Dain Blanton - Women's Beach Volleyball Coach

Dain Blanton — USC Trojans Beach Volleyball

Photo by: John McGillen/USC Athletics

Dain Blanton

Title:
Head Coach
Email:
dain.blanton@usc.edu

DAIN BLANTON—an Olympic gold-medalist and the 2024 AVCA National Coach of the Year—is in his sixth season (2024-25) as head coach of the USC beach volleyball program.

Blanton has led the Women of Troy to NCAA championships in each of the last four seasons (2021, ’22, ’23, ’24) and made USC the first team ever to capture four straight titles in the sport and the first women’s program at USC to win four consecutive national crowns. He also guided the Trojans to two Pac-12 championships; the first in 2022 and a second in 2024, which was the final Pac-12 title awarded.

Including the shortened 2020 season—his first as a collegiate head coach—Blanton holds a remarkable 142-20 (.877) overall record as USC’s head coach. His record includes a 26-5 mark in postseason duals and an incredible 17-0 record in the NCAA championship tournament.

Blanton was inducted into the USA Volleyball Hall of Fame as an All-Time Great Beach Athlete in 2024. He is also a member of the CBVA Hall of Fame as a part of the Class of 2016 and was inducted into the Southern California Indoor Volleyball Hall of Fame in 2020. Blanton is also a member of the Pepperdine Athletics Hall of Fame’s class of 2008.

Blanton’s 2024 Trojans finished the season 37-5 and claimed both the Pac-12 and NCAA championships. The team produced a 16-match win streak during the season and finished with six wins in a row, which included five 3-0 sweeps to go undefeated at the NCAA championship.

In 2023, USC completed a 32-5 season with a third consecutive NCAA crown despite falling short of the Pac-12 championship dual for the first time in program history. The Trojans had winning streaks of 14 and 10 duals during the spring but absorbed four their five losses in the final two weeks of the season and at the conference tournament. In the end, four wins in Gulf Shores sealed another national title for Blanton.

In 2021—the first full year under Blanton’s direction—the Trojans went 30-4 overall and produced winning streaks of 13 and 12 matches during the season. USC followed that campaign with a 37-1 record and ended the 2022 season on a 36-match winning streak en route to capturing the Pac-12 and NCAA championships. Both years, the Women of Troy held the No. 1 ranking in the final AVCA poll.

Under Blanton, Trojans have been selected for 12 AVCA All-America certificates. His coaching has produced the Pac-12’s Pair of the Year and Player of the Year four times. Four-time USC All-American Tina Graudina was chosen as the Pac-12 Player of the Year in 2021 and 2022. Four-time All-American Megan Kraft was chosen as the conference Player of the Year in 2023 and 2024.

Graudina teamed with Kraft for Pac-12 Pair of the Year honors in 2021 and paired with Hailey Harward to earn the honor again in 2022. Kraft—who was chosen as the league’s Freshman of the Year in 2021—was also picked for Pac-12 Pair of the Year honors twice with Delaynie Maple in 2023 and ’24. Kraft was also ultimately chosen as the AVCA’s Player of the Year in 2024.

Previously, Blanton was the volunteer assistant coach at USC for four seasons (2015-18) as the Women of Troy won the 2015 AVCA national crown and the 2016 and 2017 NCAA championships. USC also captured back-to-back (2016-17) Pac-12 titles. He replaced two-time National Coach of the Year Anna Collier, who retired from collegiate coaching in June 2019 after serving as the only previous head coach in the program’s eight-year history.

In 2020, Blanton’s team finished 6-5 after play was halted due to concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic. Each of the five losses were by 3-2 decisions and to opponents ranked in the nation’s top 20.

Before he became head coach, Blanton helped USC produce eight AVCA All-Americans and had a hand in coaching USC’s top pair of Kelly Claes and Sara Hughes to the 2015 AVCA Pairs National Championship and the 2017 USAV Collegiate National Pairs Championship. The duo also won back-to-back Pac-12 pairs titles in 2016 and 2017.

During the 2019 season, Blanton served as a color analyst and sideline reporter for ESPN, covering the NCAA beach championship in Gulf Shores, Ala.; and the Olympic Channel, covering the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship.

In the summer of 2021, Blanton served as a sideline reporter for NBC’s coverage of the beach volleyball events at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. He reprised that role as part of the NBC broadcast team in 2024 at the Paris Games.

Blanton has had a distinguished career as a sports broadcaster, covering sports such as NBA basketball and Major League Baseball, college basketball, football, and beach volleyball for networks including ESPN, NBC, ABC, FOX Sports Net, Universal Sports Network, Pac-12 Networks, Olympic Channel and Amazon Prime. He covered beach volleyball for NBC at the 2016 Olympics.

Blanton was the United States’ first two-time male beach volleyball Olympian. He and partner Eric Fonoimoana (USC’s volunteer assistant coach in 2019) captured the gold medal at the 2000 Sydney Games despite opening the tournament as the ninth seed. He then partnered with current USC men’s volleyball head coach Jeff Nygaard at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.

Blanton is among just a handful of beach volleyball players to have won an NCAA title in college, an Olympic gold medal, and multiple professional crowns. He was a 1994 AVCA All-American honorable mention choice at Pepperdine where he lettered for four years (1991-94) and helped the Waves win the 1992 NCAA indoor title as a sophomore. As a pro, Blanton won 11 beach tournaments, including nine AVP championships (four with Nygaard) and two FIVB titles, and collected more than $725,000 in winnings.

In 2003, Blanton and Nygaard were the AVP Team of the Year and Blanton was the AVP’s Best Offensive Player. He became the first male African-American to win a major beach volleyball event when he claimed the 1997 AVP Hermosa Grand Slam. He and Kent Steffes won a bronze medal at the 1997 Beach Volleyball World Championships.

Blanton was the 1990 Orange County Boys Volleyball Player of the Year at Laguna Beach (Calif.) High, where he was also an All-State basketball player.

Blanton has spent time mentoring students and as a motivational speaker through his non-profit organization Getting to Gold. He also founded a charity in 1997 called Dain’s Day at the Beach, which provides urban youth with the opportunity to participate in beach volleyball.

Blanton graduated with a bachelor’s degree in public relations from Pepperdine in 1994 and holds a teaching credential in physical education. He was born on Nov. 28, 1971, and resides in Santa Monica, Calif., with Maeve McCaffrey and their son Caid Quentin.