Baxter Hits the Scouting Trail and Royal Goes Back to the Whip

When Royal High finally lost a Marmonte League volleyball match, Coach Bob Ferguson got serious: It was time to commission a full-time scout.

Talk about overkill. The Highlanders had crafted a 66-match league winning streak that included victories in all 198 games until Thousand Oaks beat Royal last year in five games.

For the rematch, Ferguson recruited John Baxter from the booster club to scout Thousand Oaks. Royal won in three games and just keeps on whipping league opponents, building its new league winning streak to 16, again without losing so much as a game.

Pity the rest of the league. Not only does Royal field the most-talented team year after year, the Highlanders (8-0 in league play, 8-2 overall) are the best-prepared club around.

Before each match, they spend as much as two hours studying a detailed scouting report complete with opponent player profiles, hitting diagrams and team tendencies and weaknesses.

Ferguson organizes and oversees the scouting reports but is quick to credit Baxter, who has embraced his new role so enthusiastically, he hits the road to scout opponents even though he forgoes watching his son play at Royal.

“Watching him kinda makes me nervous anyway,” Baxter said about his son John, a 6-foot-3 sophomore setter.

Said the younger Baxter: “He’s helping with the team and he’s involved. We know what teams are doing and it helps us so much, especially with me being a young setter. It’s a big confidence-builder.”

Ferguson found a scout with a stellar volleyball pedigree. Baxter, 43, is a 1977 graduate of Cal State Northridge who runs his own window-cleaning business. He played volleyball at Pierce College in 1972-73 when the coach was Marv Dunphy, now Pepperdine’s well-regarded coach.

At Northridge, Baxter played for Walt Ker and Afak Yuri, then the Israeli Olympic coach.

Baxter played a key role last year in Royal’s drive to the Southern Section Division II title--the Highlanders’ sixth consecutive appearance in a section final. They have won four.

Baxter scouted and videotaped Royal’s opponents during last year’s playoffs. And because teams played every three days, he stayed up until the wee hours to bang out his report on his home computer.

“Yeah, I was up to 2 and 3 in the morning, but I love it,” he said. “It’s a hobby. It’s more fun than playing. It’s like figuring out a chess match.”

Baxter became hooked after compiling his first scouting report of Thousand Oaks. As Royal rolled over the Lancers, he sat in the stands, accurately predicting what the Lancers would do in various situations.

“It was enlightening,” he said. “We had their weaknesses down. As the match wore on, I started feeling sorry for the Thousand Oaks players.”

Because Baxter already has scouted the entire league, he plans to take a break and actually watch his son’s matches. But the break will end with the start of the playoffs.

Royal has moved up to Division I this year and will need every edge it can find, Ferguson said.

“We’re among a lot of good teams and have a chance to be right there,” Ferguson said. “We’re going to need John.

“Last year, the playoffs were so intense. We were totally wired. I didn’t sleep for three weeks.”

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Ferguson, who was inducted into the Ventura County hall of fame last month, has forged a 150-12 record as the Royal boys’ coach and also has coached the girls’ team for 12 years.

It has been a family affair at Royal: His wife Sandy is an assistant with both programs, Travis starred at Royal and is now the starting setter for Northridge, and Heidi will be a senior on the girls’ team next fall.

Family considerations--plus his own ego--have kept Ferguson, 47, from moving to the college ranks.

“I like what I’m doing, so why change?” he said. “In college, there’s a lot more pressure and a lot of traveling. My family is too important for that.”

Besides, Ferguson admits he doesn’t take orders well, which is why the one-year experiment of sharing head-coaching duties with his wife was a dismal failure.

“It didn’t work at all and it was my fault,” he said. “I was too egotistical. I didn’t listen well. That’s another reason I wouldn’t take a college job. I don’t want to be an assistant. I can’t take advice.”

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Golfer Ross Fulgentis of Westlake found a quick remedy for the disappointment that accompanied the Warriors’ first loss of the season. Just before the spring break, Westlake fell to Hart at Vista Valencia Golf Course, 317-321, in a match featuring the top two programs in the area.

The teams have become rivals, especially since Westlake ended Hart’s 52-match winning streak at Vista Valencia two years ago.

“It was disappointing losing to Hart and I played horrible,” Fulgentis said.

The Westlake junior buried that memory at Griffith Park, winning the Los Angeles Junior golf championship with a three-round score of 216, five strokes better than Westlake teammate Brandon DiTullio.

Three Warriors finished in the top five with Matt McCrite placing fifth at 224.

Fulgentis shot 67-76-73, recovering from a disastrous triple-bogey on 18 in Sunday’s second round. He bogeyed four of the first 10 holes Monday before stringing together birdies on 11, 12 and 13 to take hold of the tournament.

“I was on fire the first day,” he said. “I shot four-under on the front nine and just kept going.”

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WHO’S HOT . . .

Westlake right fielder Matt Riordan was seven for 15 in four games, leading the Warriors to their second consecutive title in the Las Vegas Durango tournament. He had four runs batted in, including a three-run home run.

Channel Islands center fielder Charles Merricks was six for 11 with four RBIs in three games in the Coachella tournament.

Simi Valley third baseman Curtis Miller extended his hitting streak to 17 games, three short of the school record, before going hitless on Wednesday against Anaheim Canyon in the Las Vegas Durango tournament.