It’s induction week on the Worldwide Volleyball Corridor of Fame in Holyoke, Massachusetts. Six inductees will be part of the earlier 161 gamers, coaches, directors and leaders from 25 nations who’ve already been enshrined within the museum on the birthplace of volleyball. We’ve got tales on all six, persevering with with Katsutoshi Nekoda from Japan:
Shortly earlier than the 1972 Olympics, Japanese setter Katsutoshi Nekoda went down with a devastating damaged leg. Undeterred, Nekoda referred to as his coach, requested him to carry a volleyball to the hospital, and in a wheelchair, Nekoda practiced his craft time and again.
After which some.
It paid off. Later that summer season on the Munich Video games, with Nekoda on the helm, Japan went undefeated in seven matches, dropping solely three units whole, to seize the Olympic gold medal.
Such is the legend of Katsutoshi Nekoda, an inductee into the 2023 class of the Worldwide Volleyball Corridor of Fame.
“He was the perfect (setter) ever. No query about it,” Invoice Neville stated emphatically.
Neville ought to know. Over the previous 56 years, he has had a courtside seat witnessing the best gamers in trendy historical past. His resume consists of stints teaching each the USA and Canadian nationwide groups, and in 1984 he was an assistant to Doug Beal when the USA gained the Olympic gold medal in Los Angeles.
“Nekoda did all the pieces with the volleyball besides restore it life,” Neville added. “He was an ideal chief. Simply the best way he introduced himself. Nice composure. His alternative of units, their accuracy, the best way he carried out the sport. He was the equal of an ideal quarterback.”
Nekoda was born in Hiroshima on February 1, 1944, 18 months earlier than the atomic bomb was dropped on that metropolis. He caught the volleyball bug at a younger age. Legend had it that between ages 14 and 29 he set 1000 balls a day. Simply 20, in 1964 he led the Japanese nationwide staff to a bronze within the first Olympic Video games that featured indoor volleyball, which occurred to be in Tokyo.
The world rapidly took discover.
“Nekoda was a groundbreaker in that he was the primary of the 5-1 setters that later grew to become extra standard within the worldwide recreation,” stated Terry Liskevych, coach of the USA girls for 11 years. “Nekoda was actually the primary man who set the usual for fast units in every single place on the courtroom. He would soar set and take all the pieces within the air. It made him extra misleading.”
If Nekoda had a weak point, it was his peak: He was solely 5-foot-9.
“He anticipated very nicely,” Neville stated. “He by no means made a foul set or unhealthy alternative. You can construct round him. He completely satisfied me {that a} 5-1 setter was the perfect system if you happen to had a very good chief, a very good setter.”
Japan was at its historic finest when Nekoda was setting. The one three medals the nation has ever gained was when Nekoda was within the driver’s seat. Along with the gold in Munich and a bronze in Tokyo, Japan gained a silver in Mexico Metropolis in 1968. He participated within the quadrennial spectacle one ultimate time in Montreal in 1976, the place he was chosen because the flagbearer on the opening ceremony for your entire Japanese Olympic delegation.
His different volleyball enjoying honors included successful bronzes within the 1970 and 1974 World Championships.
However excess of any {hardware} was the pioneering impression Nekoda had on the sport. His legacy is big. Apart from being the progenitor of the 5-1 offense, a pioneer in fast units and soar units, Nekoda is understood for his serving. His Wikipedia entry lists him as “the person who invented the ceiling serve, a serve the place the ball is hit up towards the ceiling with all of the lights to make it troublesome to evaluate the touchdown.”
Nekoda handed method too younger at age 39, from abdomen most cancers, in 1983, simply seven years after enjoying in his ultimate Video games in Montreal, the one time Japan didn’t medal when he was on the helm (they completed fourth).
He’s gone however actually not forgotten. There’s a fitness center named after him in his hometown of Hiroshima and his image and title are throughout it. He was posthumously named by the FIVB as one of many prime gamers within the 20th century. And now, the best honor of all, choice into the Worldwide Volleyball Corridor of Fame.
(particular because of Don Patterson and Terry Liskevych for his or her assist)
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Search for extra tales this week on Olympic gold medalist and four-time Olympian Phil Dalhausser (United States, seashore male participant); two-time Olympic medalist and five-time FIVB World Tour Champion Larissa França Maestrini (Brazil, seashore feminine participant); four-time Olympian and three time Olympic medalist Yumilka Ruiz (Cuba, indoor feminine participant); and longtime administrator inside varied nationwide and worldwide federations and the primary member to characterize Thailand within the IVHF, Shanrit Wongprasert (Thailand, chief).
ICYMI
Sunday: Silvano Prandi of Italy
Click here for ticket information and if you happen to gained’t be on the ceremonies they’ll be streamed at IVHF.org
