Our staff features exceptional people: teachers, educators, mentors, positive thinkers, and experienced volleyball minds. Our coaches share a deep passion for volleyball and view athletics as a vehicle by which many of life's lessons can be learned. We encourage you to read about the wonderful coaches and people of SMBC Shack.
JOSHUA MARBACH
DIRECTOR - SMBC SHACK
MY HOMETOWN: Burbank, CA
BEFORE LAVA: John Burroughs HS, Pierce college, California Baptist University.
COACHING BACKGROUND: Coached boys and girls at John Burroughs for 7 seasons, went to CIF finals and won state. Coaches girls at Marlborough. Coached boys at Harvard Westlake. Coached boys at Windward and went to CIF finals. Head coach for boys indoor and beach at Viewpoint for the last three seasons.
PLAYING EXPERIENCE: played at SMBC for 3 years. Played at Pierce for 2 years, made 2nd team all conference, transferred to California Baptist university and won a NAIA national championship.
FUN FACT: loves to camp and backpack
GUILTY PLEASURE: dark chocolate
ETHAN MARSHALL
SMBC SHACK COACH
HOMETOWN: Valencia, California
COACHING BACKGROUND: Before LAVA I coached Sand Volleyball for the Sand Club in Arizona. I am new to the coaching world only coaching one year of beach volleyball. I coached in 2020/2021 for our 12s programs. I have had the experience of learning from really great coaches in the past year. I have helped out at practices with some of our other 2020 team.
PLAYING EXPERIENCE: I started out playing at SMBC when I was 12 years old so coming back to coach has been a great experience for me. I have set for 10 years gathering some achievements such as: Club Nationals all tournament team, player of the year for the Foothill league in high school, and one bronze medal with SMBC.
FUN FACT: A fun fact about me is that I graduated from Arizona State University
GUILTY PLEASURE: A guilty pleasure I have is playing video games!
JEFF NAKAGAWA
SMBC SHACK COACH
Bio coming soon.
BRUNO GAMBOA
SMBC SHACK COACH
Bruno Gamboa is an SMBC alumnus (Class of 2016) and a two-time medalist at the USAV Boys Junior National Championship, earning silver in 2013 and bronze in 2015. He went on to compete at the collegiate club level for both UCSB and CSUN, winning a gold medal at the 2017 NCVF National Championship and a silver medal in 2022.
While continuing his playing career, Bruno began coaching youth volleyball with SBVC and Surfside Volleyball Club and also coached men's collegiate club teams at UCSB and CSUN. He is currently a high school teacher and serves as the head varsity boys volleyball coach and assistant varsity girls volleyball coach at Milken Community School in Los Angeles.
Most recently, Bruno was the assistant coach for SMBC 16-Molten's gold-medal run at the 2025 AAU Boys Volleyball National Tournament.
JAMES TARUC
SMBC SHACK COACH
FULL NAME: James Taruc
MY HOMETOWN: Quezon City, Manila Philippines 🇵🇭
BEFORE LAVA: Was coaching for SMBC.
COACHING BACKGROUND:
Started coaching in 2010-2012 at Westridge as well as club for SMBC 2010-2020. Coached at Crespi 2011-2015. Coached 2016-2017 at St. Francis. Currently coaching at Central City Value High School where I helped lead the GIRLS to 2014 DIV. 5 City Sec. Finalist, 2015 DIV. 5 City Sec. Champions, 2016 DIV. 3 City Sec. Finalist, 2017 DIV. 3 City Sec. Champions, 2018 DIV. 2 City Sec. Finalists and BOYS 2019 DIV. 4 City Sec. Finalists.
PLAYING EXPERIENCE:
Setter for 4 years in high school. 1998 DIV. 3A City Sec. Champions, 1999 City Sec. Finalists, 2000 State Champions Pierce College.
FUN FACT:
First person to play the Libero position for the MENS VOLLEYBALL team at PIERCE.
GUILTY PLEASURE: Love SWEETS.
SEAN MCQUIGGAN
SMBC SHACK COACH
Bio coming soon.
CATARINA MARBACH
SMBC SHACK COACH
JAMES RYAN NORRIS
SMBC SHACK COACH
Bio coming soon.