Russian Lands In Kangaroo Court -- Having Coached Volleyball From Leningrad To Lake Washington, Slavic Popovsky Imports An International Approach To A Team To Which Winning Is Foreign.

KIRKLAND - When they're not in the volleyball game, the players stand in the corner, behind their team's side of the court, at the end of their team's bench.

Their coach, meanwhile, sits by himself on an otherwise empty bench, sternly watching his team's performance.

It's the way the game is often run at the college level and typically in international play.

Now it's the way they do it at Lake Washington High School.

"We're not allowed to sit down," sophomore Veronica Rehder said.

It's supposed to keep the body warm, muscles loose, mind focused - and, perhaps, opponents amused.

The Kangaroos are the only team in the KingCo Conference, and might be the only high-school team in the state, to employ the conspicuous strategy.

It felt strange to them, they said. "But we're used to it now," senior Kerry Hansen said. "When he calls us in, we're ready to run out there and play."

So far, it is the most obvious contribution Lake Washington's first-year head coach, Slavic Popovsky, 42, has made to the hard-luck program.

Viatcheslav Mihailovich Popovsky.

That's his full name. About the only thing harder than spelling it is understanding his English through a thick Russian accent that has been affected by less than three years of American influence.

So he goes by simply "Slavic" or "Slava." And goes on working on his fast-improving English skills. And, mostly, goes about his volleyball very, very seriously.

"His attitude, it made you freak out at first, because it seemed like he was always mad," Rehder said. "But the more you understand, the more you see it's his culture, and he's trying to help you get better."

Popovsky may not be the ideal high-school coach. "Sometimes I've got to work more on being calm," he said. "I think maybe that's Russian way."

That doesn't mean he's not the ideal volleyball coach.

The St. Petersburg native was an assistant coach for the former USSR's women's volleyball team that won the gold medal at the 1980 Olympics. He has also coached teams that won a world championship in 1978, the European championship in 1979, as well as a Leningrad local team that won the USSR championship.

"It's my narrow specialty," he said of volleyball. "For me, volleyball is not big deal. For me, volleyball is educational tool to develop children and develop ability - to prepare some of them for high-level teams and prepare some of them for life."

Popovsky has the American equivalent of a master's degree in physical education, and before coming to the United States in January, 1992, was an author, lecturer, coach, personal fitness trainer and consultant.

He also was a man with ideas too important to him to waste in his increasingly unstable political and economic environment, he said.

"When I left, I told my mom, `I'm going to stay there,' " he said. "She said, `If you can, do it.'

"I respect Russia. But it's not my way. The United States, it's exactly what I needed to do. I'm ready for the United States now."

He didn't seem ready when he arrived in New York - after taking the first departure approval he could get, regardless of destination. "I came here without connections, very bad (English) language and no money at all," he said.

He worked odd jobs until an acquaintance directed him to opportunities in the Northwest about a month later, he said. Then came an assistant coaching job at Vashon High in the fall of '92, and a junior-varsity job at Lake Washington the next year.

When Marcene McGowen left the head coaching job, Popovsky was hired.

He hoped to find two things in this country: a tradition of capitalism, and a market for a "volleyball institute" designed to teach coaches and coach players of all ages.

He found the first, and he's trying to build the second through clinics at Highline Athletic Club in Burien and Bellevue Athletic Club (charging from $25 to $40).

"If I'm good specialist, I can start from the bottom, and if I'm good specialist, they would have to recognize this," he said. "If they don't, maybe I have to think again more."

If Popovsky wanted to start from the bottom, he came to the right place. In the 1990s, Lake Washington has finished no higher than eighth place in the KingCo Conference and has won no more than four of 12 KingCo matches in a season.

But despite his team's 1-9 start this year, the coach dismisses this season as the sacrifice for the future: "You have to destroy their bad skills, then build new skills."

His players seem to believe in him. "I feel like I've improved more within the first two games (this year) than I had in all of high school before," said Hansen, one of only four seniors on the varsity roster.

Said Popovsky: "Next year, this team is going to be the best (in KingCo)."