Hall of Fame: Tina Bowman (Newport Harbor)

Richard Dunn

While former Newport Harbor High three-sport standout Tina Bowman

might be known best for volleyball, she arrived on the athletic landscape

as a track and field state finalist in the girls high jump.

Bowman, who played collegiate volleyball at Golden West College and

the University of South Florida, actually finished her career as a high

jumper on South Florida’s 2000 NCAA indoor championship track and field

team.

In the spring of 1999, the South Florida track coaches, who needed a

high jumper, got wind of the fact that Bowman was a pretty good high

jumper in high school.

A couple of weeks before the Conference USA Track and Field

Championships, the Bulls’ coaches offered Bowman, whose collegiate

volleyball career was over, a scholarship for the following year if she

scored any points as a late addition to the women’s team.

Four years removed from track competition and with only a few weeks to

find her step again, Bowman placed fourth at the ’99 Conference USA

finals and scored four points for the Tampa-based Bulls, who awarded her

a fifth year of college on scholarship.

Bowman, who finished fourth again at the 2000 Conference USA finals,

made her first real mark at Newport Harbor as a high jumper in 1992, when

she finished fourth at the CIF State Championships at Cerritos College as

a freshman.

A gifted athlete at Ensign Junior High, Bowman started high jumping in

the seventh grade, “because you had to do it in P.E., and I realized I

could get over the bar,” she said.

After a breakthrough season as a Newport Harbor freshman, Bowman

captured the 1993 CIF Southern Section Division II high jump title as a

sophomore. She also won the Sea View League championship that year,

placed third at the state meet and reached a personal best of 5 feet, 9

1/4 inches to win the Mt. San Antonio College Relays.

But Bowman, groomed at the Orange County Volleyball Club, was a

standout middle blocker on the Sailors’ 1994 state Division I

championship volleyball team under Coach Dan Glenn and played on two

state championship squads at Golden West in 1995-96.

At South Florida, the 5-foot-9 Bowman helped the Bulls win

back-to-back Conference USA titles in 1997-98, while reaching the NCAA

Tournament both years.

“It was totally different (at South Florida), because every match we

had was out of state,” Bowman said. “It was a very hard traveling

schedule. We’d leave on Thursday and come back late Sunday. We’d fly

everywhere -- to Houston, to Charlotte (N.C.), to Chicago and

Cincinnati. But it was just great. I got to see everything because we

traveled so much. It was really great stuff.”

At Newport Harbor, Bowman also played basketball and served as a

forward in then-Coach Shannon Jakosky’s seven-player rotation.

“Basketball was just something I did to fill space between volleyball and

track, but it was fun,” she said.

In volleyball, Bowman played in the epic 1993 Back Bay matches between

Corona del Mar and Newport Harbor, the Nos. 1 and 2 ranked teams in the

nation.

The Sailors, also with stars Misty May and Melissa Schutz, finished

undefeated in the Sea View League with two wins over the Sea Kings.

“In the first (league match), we were actually down, 0-2, and came

back to win in (the Sea Kings’) gym,” said Bowman, one of many juniors on

Newport’s side. “That was when Corona del Mar was ranked No. 1 in the

nation (by USA Today) and we were No. 2.”

Newport Harbor won again at home in the second match between the Back

Bay powerhouses, but the Sailors lost to their crosstown rivals in the

CIF Division I title match and again in the state finals. “Those two

teams were unreal,” Bowman said.

As a senior, Bowman’s prep volleyball career was crowned by the 1994

CIF Division I, state and national championships.

These days, the latest honoree in the Daily Pilot Sports Hall of Fame

is coaching volleyball (boys and girls JV) at Huntington Beach High and

works for a volleyball company, Volleyball One. She’s single and lives in

Long Beach.