Central Catholic volleyball seeks 3-peat in Oregon

Rick Lorenz remembers his first year of coaching high school volleyball as if it were yesterday. It is, actually, very similar to today.

"I was blessed with great athletes and great volleyball players," said Lorenz, who in his first year as a head coach led Portland's (Ore.) St. Mary's Academy to a state championship. "I had never coached and told the nun who hired me I wasn't a very good player. She told me I would be fine and not to mess it up … not to get in their (the team's) way and they'd win a state title."

Lorenz says he stayed out of their way, and led by a pair of Parade All-Americans as St. Mary's won it all.

That was 36 seasons and more than 1,000 wins ago. Along the way, Lorenz led St. Mary's to five state titles. This weekend, he enters Oregon's large-school quarterfinals as his Central Catholic (Portland, Ore.) Rams go for their fifth state title under Lorenz. It would also be a three-peat.

In his 36 seasons, Lorenz has won 1,054 times while losing only 171 to rank among the top 30 winningest coaches in U.S. prep volleyball annals. No other volleyball coach in Oregon has 10 state titles, and Lorenz also has eight second-place finishes. That's a phenomenal average – nearly 50 percent of the time his team reaches the state finals.

His last two teams have combined to win 64 straight and the 2011 squad is 41-0, having lost just a trio of games in those matches this season.

His state championship-winning 2010 Rams team had nine seniors and lost only four matches. They ended the season on a 23-match victory streak and their only losses were to out-of-state schools, including three straight in a prestigious Las Vegas tournament. They haven't lost to an Oregon team since 2008.

Lorenz says the 2010 and 2011 CCHS teams remind him very much of his first two St. Mary's teams.

"We had nine seniors last year and won it all. We had the state's best player in a junior in Martenne Bettendorf," said Lorenz. "And we had the state's best player in 1976 in junior Anna Maria Lopez and nine other girls who went on to play college volleyball. We dominated."

Lorenz said no one expected a state title the following year (1977), but "we rode the broad shoulders of Lopez to another title. We only had two seniors on that team."

This year's squad has just two seniors, but one is the 6-foot-1 Bettendorf and a young supporting cast much like the team that surrounded Lopez in 1977.

"Martenne is the state's best player," said Lorenz, who teaches art at Central Catholic. "Much like the 1977 team, we weren't expecting the success of this year's team … not to be unbeaten at this point in the season. If you'd said two months ago we'd be unbeaten, I wouldn't have believed you."

That's the same thing he thought in 1977.

Lorenz is quick to add that the "talent was there" in both teams ('77 and '11), but both teams were very young.

"The team has grown as Martenne has put the team on her back and has gotten us through much of the season," said Lorenz. "That has given us time to develop younger players and we're feeling pretty good as we head into the last week.

"We're happy with the progression. The kids are feeling we need three more days of good practice ... and this time of year that really says something. A lot of kids are ready for season to end, but not this group. Their passion and desire shows."

This year's top-ranked Rams have four freshmen to go along with a pair of sophomores and four juniors. The 2010 junior varsity was 35-0.

"We have a terrific frontline with Martenne, and juniors Raina Hembry and Kailee Johnson, both 6-3," said Lorenz.

The report on Martenne is a coach's dream: puts in time in summer, dedicated, co-captain, humble, great work ethic. She makes everyone around her better.

And don't forget the two-foot vertical jump.

"Her leadership has helped our young kids," Lorenz said about his University of Oregon-bound senior. "She's very humble, very giving, not into herself. It's real easy for younger kids to rally around her. They'll pick up the pace because they see Martenne do that. It's been kind of our underlying current in this year's success – a dominant player who is a good leader. Younger players want to contribute more. Just like when I coached Anna Maria."

Lorenz calls Johnson one of the best – if not the best – basketball player in Oregon.

"She's not your typical volleyball player in the fact that it is her No. 2 sport. We get her when volleyball season begins, not before like all the other girls who play club," said Lorenz. "While the others are clubbing it, she's playing club basketball."

In addition, Lorenz says his second six (players) give his first six as much competition as most opponents do.

"We have a dozen outstanding athletes. When you face the best front line in state every day in practice, you get better, you step it up. I mean it is day-in and day-out of fierce competition."

Again, Lorenz points to similarities of '76-'77 and his last two teams. Dominant well-rounded and senior-laden team one year, then inexperience, but the state's top player leading the way the next year.

"It's kind of an oddity brought on back by fact that we didn't have many seniors returning (either year). And expectations weren't as high, but the younger players wanted to step it up. Their mental toughness deserves a lot of credit."

Players in his programs know what to expect when they get to Central. He operates Rose City Mizuno Volleyball, one of the most successful clubs in the Northwest and his assistant coaches have been with him for 33, 24, 16 and 12 years – both at the high school and club level.

"That first team was a good way to start, a good way to set a good model. Having that type of talent altogether on one team was amazing," said Lorenz, who has helped more than 100 players earn college volleyball scholarships over the years.

Though he readily admits the game has changed, Lorenz does one thing few coaches do and he's been doing it for 25 years – his players wear 8-pound weighted vests for much of each workout.

"We wrap 'em tight above their hips. They fit snug," he said. "We do all our ballhandling with the weighted vests. It really helps strengthen players and makes 'em quicker, a lot quicker. The girls know it's an advantage. I will always swear by it."

It does make practice harder, but as Lorenz says, "practice is mine, the game is yours – 85 percent of the season is practice."

Another thing that makes his teams so successful is his scouting. His scouts are required to find three (opponent) players who are the weakest passers or serve receivers. "We focus on them. If you serve it to the right people, you disrupt the entire team."

Lorenz's route to becoming Oregon's czar of prep volleyball was far from design. He attended Blanchet High in Seattle. He was a standout in basketball and football and a four-year letterwinner in track, then played two years of basketball at Seattle University.

His introduction to volleyball came from friend Kirk Clothier, who played volleyball for the University of Washington during the late 1960s, when both men and women competed in the sport in the Pac-8. Lorenz used to watch his friend play and that hooked him.

Lorenz received a degree in art in 1974 along with a minor in music history. The next year, he earned a teaching degree that has come in handy over the past 35 years. He has his masters in theology, though he teaches only art these days with a focus on pottery and stained glass.

"I look back at that first interview at St.Mary's and chuckle," said Lorenz, who is in his 25th season at Central. "I didn't even know it was an all-girls school. But to coach that volleyball team (in 1976) was really something special. I inherited two Parade All-Americans and stayed out of their way. No one knew who I was, but more importantly I didn't mess it up."

And on the verge of his 10th state title, no one is expecting him to "mess up" this one, either.