Bruins Add Jose Loiola to Beach Volleyball Staff
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LOS ANGELES, Calif. -- UCLA head women's beach volleyball coach Stein Metzger announced today the hiring of beach volleyball Hall of Famer Jose Loiola as the Bruins' volunteer assistant coach effective immediately.
While this is Loiola's first collegiate post, he has been coaching some of the world's youngest and brightest stars for over a decade. He is currently coaching emerging stars on both the men's and women's professional tours. Under his tutelage, Tri Bourne and Trevor Crabb placed third overall in the 2020 AVP Champions Cup Series and won The Porsche Cup in August. On the women's side, he also coached Sara Hughes and Brandie Wilkerson to a third-place overall finish in the 2020 AVP Champions Cup Series with a best finish of second at The Wilson Cup in July.
"I am thrilled to have Jose join our staff," Metzger said. "He is one of the greatest beach volleyball players of all time and is now coaching some of the top teams on the professional scene. His experience, knowledge and passion are unrivaled and I know the team will benefit tremendously from his mentorship. As a student at UCLA, and later on the professional tour, I looked up to Jose and learned a great deal from his play. I now look forward to learning more from one of the masters in the game."
Loiola got his start working with professional athletes in 2014 when he coached UCLA's Jeremy Casebeer and Casey Jennings out of BYU. He mentored three different teams in 2015, highlighted by the duo of Theo Brunner and Nick Lucena, who placed fourth at the FIVB World Championship. Also in 2015, he coached the tandem of Irene (Hester) Pollock and Caitlin Ledoux. Pollock would later help guide the Bruins to their second straight NCAA Championship in 2019 as the volunteer assistant coach. Loiola coached Hughes and Kelley Claes in 2017 to an AVP victory in Chicago. He coached Hughes and Summer Ross in 2018-19 as the pair would claim two tour stop victories in the AVP and won gold in Russia on the FIVB circuit. He also would begin his coaching of Bourne and Crabb in 2019.
He got his start in coaching in 2011 as the head coach of Team Wave (indoor volleyball club). He has also served stints as an assistant coach at West Torrance High School in 2012 and that same year was an assistant coach for the Men's U19 World Championship in Cypress. Also in 2012, he served as the head coach for the U17 Women's Junior National Team. He was a head coach for the U21 Men's and Women's World Championships in Croatia in 2013. In 2014, he guided the U21 Women to a bronze medal at the World Championship and served as the head coach for the U21 Junior National Team in 2015. He also served as the head coach of the U21 Travel Team that went to China. He spent four years (2015-18) as a head coach for the USA Volleyball Beach Tryouts (High Performance), which is now the National Team Development Program.
Loiola recorded 55 victories over his long and legendary career. He won titles for eight straight years, from 1995 through 2002, including 13 AVP titles in 1997 and seven FIVB titles in 1999. Loiola has experienced success both on the AVP Tour as well as internationally, winning 35 domestic events plus 20 on the FIVB Tour. Among his many wins are the 1997 King of the Beach, 1999 FIVB World Championship (Marseille, France), 2001 Goodwill Games (Australia) and twice winning the Manhattan Beach Open (1995 and 2000). He was an Olympian for Brazil in 2000 (Sydney, Australia), finishing ninth with Emanuel Rego.
He won four AVP Offensive Player of the Year awards (1995-98). Loiola was the first player to be selected AVP Rookie of the Year (1993) and then MVP (1997). His first title, an indoor tournament in 1995, marked the first time an AVP event was won by foreign-born players, as he claimed the title with Eduardo Bacil. In 2001 the FIVB chose Loiola and Rego as one of the two best beach volleyball teams of the '90s.
Loiola, a junior national champion in Brazil, was inducted into the CBVA Beach Volleyball Hall of Fame in 2014 and the International Volleyball Hall of Fame in 2017.
A business major, he is working on his bachelor's degree in sports, entertainment, and hospitality at CS Dominguez Hills.