By CRAIG CURRIER
Valley Press Assistant Sports Editor
Growing up, he always considered basketball his game.
But his tall frame and long arms were ideal for volleyball from the start. Now a 6-foot-5 junior, Kachold just started playing the sport in eighth grade when friend and Quartz Hill High School teammate Evan Mottram finally convinced him to give it a try.
He was a natural.
His height and left-handed swing were perfect for an opposite hitter.
"In high school it's real fun," said Mottram, who also plays on a club team with Kachold in Pacific Palisades. "I just get to sit and watch him pound balls straight down. Having an opposite like that makes it so much easier for our setter, he has that many options to choose from."
Kachold also gelled with Rebels coach Justin Harris his freshman year and Kachold, Mottram and Hunter Horn all made the varsity team as ninth graders.
As is the case with most talented freshmen, Kachold improved rapidly.
"He wasn't as tall then and he couldn't jump as high," Harris said. "He made some errors, but you could tell he was going to be good and he kept getting better."
At the beginning of his sophomore year, though, Kachold still wanted to play basketball. And during a sixth-period workout in the fall, he suffered the first of two painful knee injuries which sidelined him until late in the spring.
Kachold partially dislocated his left kneecap during that basketball class and eventually had surgery to help repair it.
But just a few months later, in a February volleyball scrimmage against Paraclete, he landed awkwardly on the other knee, dislocating his right one this time.
Surgery was not required again, but the rehab was difficult and time consuming.
He missed more than half the volleyball season, spending numerous days a week at the Athletic Injury Management (AIM) offices, a physical therapy specialist in Lancaster.
More difficult, though, was the mental aspect of the second injury. Sure, it hurt, Kachold said, but the timing of it couldn't have been worse.
"Oh yea, it was extremely frustrating," he said. "I was just starting to feel good and everything was getting back to normal."
He never regained full strength last year after joining the Rebels for the second half of Golden League play and going through to the Southern Section Division III semifinals.
Kachold said he felt tentative on the court and really wasn't himself, both mentally and physically, until he started his club season in the summer.
"I didn't feel 100% until clear after the high school season was over," he said. "Even in the semifinals last year, I was kind of scared about my knees."
Even though Quartz Hill was losing senior outside hitter Patrick Studdert after last year's deep playoff run, Harris knew he was going to have a great team this year, especially if Kachold stayed healthy.
"I think everybody realized it at the league meeting last year when they thought I was losing a bunch of seniors and then I told them those three guys were only sophomores," Harris said.
Mottram noticed the same thing, especially when the Rebels returned to practice late in the winter.
"He got so much better over the summer playing club that he could take on that role of replacing Pat," Mottram said.
Kachold's knees are certainly still a concern, but he's gone more than a year without additional problems. He said he recently shed protective braces, which was as big a challenge mentally as it was physically.
"Every doctor I saw said there was no brace that would stop my knees from dislocating again," he said. "But I wore them all summer and this season, depending on the floor we were playing on.
"It was a mental stability for me. Now, I almost don't think about it."
Harris said if nothing else, the injuries made Kachold much more aware of what he needed to do to become stronger and more agile on the court.
Kachold continues the workouts at AIM, albeit less frequently. They are sport-specific, which allows him to concentrate on the muscles he uses most.
"He's not just a meathead in the gym lifting as much weight as he can," Harris said. "He's doing stuff that makes him a better volleyball player."
So excited about Quartz Hill's potential is Kachold, that he is constantly thinking ahead about what he and his teammates have to accomplish in order to make a return trip to the Division III semifinals.
The Rebels have won all 58 individual games (excluding single-game tournaments) they played this year and went 14-0 in the Golden League on the way to their third-straight league title. This group of Quartz Hill players have experienced nothing but the highest level of success.
The Rebels enter tonight's second round match at Garden Grove Pacifica as the No. 2 seed in Division III.
"This is the best team I've had," Harris said. "Last year's team was good, but this year these guys are all good friends. When we need to rally, they come together as a team."