Longtime Portland State volleyball coach Jeff Mozzochi will be honored tomorrow night between sets two and three of PSU's volleyball match against Eastern Washington. First serve is set for 7 p.m. at the Stott Center. Mozzochi is stepping aside from his associate head coaching position to take on an administrative role in the PSU Athletic Department. Mozzochi twice served as Portland State's head coach, and led the Vikings to four NCAA DII national titles. Following the match, there will be a no-host gathering at Paccini's on the campus of Portland State.

Feature story written by John Wykoff.

Jeff Mozzochi was so bad at volleyball that he fell in love with the sport.

Portland State’s Associate Head Volleyball Coach, who turned head coaching duties over to Michael Seemann three years ago, was a three sport high school athlete in southern California when some friends talked him into playing in a pickup volleyball match.

“I was so bad, I couldn’t believe how bad I was … and, I played football, baseball and basketball in high school and had a high opinion of my athletic ability,” recalled Mozzochi as he prepares to leave the Viking Volleyball program for the second time—this time to accept an as-yet untitled administrative position under Athletic Director Torre Chisholm.

As with many athletes, Mozzochi loved nothing more than a challenge.

So, when it came time to choose a college sport, he chose volleyball.  “I fell in love with the sport,” he said.


And, it’s a sport which has mostly loved him back.

He leaves the collegiate coaching ranks as one of the most successful volleyball coaches in the nation, having compiled a phenomenal 287-75 record during his first nine years (1984-1992) at PSU. During his second stint as head coach (2001-2006) he brought the program back from a 0-25 record in 2000 and led the Vikings to their first 20-win season at the Division I level in 2005. Mozzochi put the program in position to contend for the Big Sky Conference championship and an NCAA tournament berth once he handed the reigns over to Seemann, his hand picked successor.

During his first nine years, Mozzochi was chosen National Coach of the Year twice and Regional Coach of the Year three times. His squads finished in the top 10 nationally in each of his nine seasons and in the top four six times, including four Division II National Championships and a 36-1 season in 1992, the best in PSU history.

“During those years, the top 10 Division II teams could fit comfortably into the top 50 Division I teams … and we regularly beat Pac-10 teams,” he recalled.

MOZZOCHI COMES TO THE PARK BLOCKS

His tenure at Portland State began with an interesting and unusual coaching exchange.

After transferring from the UC Santa Barbara to UC Berkeley, Mozzochi earned his degree in exercise science in 1980 (both had strong volleyball programs) and began his coaching career (“when I started playing, I was thinking pre-med or architecture. I had no intention of becoming a coach). He had become associate head coach at UC Berkeley when the top spot came open in 1984.

Then-Portland State volleyball coach Marlene Piper and Mozzochi were the two finalists for the job leading the Bears, eventually won by Piper. They worked together for about seven weeks, recognizing that they had similar approaches to the game.

“Marlene was very concerned about the highly successful program she had left at Portland State. She convinced me to apply for her old job,” Mozzochi said.

Portland State was interested in Mozzochi “because of his experience. He’d been really involved in the Bay Area club scene and had a great reputation as an up and coming coach,” said longtime friend Teri Mariani, who was the head softball coach at PSU at the time. “We were a successful Division II team, had come in second nationally the previous year and had a strong group coming back. So it probably looked like an attractive opportunity to Jeff,” she added.

Mozzochi remembers looking at the Portland State program and realizing that the only goal left for the team was to win a national championship (and remember, this is a guy who thrives on challenges).

“I realized that I had the nucleus of the national runner-up team coming back, and that they were very hungry, having been runners-up the year before. Our goal was to out-work everyone else,” he said.

Piper, he said, had established a good work ethic, “so it was easy to come in and continue that. I was a demanding, tough coach. Training and practice was harder than any competition we faced” … all of which paid off in a national championship during his first season in 1984.

One of the first things then-Athletic Director Roy Love told Mozzochi after he was hired was that PSU had agreed to host the national tournament that year and he expected the Vikings to be in it.

“There was a lot of pressure on us that first year,” said Mozzochi.

Perhaps the biggest impediment to the move was that (then fiancée, now wife) Marty Mozzochi coached the University of San Francisco’s volleyball team and had just brought it to a break-through point.

“Marty came to one of our first practices and realized this team was better than the one she was coaching” and the pair also had often talked about coaching together. Here was their chance.

Immediately, they noticed a difference between the Bay Area and Portland when it came to volleyball.

“At our first official practice, we had three television stations and The Oregonian. That was very different. We knew then that this was going to be a special place for us,” he said.

A SPECIAL TIME

The Mozzochi’s were a good coaching team, said Mariani.

“They were a coaching couple … not unique, but it’s unusual and doesn’t always work out so well. She’s more of a calming influence. If he got too tense, she was able to calm him down,” she remembered, adding that he’d mellowed when he returned in 2001.

Those first nine years on the Park Blocks were really special. He and Marty coached in seven national championship games between college and USA Volleyball Open competition. He was also an advisor to the 1992 US Olympic women’s team and was sent as a scout to Europe.

“It was a special time. We knew we were good at what we did and we were extremely busy (they had to run several summer camps each year to bring in funding for the program), but every once and awhile we’d look at each other and go ‘wow!’ We’d never imagined ourselves in this position.”

TIME FOR A NEW CHALLENGE

Following the Vikings’ 1992 national championship, conditions were ripe for Mozzochi to accept an offer to head Oregon State’s women’s volleyball program. And, that turned out to be a major learning experience for the high flying Mazzochi’s.

It was around that time that Pac-10 schools started paying more attention to their volleyball programs and began putting distance between themselves and the quality of play at the Division II level. That meant intense competition for high school players.
 
In many sports, he said, players gravitate to coaches for whom they want to play or toward coaches who can give them a leg up on playing after college. In volleyball, good players are attracted to successful programs and while OSU (and Mozzochi — Marty quit coaching on the college-level during their time there) had some early success, things tailed off over his six years there, even though his teams recorded the most wins (93) in Oregon State history.

“Pac-10 competition turned out to be really brutal. Much of the best talent came from southern California and we were trying to get them to come to Corvallis over offers from the likes of Stanford, USC and UCLA. We got some good talent, but we never could get that A-plus player who would make the difference. We were good with the talent we got, but not great,” he said.

So, when a new OSU athletic director announced that the school was putting most of its emphasis into football (meaning some promises wouldn’t be kept), there was a mutual parting of the ways (one of the few times when volleyball hasn’t quite returned Mozzochi’s love for the game).

It’s pretty obvious he felt jilted. He and Marty considered some other lines of endeavor — even working in his family’s restaurant for awhile. But the allure of his first love (ok, maybe second love after his family) proved too strong and in 2000, he put out the word that he’d be interested in coaching again.

COMING BACK HOME

When his friends heard of his renewed passion, a number of schools expressed interest and, as it happened, the Viking program was ripe for a coaching change.

Mozzochi took over and maintained an outstandingly successful Division II program the first time at PSU. But, the program had moved to the Division I level in 1996 and fallen on hard times. It was one of the worst programs in Division I women’s volleyball when he arrived.

“He came back to a program that was going backwards. I think that’s where his coaching ability really showed,” Mariani said, who also served as Mozzochi’s boss at the interim athletic diretor from June 30, 2006-March 26, 2007.

Mozzochi recalled looking at other opportunities, “but they were just jobs. This is more than a job. We really like this place (both Portland State and Portland).”

The talent level on the team he inherited was “down a little bit, but there were some players who really were playing hard.” His challenge: get local high school and club coaches (some of whom had played for him during his first time through PSU) to believe that the school once again was serious about volleyball.

His phone began to ring. Suddenly, he found himself with an enthusiastic Portland area volleyball community that wanted to recommend top talent to the Vikings.

“I told (then-athletic director) Tom Burman that we could be competitive in three to five years. We made the Big Sky tournament the second year and were competing for the championship in four to five,” he said.

His efforts also were boosted by another change that had taken place in regional volleyball. While Portland had a strong club and high school volleyball tradition, the Seattle area did not. “When I came back, the sport had really taken off in the Seattle area, producing a larger Northwest pool of talent,” said Mozzochi.

There’s no question that Mozzochi has had great experiences during his coaching career at Portland State. He lists the entire first nine years among them. Then, there’s winning the Big Sky championship last year.

But it’s been the process of returning the PSU program to the upper echelons of conference play which has meant the most to him.

“Winning the championship last year was the culmination of what I came here to do. Winning that championship was really special, but it’s the process that’s really important to me. The process of getting this program back on its feet is what really rewards me,” he said.

STEPPING ASIDE FOR THE FUTURE

A few years into his second stint at PSU, Mozzochi noticed an up-and-coming coach named Michael Seemann, and eventually invited him leave his position as an Oregon State assistant to become associate head Coach at PSU. By 2006, Portland State’s program was well on the road to recovery, “and I realized that I’d lose Michael if I didn’t follow through on my promise to step aside.” So, for the last three years, Mozzochi has been associate head coach, aiding Seemann in returning the glory days of PSU women’s volleyball.

During this period, though, something was gnawing at him.

“My family was growing up. My son (Evan) was getting ready to play college football (at Idaho State) and I’d missed most of his high school games. I wanted more time to watch him play and more time to spend time with my family,” he said.

So, when Chisholm broached his plan for a new administrative position, someone to be in charge of student services, looking after student athletes’ welfare, and be a mentor to other Viking head coaches, Mozzochi said he’d think about it.

Having mastered his latest challenge, he was interested in a new one.

Chisholm said Mozzochi’s “unique” understanding of PSU makes him the perfect fit for overseeing the welfare of the school’s student athletes.

“He has a unique understanding of the student experience at PSU. Besides understanding this university, he is single minded and persistent, like a lot of successful coaches. I want someone like that to oversee student services, to advocate for our student athletes,” Chisholm said.

To Mariani, whose time as Portland State’s athletic director taught her a thing or two about sports administration, Mozzoci  “brings the understanding of what coaches need, but balances that with being able to see the bigger picture. He is attentive to detail. He’s meticulous in the management of people and will be so as an administrator.”

As for the game of volleyball, Mozzochi is still in love.

“Marty said ‘no way’, that administration wasn’t my thing. But, I took on a few administrative duties last year and decided that I liked it. We’ll see (he’ll move into the position full-time following this volleyball season). I’m not 100 percent sure that I’m finished with coaching. I still enjoy coaching, but maybe not on the college level. I’ll probably do something along that line again,” he said.

After all, he’s only 52-years-old.  And you can still feel the love.  Going both ways.