13 day death march to the Gross-Rosen concentration camp. Prisoners were given half a loaf of bread, a small portion of honey and margarine and half a sausage for the trip. More than 800 died or were murdered on the way to Gross-Rosen where they were put on trains and sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp.

Five days after the evacuation of Blechhammer, Nazi soldiers returned to the camp and began shooting some of the 100 or so prisoners who had been left in the camp’s infirmary. Prisoners still capable of walking were ordered to carry the dead to open trenches where they too were shot. The bodies were then covered in straw and gasoline and lit on fire.

The area was restored to Poland by the Allies at the Potsdam Conference in July and August 1945. Earlier, however, at the Yalta Conference the previous February the Allies sanctioned the formation of a pro-Communist government for Poland. The country would remain under Communist control and in the Soviet orbit until 1989.

On her first run through the forest near Slawiecice, Smith came across remnants of Blechhammer, the camp’s gate and the crematorium, its guard towers.

“Poland is not that far out of some very serious things going on politically,” she said. “So you have to look at everything through that lens and I was actually surprised by the immediate, initial response from Polish people because Polish-Ukrainian relations are fairly complicated historically but Polish people also know what it’s like to be conquered and to have a war in their country and to almost be obliterated as a country and so I think that resonated and people were like, we have to help.”

The Smiths felt a similar calling.

Kelli Smith had previously worked with non-profit groups dealing with child advocacy, literacy and addressing poverty in India.

“The second the invasion happened and the second she had an opportunity to help the people in Ukraine, I just saw the immediate reaction,” David Smith said. “She was just immediately drawn to the pain and the suffering, what she could do to help. She was not, well she never is, content to just sit back and let the world pass her by. She wants to be a voice of change. She wants to be a spark.”

Among the thousands of Ukrainian refugees coming into the area near Kedzierzyn-Kozle were children who had been forced to abandon among other things their education. A teacher had also driven out of Ukraine to the area. The woman, however, could not legally teach in Poland until her teaching credential was translated from Ukrainian to Polish.

“She didn’t have any money,” David Smith said. “She literally just fled across the border with a backpack. That’s all she had.”

The Smiths were made aware of the teacher’s plight through their friend Marta Koziarska, a local resident.

“It was like an impulse,” Koziarska said in an email, referring to Kelli Smith’s reaction to the situation. “Kelli is the most empathic, warm and helpful person on the world. When one of our local politicians asked me about a little help with collecting money for the documents for one woman, so she could work in Polish school and help to Ukrainian kids i though directly about Kelli. I asked her and 5 minutes later she told me – WE ARE DOING THIS!!! Next 15 minutes later she called me it could be something bigger.

“That is how it started.”

Kelli Smith recalled, “The big ask was $250 U.S.”

“I could have done that myself but I was like, let me engage my friends and see if someone wants to help and I posted on social media and within 10, 15 minutes we had more than double that amount,” she continued. “So I was like, ‘OK, maybe I really could do something more.’”

She connected with a local group sending goods to groups working with refugees on the Poland-Ukraine border.

“We were collecting goods to send to the border and so we started buying diapers and had some old cell phones to donate and was posting about that and a couple people from the U.S. said, ‘Oh, can I send you money and you buy stuff on our behalf and send it to the refugees as well?’” Kelli Smith recalled. “And at the time that was kind of the gateway and I mentioned to a couple of people I met here, like, ‘Hey, if something bigger comes up, I think I might be able to raise a little bit of money to do something bigger.’ My thought was maybe I can raise like $10,000 dollars. So I told a few people here that I knew and I think maybe a week into it a friend got back to me and said there’s something we need help with. And it was just kind of interesting that their idea of a bigger thing was so different from my idea of a bigger thing.”

Team USA libero Erik Shoji also plays for Zaska Kedzierzyn-Kozle and lives in a downstairs apartment in the home where the Smiths and their two children, Cohen and Amelie, live. Shoji has nearly 200,000 followers on Instagram.

Kelli scheduled a follow-up meeting with the person trying to put together a school for the refugee children and then took to social media, including posting on Shoji’s account during a Zaska match.

“I was thinking let’s raise around $10,000, and within the first 2 ½ days, just saying on social media, ‘Hey, friends, I’m going to raise some money, it’s going to go directly to Ukrainians but I don’t know what that will look like, I don’t know anything right now, I have a meeting on Monday with somebody who’s really hands-on helping people, but if you know me you can trust me, I’m going to give every dollar directly there,’” Smith recalled. “And I just posted my Venmo and my PayPal and said any transaction cost, don’t worry about that, I’ll cover that, it’s all going to go dollar for dollar to Ukrainians. So by the time we had that meeting, we had about $17,000. So it well exceeded our goal, our expectations. So that day we were able to commit to around $10,000 to that contact. He had this big dream of starting some classes for Ukrainian kids in this small village.”

Within a week, Smith’s fundraising had opened a classroom for 18 Ukrainian students. It also covered a clothing allowance and school supplies for each student, and a printer for the classroom.

“So from then we knew it will be a full time job to help Ukrainians,” Koziarska said. “Donors and also refugees trusted us. We are honest, helpful and every time we spend some money, we public everything in social media, so everybody knew that every single cent is going where it should be. It it a great adventure.”

Before long Smith had also raised enough money to open and furnish a preschool in a cleared-out attic. She raised money for a junior high classroom and purchased a laptop for each student so they could also stay connected with their schools back in Ukraine.

“So from there it just kind of snowballed,” Smith said. “Marta is like my right hand and people here knew I was trying to help the Ukrainians, so they’d call her and say, ‘Hey, this family just arrived,’ they need clothes or a bike or they need food. And so it just went like that and we made more and more contacts for people here that we really came to trust and as of right now we’ve raised $88,000. Which is just like crazy, through my Venmo and my PayPal. And it’s just become word of mouth. At the beginning it was just a lot of people that I knew personally, again, through my church community, through my non-profit work, I’ve had the pleasure of knowing tons of people who have had similar passions and feelings toward giving to other people, from there they shared, ‘Hey, I know Kelli personally, I trust her, she’s going to do what she says.’ So that led to kids doing bake sales in Hawaii raising thousands of dollars, people I’ve never met.”

A pair of eighth grade boys in New York sent $1,000 they made as part of a class project selling snacks to their classmates. Mariners Elementary School in Newport Harbor, the school Cohen Smith attends when the family is in the U.S., raised around $5,000.

“It’s gone beyond what I ever thought,” Kelli said. “I never thought it would go on this long. Here we are at the end of June. Not just the war, but my efforts. Last year I usually come home to the U.S. so I thought by April, I would be done and it was like I still have a lot of money so I kept working with my partners, even when I was in the U.S., and it’s like every time I get close to having almost zero, something has popped up and there’s new donations. I still haven’t had to say no to anything.”

For a time, Smith was “shopping 8 hours of time. Five hundred pounds of potatoes, 200 pounds of onions. Buy them from a local farmer. So I’m helping the farmer but I’m helping the Ukrainians. Which is interesting. People saw they gave money and then they saw exactly what I was doing. It’s really a concrete thing to see a huge crate of vegetables that I bought and to see that, ‘Oh, my goodness, $250 bought like hundreds of pounds of dry goods.’”

Smith’s efforts have continued even as she has battled the lingering effects of COVID. She has suffered from asthma since high school, a condition made all the more worse by her two bouts of COVID.

“Post COVID, my lungs just aren’t the same and I have to medicate daily just to keep it, weird symptoms at bay, vomit, dizzying,” she said. “Every three to four months having chest pains like having a 10 pound (weight) sitting on my chest at all times. Get dizzy, lightheaded, legs like Jello.”

Smith was hospitalized for three days in December.

She refused, however, to be slowed.

Quarantined because of COVID, Smith created a running path around her backyard.

“Thirty laps around the garden is a mile,” she said. “Got up to nine miles. 270 laps. Too much. Erik would take time lapses from his kitchen window, half concrete, half snow, you could see the exact path I ran.”

Her impact can also be seen all over her community.

Recently Smith’s efforts helped fund a renovation and conversion of a building into a community center. Funds have paid for swim passes for families at a local facility, bikes and scooters for children, things to help create a sense of normalcy and connection in a new and often strange place.

“There are some growing pains for some of them,” Kelli said. “Some of them are doing really well and some of them are having growing pains with just different situations so I’m just available to help in those growing pains and financial situations because of this or that. But also I want to help families just have a normal life and be able to do different things. Like, be able to go to the swimming pool and not have to sacrifice their real necessities, to allow their kids to have a normal moment, a normal childhood. So that’s been a big emphasis the whole time: sometimes there are things that are necessities but there are also things, like we all have, preferences and just because you’re a refugee doesn’t mean you don’t get to have a preference.

“Like the old woman who asked, ‘May I buy just one lipstick at the pharmacy on our shopping trip?’ And I said, ‘Of course.’ It’s buying scooters and bikes for kids. They don’t need scooters and bikes, but it lets them be regular kids because they’ve experienced things they shouldn’t have to. So it’s really been about building community relationships. It’s just being ready for whatever comes. Sometimes there are weeks where I don’t hear from anyone and sometimes there are a few things that hit right in a row.

“I just keep waiting for the next thing to see what it is.”

THE SMOJIS

David Smith has never used his hearing impairment as an excuse.

His mother, Nancy, wouldn’t have let him even if he had wanted to.

While getting her teaching credential at Cal State Northridge, Nancy Smith also learned American Sign Language. She went on to teach deaf students in the LAUSD.

“Just happenstance,” David Smith said, shaking his head.

“It just so happened that when I was born she was more equipped than she thought she would be,” Smith continued. “Obviously they didn’t know right away but it was just a miracle how that happened. I think she probably had a little more confidence in how to deal with the situation and advocate for me.

“I think a lot of people with a disability, whether it’s hearing, vision or developmental, it, you’re overwhelmed if you haven’t had any experience with that. But my Mom knew a lot of people who are deaf, even more than I am, but are very capable. So it wasn’t like, ‘Oh, woe is me. Woe is my child.’ It was like I can do this and they can do this too. She’s been my advocate for me, she’s been a rock for me, especially early on in my life.

“Didn’t allow me to go to that default excuse of why I can’t do things. No, you can do it.”

After graduating from Saugus High School, he led UCI to the NCAA title in 2007. Two years later he joined the U.S. national team.

Since the 2010-11 season, club teams featuring Smith as the middle have won 18 league titles or national cups. In four seasons with Zaska Kedzierzyn-Kozle, Smith has won a Polish league title, three Polish Cups, two Polish Super Cups and the last three Champions League crowns.

“David Smith has been one of the most important players for Zaksa throughout their incredible run of success in the CEV Champions League Volley in the last three seasons,” read the Champions League news release announcing Smith as the league’s MVP. “The American middle blocker’s performance in the SuperFinals this past weekend cannot be fully described by just looking at the statistics. His 13 points (4 kill blocks/2 aces) came at the perfect time for his team, almost choosing the hardest moments of the match to shine.”

Shoji, 33, has also played a major role in Zaska’s success.

Shoji, college volleyball’s first ever four-year All-American while at Stanford, comes from volleyball royalty. His father Dave Shoji is the winningest coach in women’s Division I college history, guiding Hawaii to four national championships before retiring in 2017. Erik’s older brother Kawika was an All-American setter at Stanford and longtime member of the U.S. national team, joining Erik and Smith in claiming a bronze medal at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

In the Smiths, Shoji has found a second family in Poland.

Shoji has an apartment with its own entrance on the first floor of the Smith’s house but usually can be found upstairs with the family.

“I wonder in the beginning,” Kelli said, recalling when her husband first invited Shoji to move into the house. “We weren’t that close. Knew his brother better than Erik. Will he be annoyed by us, you know two kids?”

But Shoji and the Smiths have become so close that they created a new family name on social media: the Smojis.

“We just decided, combine our names together,” Shoji said. “I’m part of the family.”

To Cohen and Amelie, Shoji is “Uncle E.”

Cohen, 11, recently had to do a report for school detailing where in the world he would like to go and with whom.

He wrote, “Go to Tokyo with Uncle E because he’ll know all the great places to eat.”

“I joke he’s like my third child because I feed him most of the time,” Kelli said. “He’ll text me, especially after games, ‘What do we have to eat?’ Erik and I really connect really well. Really good friendship. We get each other. So sometimes I feel like I’m his person here when he needs to vent something. He knows he can do that with me. It’s funny because last year when I went home in April. His dad texted me, ‘Who is going to take care of Erik now?’”

“I was like he’s fine. He can take care of himself.”

David Smith has come to view Shoji as more than just a teammate.

“It’s a friendship that has been taken to another level just because we can spend so much time together,” Smith said. “We rely on each other a lot, and my wife, and my kids love him as well. I love him as a teammate and a friend and we’ve developed a really good relationship over the last couple of years. We’ve spent so much time together that people just joke that we’re just one family and we are. Not by blood, but by circumstance, what we’ve gone through.”

That journey includes the disappointment of failing to medal at the Olympic Games in Tokyo, a memory that continues to haunt Smith and Shoji as they head into this week’s Nations League play.

“To get to the top, to get that gold medal at the next Olympics that’s obviously our main goal, our main target for the next year,” Smith said “We always talk about the margin being thin, razor thin, the difference between good and great is like one ball. How do we have the discipline and muscle memory and chemistry that those points count when you need to? So I don’t think there needs to be a whole overhaul of offensive systems, defensive systems, blah, blah, blah. I think it’s really about playing a little bit more efficiently together and at the end, you need a little bit of luck for sure. The ball touches the line, ball’s out a centimeter and it changes the whole game sometimes. But I truly do believe you make your own luck and put yourself in that situation to take advantage of that luck every once in a while. I think we have a great group. I think we have a ton of talent, ton of experience and I’m super excited to see the direction of this program over the next year. I think we have a great group of guys, I love playing with them. I think we’re all focused on making something special in Paris.”

A big reason for Team USA’s confidence going into Nations League play, and the Olympic qualifying tournament in Japan later this fall, is the play of the 6-foot-7 Smith.

“He’s playing some of the best volleyball of his career at age 36, 37, 38,” Shoji said. “So it’s been really inspiring to watch as someone who has seen him now for 11, 12 years on the court, I can honestly say this is the best volleyball he’s played, I think, in his career and he’s doing it at that age in this position that he’s in. I think it’s basically unheard of, so he’s kind of just an inspiration for us to see as younger players that you can still go, still do it and he’s become more of a leader. He’s kind of this silent leader that leads by example. Because maybe you might not notice him but at the end and you’re looking at the stats, he’s hitting for a great percentage, touching a lot of balls and getting a lot of blocks.

“He’s really come into a role that maybe he didn’t quite embrace when he was younger. He is a little bit undersized in the volleyball world at 6-7, 6-8, you know he’s undersized. But he’s accepted that in the last couple of years, and he goes, ‘I might be undersized but I’m going to carve you up, I’m going to beat you and get great touches.’ I think in the past he’s compared himself to a 6-10, 6-11, and 7-footers and now he’s not doing that and just kind of coming into his own and performing the best he has in a while.”

Often, Smith, who has a degree in civil engineering, has also simply outsmarted opponents.

“Well I think he’s smarter than most people in this world just from an academic side, someone who can analyze a game and numbers and statistics and where people are on the court and figure out a way to get the job done,” Shoji said. “So I think in general he’s just a smart person. But he’s very analytical, he’s an engineer, he can look at something and deconstruct it and figure out a way to get it done.”

Smith’s success, both with Team USA and Zaska in recent years, followed a series of honest conversations with Kelli.

“He’s truly passionate about the game and he’s always trying to make himself better,” Kelli said. “Probably around 34, 35, there was a lot of talk about, oh, he’s getting older, he’s getting older and he started to express that as well, ‘Oh, maybe it’s because he’s getting older and I refused to allow that to be an excuse. That’s my personality. I was like no, you’re going to keep going. If you’re going to go, go. Don’t even say that anymore because now he’s just like just whatever, joking about it. Then, I think it was sinking in a little too much and I was thinking, like, if you even keep talking about that it’s going to get in your head and at this level you need to be operating with the most confidence that you can.

“And so he’s been really blessed to not have a lot of injuries. I think his body was made to do what he’s doing. He’s got a wife at home and I don’t accept complacency because I’ve said we have to all, all of us, have to be all in for this to work.

“I have to be. That’s my personality and it’s not his personality. On the court, you see a very aggressive David Smith who is really passionate and fiery and he’ll yell. In real life, he’s much more mild-mannered and passive. So sometimes in his career, he’s needed a little bit of a shove to say, ‘Hey, is this all you’ve got? Are you giving it all because again this is a team effort at home as well.”

David Smith was asked how much longer he saw himself playing.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I thought, I genuinely thought I would be done after Tokyo. That was the end game. But my body has been great. My family has been great. They love living overseas in Poland. We have a great club that takes care of us there. Obviously, we’re super successful, we’re back to back to back European champions right now. So there’s been no reason to stop. The main goal is to make it to Paris, make an Olympic team. But we’ll see what happens after that. My son is old enough that it would be nice to give him some stability for my child that I remember having. He’s around that age and I would love to give him that experience. But it would be nice to settle down and see him thrive and see what he’s interested in. I’m still motivated and inspired.

“Right now I just have next summer in my mind.”

SHOWING THAT YOU CARE

Cohen Smith is his parent’s son.

Recently he informed David and Kelli that he had a new classmate, a boy whose family fled Ukraine.

“And my wife and I were trying to get him to think about it a little bit,” David recalled, “Who is it? Where is he from? Why is he here? How do you think he’s feeling right now? My son was like, ‘Oh, wait, he’s probably a little nervous, probably a little scared, probably out of place, just like I was when I first came to (Kedzierzyn-Kozle).”

David Smith is also still trying to connect, still trying to level life’s playing field.

Families with deaf children will drive hours to meet Smith at Zaska matches. Before a match four years ago he was approached by a friend. A mother had a deaf child and would Smith mind meeting her?

Smith agreed.

“She just had some questions and you could see the second you met her it was just a mom like so many out there, ‘I just don’t know what to do. I have a child, I love my child, I want what’s best for my child and I don’t know how to do it.’

“And I said, ‘You’re doing a great job first of all, you’re doing enough, you’re doing more than enough, just this conversation shows that you care.’ Meeting the child, so he can see someone growing up, because I really didn’t have that growing up, it wasn’t like I had a deaf athlete (to look up to), ‘Oh, I can do that.’ I was super happy about that.”

Today the boy is a champion swimmer.

“The cool thing about sign language is it’s not an international language but I can understand Polish sign language, a shared sign understanding.”

Kelli Smith is driven by her own sense of understanding, shaped both by her natural instinct and the place she now calls home, always moving forward, looking not waiting for opportunities to change her section of the world.

She is back running through the forest around Blechhammer regularly, past the camp’s gate, past its moss covered crumbling walls, past the crematorium, past the watchtowers, history’s ghosts tracking a dreamer as she moves through a nightmare, soft steps over a hard and bloody past.