Members of the West Forsyth boys volleyball team pose after winning the state championship. - Photo by Chrissi Shugart

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By Jay Spivey 

For the Clemmons Courier

High school boys indoor volleyball might not be a sanctioned sport yet in the eyes of the North Carolina High School Athletic Association, but that doesn’t matter to West Forsyth. 

West Forsyth defeated Chapel Hill in the semifinals this past Saturday, and later that afternoon rolled past Cornelius Hough to win the N.C. Boys Volleyball Association Class 4-A state championship at Queen’s University of Charlotte.  

“I would describe it as pure elation,” West Forsyth Coach Patrick Shugart said. “Coaches, players, parents, family, friends, managers — we understood. We’ve been close before. And we’ve been a highly ranked program the entire time. We started off on a good foot with having Grant (Lamoureux, who now plays at Pepperdine) and having a bunch of other guys that knew how to play volleyball.  

“We were able as a program three years ago to sort of hit the ground running. And so, we recognize that that’s a huge advantage.” 

All of those steps led to the ultimate goal of winning the state championship. In the previous two seasons, West Forsyth lost to Waxhaw’s Marvin Ridge in the state championship in 2023, and last year, Weddington knocked off West Forsyth in the quarterfinals. 

“But then the idea for the guys that are there now, we don’t want to just be regarded as someone who started out good and then was OK,” Shugart said. “We want to get it done, fulfill the promise in some manner of speaking.”

The Titans, who finished 25-1, had to claw back after losing the first set in both best-of-five matches to win each 3-1. 

“We know that we have a community of boys here that are super into volleyball,” Shugart said. “And then, to be able to deliver on that in such a challenging field of really good teams was just very satisfying to everybody.” 

In addition to winning the state championship, Shugart’s son, Liam, who is a junior, was named MVP of the state championship. 

“I am super-proud of him,” Patrick Shugart said. “Our team did not have any one kid that was a single powerhouse. We didn’t have a Grant Lamoureux for example. It’s just like, ‘Wow, you have to stop that guy.’ We had a very well-balanced offense run by our two centers. At any one point we could go to any of our guys — in the middle, the outside, the right side — and it was a really well-balanced team. 

“And (Liam Shugart) did a great job of not only running the offense when he was back row, but he was one of our most effective hitters and blockers when he was on the front row. He was probably our best server (Saturday). He played great defense and then just played really high IQ volleyball and helped pick out the tendencies of the other teams so that we could take away what they wanted to do and that kind of stuff.” 

After defeating Chapel Hill (15-2) 3-1 in the semifinals, West Forsyth advanced to play Hough (17-4), which defeated Weddington (17-4). 

“I thought we played tremendous volleyball (Saturday),” Patrick Shugart said. “I was super-proud. Chapel Hill and Hough, both really good high school volleyball teams.” 

The match against Hough set up a rematch of a match played earlier this season. The two schools played a three-set match on March 29 and Hough won 25-23, 22-25, 15-11. 

“The one closest one (game during the season) wouldn’t be against Hough, but that was two out of three,” Patrick Shugart said. “Two out of threes are certainly a different thing than three out of five. They’re totally different. They’re so much quicker.” 

Against Chapel Hill, West Forsyth fell behind 1-0 after losing the first set 25-23. However, West Forsyth came back and won the next three sets 25-23, 25-21, 25-17 to advance to the state championship later Saturday afternoon.  

“The storyline was kind of the same in both,” Patrick Shugart said. “You know, we lost the first set both times and it wasn’t because we were bad or anything. The other team was good, and we were trying, and they just got to 25 first. It wasn’t any one particular thing.” 

Hough won the first set 25-21, but West Forsyth tied it after winning the second set 25-22. West Forsyth won the third set 25-21 to take a 2-1 lead.

“There was no sense of panic,” Patrick Shugart said. “I think there was disappointment. There had to be. Losing a game is not the way you’re trying to start the finals. But there was definitely not a sense of panic. It was, ‘OK, this is what they’re doing, and this is how we’re going to make our adjustments on it.’ 

“And I felt like offensively we were actually doing OK. We were just having trouble stopping them. The guys just kind of settled down and just dove back into the next set. It was a very intense finals.” 

The Titans took the fourth set 25-18 to defeat the Huskies for the championship. Many of the last handful of points came off Nas Jackson, who is a serving specialist for the Titans.  

“We had (Jackson) come in for one of our other players to serve near the end. He got a couple points in a row,” Patrick Shugart said. “And then, the very last point, championship point, he served an ace, which was just tremendous.” 

Boys indoor volleyball has become increasingly more popular in North Carolina. 

“It’s very challenging. It’s only going to continue to get harder as boys volleyball gets bigger with more and more teams, more and more kids playing club,” Patrick Shugart said. “We’ve seen a huge explosion.” 

Now, it’s a wait and see as to what happens with the possibility of boys indoor volleyball being sanctioned by the NCHSAA. 

“From what I understand there is a process for it,” Patrick Shugart said. “We’ve officially started that process. And we’ve met certain metrics, thresholds, numbers of teams competing and stuff like that. But I don’t know enough of the politics or the legal aspects of all of it to speak super-confidently.

“All I can really say is that every school that tries to start a boys program, having enough boys is not the problem at all. It’s either, you have a supportive administration and it’s hard to find a coach because coaching is a big commitment of time, or there are some schools, none that I know of in WS/FCS (Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools), but some other counties they’re really uninterested in helping it be a sport.”