Only when Connor Hughes had settled into his seat on the plane could he finally catch his breath, open his cell phone, and give his father a quick call assuring him that, yes, he actually had made it on board.
A mad dash to and through the airport had not all been for naught.
“We pulled up 12 minutes before the plane was supposed to take off,” Rory Hughes recalled with a laugh. “It was like some kind of TV commercial or something. I told Connor, ‘You’re gonna have to get out and run through that airport.’”
The younger Hughes did so, little more than an hour after having finished running up and down the court in a high school playoff basketball game last year, and just in time to catch a red-eye flight to Chicago for a club volleyball tournament.
“It’s definitely time-consuming, but I love playing both sports and I wouldn’t want to miss out on everything that’s going on with the basketball team,” he says. “It hasn’t ever really bothered me. Sometimes, I’ll have double practices with basketball in the morning and volleyball at night. But, other than that, it’s not too hard.”
Not for Hughes, anyway.
The Mater Dei High (Santa Ana, Calif.) senior successfully balances his star power as one of the top boys’ volleyball players in the country. He’s regarded by some observers as the No. 2 recruit in the Class of 2009 and will play at UC Irvine next season. He also has a reserve role on the No. 1-ranked high school basketball team in the country.
“It’s a testament to how good an athlete he is,” Mater Dei volleyball coach Darrick Lucero said. “The day he devotes his whole body, spirit and soul to volleyball, it’s going to be lights out for his opponents.”
For now, Hughes’ “other” sport is the priority. By late March, however, the basketball team’s sixth man will be the go-to guy on the Monarchs’ volleyball team.
“It’s like a 50-50 thing,” Hughes said. “If we have a big basketball game, I’m missing volleyball, and, if there’s a major volleyball tournament, I might miss basketball.”
Or, he might just try to accommodate both sports.
Last year, Hughes played in the Division II state championship game in Sacramento with the basketball team one night, then flew home the next day and competed with the Monarchs’ volleyball team in the Orange County championships. Another time, he played in an annual one-day basketball extravaganza during the day, and then, that night, was on his way to San Jose to compete in a club volleyball tournament.
“What an experience,” Rory Hughes says. “People probably don’t really know what Connor’s had to go through to play both sports.”
They wouldn’t find out from Hughes himself.
The 6’6”, 175-pound outside hitter is quiet and unassuming. He looks forward to focusing solely on volleyball at UC Irvine in the future but believes playing two sports has kept him balanced and better prepared for both.
“I think basketball makes me stronger for volleyball,” he said. “I’m always trading off, using different muscles, and it keeps me in (better) shape than just playing one sport throughout the year.”
Hughes, who Mater Dei basketball coach Gary McKnight says would start on any other team—one that wasn’t ranked, as of press time, No. 1 in the country by USA Today—usually comes off the bench as a substitute for either David or Travis Wear, the Monarchs’ 6’10” senior twin towers.
“I’m sure he’d like to play more, but you have five All-Americans in front of him. It’s just like he is in volleyball, where nobody plays in front of him,” said McKnight, whose program has won six state titles (including the last two in a row). “But he’s tremendous for the role. He’s always getting us dunks, and the other kids look for him.”
That goes double in volleyball, where Hughes, seemingly, was destined to excel.
His mother, Laura, played in high school and his two sisters, Lauren, and Sara, still play. And AVP star Mike Lambert used to live down the block.
“The guys on the team look up to him,” Lucero said. “They see him flying all over the place, contributing to the best basketball team in the country, being coached to the highest levels and being successful, and he brings all that with him to the volleyball team.”
Hughes, the Trinity League’s most valuable player last season, has a 36” vertical, an 11’5” touch height and an arm span as wide as he is tall.
John Speraw, his club coach and college coach next season at UC Irvine, will have a front-row seat for all the future possibilities.
“His upside is tremendous,” Speraw said. “He’s going to be a great player someday, but how quickly that occurs is going to be up to him.”
It is a decision that already has been made. Hughes expects to see significant strides in volleyball just as soon as he’s done with basketball.
“I just want to concentrate on one thing, and go for it,” he said. “It’s exciting what might be able to happen in volleyball. I’m just going to see how good I can get. |
Hughes is part of a Mater Dei basketball team that was ranked No. 1 in the nation as of press time.
Photo: Julian Baum (www.biggirlinthemiddle.com)
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© 2009