What a concept: UC Davis’ coaches teach classes too

When Jamie Holmes taught her intermediate volleyball class at UC Davis on Oct. 29, there was undoubtedly a little more poignancy to the lecture for her nearly 40 students.

After all, three days before in her "night job" as the Aggies women’s volleyball head coach, UC Davis upset the then-eighth-ranked University of Hawaii Rainbow Wahine.

Holmes comes to the Stan Sheriff Center for Friday’s match as the only women’s volleyball coach in the Big West Conference — and perhaps NCAA Division I — who also teaches classes. Big West officials say they know of no others.

At UC Davis, which mandates that all the head coaches of its 23 varsity sports — and some assistants — serve in the classroom and on the athletic venues, Holmes is what is known as a "lecturer-coach" operating on separate contracts.

It is part of what the school likes to term the "Davis Way," a remarkable campus-wide promotion of interaction between the student body and athletics. It is a carryover from Davis’ pre-2003 days as a Division II member and unique for a major college program.

"I certainly love the interaction with the student body and, with the repeat students I get (in classes), I think they enjoy having the head coach of the women’s volleyball team teaching them how to play the sport," Holmes said.

At Davis, 15 miles from Sacramento, they’ve had a head football coach teach badminton, a basketball coach instructing in rock climbing and a mathematics professor teaching aikido.

In return for a wide offering of sports and activities and access to instruction from head coaches, Davis’ approximately 30,000 students each pay $650 a year in athletic fees, underwriting as much as 75 percent of the athletic budget.

It is a refreshing concept and Holmes has done remarkably well with it despite the limitations, going 14-13 this season, and 100-76 overall, in six seasons at Davis.

Unfortunately, don’t expect to see Norm Chow teaching football theory, Gib Arnold instructing in archery or Dave Shoji explaining the finer techniques of setting a volleyball to the general student body for credit in Manoa anytime soon.

Even with a limited load of classes (five per year) to teach, Holmes finds herself pressed for time, scrambling out of video sessions with the players to instruct a class. Or forced to creatively work in recruiting opportunities and travel schedules. And, at Davis, which operates on the quarter system, find time to take a vacation. Situations that Holmes, whose graduate work was in divinity, jokes can cause her to "backslide a little."

It is a far cry from what she was used to as an Ohio State assistant with what she calls "all the tools." Holmes acknowledges, "I (sometimes) get a little embittered, if you will, but that just lasts a short time. I think, overall, we coaches enjoy the chance to interact with the general student body. I know I get a lot of satisfaction in being able to share my passion for volleyball with them."

Especially when she can bring the classroom lessons to life with illustrations fresh from an upset of a nationally ranked opponent.

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Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.