First, a tourney; then, a history lesson
In Holyoke, the Prep will visit Hall of Fame
Pop quiz.
Name three members of the Basketball Hall of Fame.
"Three basketball Hall of Famers?" asked Phil Ellison, a senior outside hitter on the St. John's Prep volleyball team.
Yup.
"Magic? I don't know. Jordan and Bird."
He gets a pass on Jordan, who's a lock as soon as he is eligible. But otherwise he was two for three.
OK, name three volleyball Hall of Famers.
Ellison didn't hesitate. "You've got me, man. No idea.
"I'd love to tell you that I know one," said Ellison. "And I'd love to represent the sport really well, but I really can't name one."
Ellison said he didn't even know there was a hall of fame until last year, when he heard a couple of teammates talking about it.
"I'd say one out of every 10 or 15 people knows there's actually a hall of fame," said Ellison, "and of those . . . not every one knows where it is. I'd say it's virtually unknown."
The fact is that the Volleyball Hall of Fame is on the other side of the state, and it has been in existence for more than 30 years. And the fact that it is such a secret is part of the reason the Eagles were invited to Holyoke, the birthplace of their sport, for the inaugural Volleyball Hall of Fame Showcase of Champions this weekend.
In part, Hall of Fame executive director Jerry Fitzsimmons said, the goal of the event is to shine the spotlight on 15 of the top volleyball programs in the state. But the weekend event should also be a learning experience.
"We're encouraging all of them to come to the Hall of Fame and learn about the sport and its invention and evolution," he said.
Neighboring Springfield attracts Spalding-heads from around the globe to the Basketball Hall of Fame, and Newport, R.I., draws a nice crowd for the Tennis Hall of Fame. And while Fitzsimmons said the volleyball hall is in more of an "embryonic stage" than either of those two shrines, it certainly has history.
Part of volleyball's DNA is intertwined with basketball's. Four years after James Naismith put the peach basket to good use in Springfield, William G. Morgan (who was recruited by Naismith to play football for the YMCA training school, which is now Springfield College) got his gears grinding at a Holyoke YMCA and created a less strenuous alternative for middle-aged businessmen.
That was in 1895. In 1985, Morgan was the hall's first inductee. The list also includes Flo Hyman, the 6-foot-5-inch Olympian tower of charisma who helped take the sport global in the 1980s before dying during a match in Japan; Doug Beal, the coach who turned USA Volleyball from the 19th-ranked team to a gold medalist in the Los Angeles Games in 1984; and "Karch" Kiraly, the dominant Olympian who would retire to play beach volleyball.
The hall is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.
"We have grown from a couple of small displays at City Hall to a facility that has a range of activities, from interactive videos and exhibits to some hands-on stuff," Fitzsimmons said.
St. John's Prep coach Andrew Viselli plans to make sure his team lets it all soak in. The Eagles will play a game Saturday morning against Lawrence in their first meeting since last year's North semifinal (a 3-0 Prep win), and Viselli said he wants to use the rest of the day to let his team take in the history.
"I think this is going to be great for the kids," said Viselli, who guided the Eagles to a 23-1 mark last spring and the state semifinals. "Everyone knows about Canton [the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Ohio]. Everyone knows about Cooperstown [Baseball Hall of Fame in New York]. For these kids to say I'm playing a sport and the Hall of Fame's in my backyard and I didn't even know it, that's awesome."
It will be a learning experience for Viselli as well. He is the only volleyball coach St. John's Prep has ever had, taking the job his senior year at Salem State. He is more of a strategist than a history buff, but he has picked up historical tidbits along the way, such as how the game became popular on the West Coast because World War II vets played it while they were away.
Viselli said he wasn't the greatest volleyball player, but he would play two-on-two tournaments in high school and pretend he was one of the players he had seen on TV, like Steve Timmons, Sinjin Smith, or Kiraly.
"We can say that these are the people who paved the way and just really opened eyes that this is a big national sport that was started right here," he said. "Hopefully kids will take that with them and have more pride. My kids are proud of their sport and the way they play it, but I think they'll have a little more overall pride in the sport."
Julian Benbow can be reached at jbenbow@globe.com.
