The Road to Paris: A Q&A with USA Volleyball’s Nate Ngo ’06
(Photo Courtesy of USA Volleyball)
With the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics nearly a week away, it’s a good time to catch up with a Sacred Heart Cathedral Alum looking to bring the gold back home. Nate Ngo ’06, USA Volleyball Men’s National Team Technical Coordinator, took time out of his busy schedule to answer a few questions, including his time at SHC, his love for blending his two passions (math and volleyball) and his path to success on and off the court.
Where did you grow up, and where did you go to grammar school?
I grew up in San Francisco and attended St. Anne’s.
Where do you currently live?
I currently live in Long Beach, CA.
Take me back to your time at Sacred Heart Cathedral. What are some memories that stand out?
I spent much of my time and focus (other than classes) on volleyball. SHC was where my volleyball journey began and the source of my favorite memories during high school.
Who were some teachers that impacted your development as a student?
Mr. (Brian) Murphy was probably the teacher who really had me enjoying math classes and made me want to be in a teaching/coaching role beyond high school.
Who were some of the most influential SHC coaches? Why?
For me, Coach Nga Tran (boys volleyball) and Coach Margi Beima (girls volleyball) were the most influential coaches. Nga really fostered my love for the sport, starting club volleyball for our group, and building the program up with our senior class. Margi gave me the opportunity to be a part of the girls team, which would be the start of my fusion between my analytic abilities and volleyball.
What’s your fondest memory of when you were an SHC Volleyball player?
Our team’s run during my senior year, winning a share of the WCAL and reaching the CCS final had to be the fondest memory of my time, particularly from winning three matches overall during my freshman year.
What did you do after graduating from Sacred Heart Cathedral?
After SHC, I attended Cal Poly and earned my bachelor's degree in math while working with the NCAA Women’s Volleyball program and coaching the Women’s Club Volleyball team. After Cal Poly, I briefly worked with a professional volleyball team in Vienna, Austria for a few months before starting my master's program in statistics at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln where I worked with the volleyball program as a Graduate Assistant. After completing my master's, I was hired as an assistant coach at the University of Portland, where I spent one year. I was then hired as the Technical Coordinator/Performance Analyst for the USA Men’s Indoor National Volleyball Team where I’ve been since 2015.
How did you get started in coaching at the collegiate level? What inspired you?
I got started by asking to help as a student manager for the women’s NCAA team at Cal Poly, just before the start of my freshman year. This was an idea that was encouraged by Margi Beima, having done similar duties for the girls volleyball team at SHC while I was a student.
Explain your role as statistics manager at Cal Poly?
During my freshman year (2006) at Cal Poly, I became the student manager for the women’s volleyball team, helping out with any odds and ends, and eventually partaking in the role of recording match and practice statistics by pen and paper during that year. In the winter quarter of that school year, the coaching staff introduced me to a software program called Data Volley which was already very popular for volleyball statistics tracking in Italy, but beginning to gain traction in the US market, specifically in the NCAA Women’s Volleyball world. I took the rest of the school year to learn how to use it and was subsequently named a Volunteer Assistant Coach for the team in 2007, a role I continued during the rest of my time at Cal Poly. I was also heavily involved as a practice player as well.
What was your role on the University of Nebraska Volleyball Team? What year did you start?
At Nebraska, my main role was similar to what I was doing at Cal Poly, in addition to assisting with drills in practice. I started this role in the fall of 2011
From the University of Nebraska, you went to the University of Portland. What was your role there?
At the University of Portland, I was hired as a full-time assistant coach. While I was in charge of all things analytics/scouting, I was involved with running summer camps, coaching, overseeing academic progress and some recruiting.
The Men’s National Team, how did that opportunity come to you in 2015?
The Monday after our 2014 season finished with the University of Portland, I was in the office getting ready to do a season wrap-up when I received a phone call from one of the assistant coaches with the Men’s National Team. He explained that they had an opening for their Technical Coordinator role and that I had been recommended as someone to contact. Working with the National Team was something I had a strong interest in and was passed up for in 2013. To receive that call out of the blue was surprising but bittersweet as I enjoyed my time with the University of Portland, especially with our coaching staff. While I thought I was ready to move on from analytics work to more of a coaching role after being passed up for the position a couple of years earlier, this was an opportunity I just could not say no to. It was bittersweet leaving a place I loved living and working at.
My first role is also my current one with the National Team, Technical Coordinator/Performance Analyst.
You mentioned that volleyball has blended your love for math and volleyball. How has that evolved since the beginning of your career to now?
I was incredibly fortunate to get into the space I’m in as early as I did. While much of what I do, and what others in similar roles do, has stayed consistent, the advent of technology in sports analytics over the last 17 years has evolved and forced me to evolve with it. Much of the analysis I did in my earlier years was done in Microsoft Excel. At the end of my first season with the National Team, there were things that our coaches were asking for that I just couldn’t provide within Excel, and this led me to learn how to utilize the programming language R, which is what we use for all our analytics now.
What was the experience like for you in Rio? Did you ever picture yourself on the Olympic stage?
First of all, being on the Olympic stage was not something I had set my mind to. I always want to do whatever I’m doing to the best of my ability, but I don’t set lofty goals like that, especially when I first started. My experience in Rio was an absolute emotional roller coaster. Just before Rio, I was struggling through some personal life stuff, and then the next week I left for Houston for Olympic Processing which was an amazing start to the Olympic experience. I was fitted for Opening and Closing Ceremony outfits. Then, I had the unbelievable opportunity to walk in the Opening Ceremonies. This was followed up by losing our first two matches to Canada and Italy, Then we beat Brazil in one of the most epic volleyball matches I’ve ever been a part of to keep our hopes alive. We then beat France and Mexico to advance out of the group and beat Poland in the quarterfinals. In the semifinal against Italy, we were up 2 sets to 1 and 23-19 in the fourth set, only to end up losing that set and the match in a heartbreaking defeat. In the bronze-medal match against Russia, we were down 0-2 in sets but came back to win the bronze in the fifth set, 15-13.
Since Rio, what has life and your career been like? How do you balance your personal life and your career?
Since Rio, I had the realization that I loved my role with the team and our staff and that I wanted to continue to do this for as long as possible. I have had numerous opportunities to go and coach with my friends and in recent years, scaled back the coaching on the side to be able to spend time with my partner and get up to the mountains during our National Team off-season.
What’s a day-in-the-life look for you as you prepare for Paris? What’s your daily routine?
As of early May, we have started daily training which means getting to the gym by 8 am to set up the gym for practice – getting all our cameras started, streaming video on mobile TVs and a large projector and preparing all our training accessories such as radar guns for measuring serve speed. I assist in running the earlier parts of training, serving and hitting balls at the players to get them reps. Then when live 6 on 6 play starts, I’ll get on my computer and tag all the contacts for easier viewing for the athletes afterwards. After training, we usually have lunch and a staff meeting to discuss how training went that day and what we may want to change for the following day.
When we travel to competitions (Volleyball Nations League and the Olympics this year), I will spend much of my days in the arena, scouting opponent matches and our matches.
Do you think SHC prepared you for where you are today (athletically and academically)?
My journey through college and volleyball has allowed me to learn so many life lessons. I am grateful for my time at SHC for laying a solid foundation for me athletically and academically. It’s allowed me to build and go forward in my career.
What would you say to current SHC students striving to accomplish goals during and after high school?
If there was one thing I wished I learned sooner than I had, it would be the idea that failure is not final, but not learning from it might be.
