By MATT GOLDBERG

Herald-Whig Sports Writer

Bill Connell is always willing to give a young coach a chance.

The Quincy Notre Dame athletic director remembers when he was a 22-year-old looking for his break as a head football coach.

"I'm very quick to defend the idea of youth," Connell said. "... I'm never afraid to go with a young candidate."

On Monday, Connell introduced 27-year-old Freddy Mejia III as the Lady Raiders' new girls volleyball coach. Mejia has been an assistant coach for the Quincy University men's volleyball team for two seasons.

"He's obviously a young coach but I think he's a coach that's coachable," Connell said. "When I say that, he obviously knows his X's and O's of volleyball. Obviously as a young coach in our setting (there's) lots to learn ... little things that add up to be a whole lot -- running a program."

Even though this is Mejia's first varsity head coaching position, the Quincy University undergraduate student impressed Connell in both of his interviews.

"He was somebody that stuck out to the interviewing committee immediately ... we believe he'll be able to restore our volleyball program to where it's been at in past years," Connell said.

Mejia replaces Mark Damhorst, who coached the Lady Raiders for two seasons.

"It's been a long search but it's been a very thorough search," Connell said. "We've made sure that we found the right person for Quincy Notre Dame."

QND is a shade below .500 (53-54) during the past three seasons.

"All of the programs at Quincy Notre Dame are very important to me," Connell said. "This has been one that obviously has not been up to snuff in my opinion and ultimately it was one reason why we didn't make a real quick decision."

Connell said seeing Mejia implement his up-tempo style of play into the program should be fun to watch.

"I think he'll bring some excitement to the court that we haven't had in the past few years," Connell said.

Mejia said he occasionally helped coach the QND varsity last.

"I enjoyed the girls, how they worked, and once I found the job being open I really want to jump on that opportunity to work with the whole team," Mejia said.

Mejia hails from Los Angeles. He started playing volleyball toward the end of his high school career and went on to play in 2001 and 2003 at Long Beach City College and then he transferred to play in 2004 at the University of La Verne -- where the program was cut after one season.

"After the program got cut I decided to travel the world a little bit," Mejia said.

During the summer of 2006 he led a boys 18-and-under team and a 17-and-under girls club team to the junior Olympics.

In 2006, he planned on playing at Quincy University but because of eligibility issues he ended up becoming an assistant coach.

-- mgoldberg@whig.com/ 221-3367