Costa Mesa moves on from Todd Hanson as its volleyball coach

Todd Hanson will not return as the boys’ and girls’ volleyball coach at Costa Mesa High, Mustangs athletic director Sharon Uhl said on Wednesday.

Uhl said that the decision to move on from Hanson was made by human resources, but she would not comment any further.

The Costa Mesa girls’ volleyball team had put up particularly good results the past three seasons. The Mustangs went 49-31 overall and 23-7 in Orange Coast League matches over that span.

“Six years ago, I took over a [girls’ volleyball] program that was dead last,” Hanson said. “In those six years, we went to the playoffs for the first time in quite a while and then won our first playoff game in forever [against Tustin in the first round of the CIF Southern Section Division 5 playoffs in 2017].

“In those six years, we took third [place] once and second the last three seasons in a league with Laguna Beach, Calvary Chapel and our rival Estancia. We won the Battle of the Bell four out of six years. I had grown very fond of the kids and the school, so it was very hard to accept.”

Hanson, who was a walk-on coach, also led the boys’ volleyball program to back-to-back winning seasons in 2015 and 2016, advancing to the second round of the Division 2 playoffs in the latter.

Costa Mesa has opened the search for its next girls’ volleyball coach. While the school would like to have an on-campus coach, Uhl said that it will depend on if the coaching candidate carries a credential in a subject of which the school has an open teaching position.

On another note, Uhl said the school has no intention of compromising on a new stance to have the boys’ and girls’ volleyball coaching jobs handled by separate individuals.

“We are going to divide up the positions,” Uhl said. “It will be a girls’ coach, and we will have a separate boys’ coach, as well.”

Asked why the school has taken that approach, Uhl said, “I think it limits us [to have one coach for both teams] because a lot of the coaches are club coaches, and boys’ season is during girls’ high school season and vice-versa.”

::

Support our sports coverage by becoming a digital subscriber.

For more sports stories, visit latimes.com/socal/daily-pilot/sports or follow us on Twitter @DailyPilotSport.

[email protected]

Twitter: @ProfessorTurner