U.S. volleyball coach talks about tragedy at Beijing Games

His eyes were vacant, pierced by the reality that even in its most charmed moments, life carries no shield.

"It hurts," said Hugh McCutcheon, the U.S. men's volleyball coach. "I think it's something that no one should ever have to go through."

His sport is one of both soaring sets and vicious spikes.

One moment, McCutcheon was on a cozy gym floor Saturday afternoon, surrounded by his giddy team as it went through a final pre-competition practice.

The next moment, he was on a frenzied city street, surrounded by death.

One moment, his phone contained a happy text message from his father-in-law.

The next moment, that phone carried the news that his father-in-law had been slain during a nearby tour of the ancient Drum Tower.

Todd Bachman, 62, a business owner from Lakeville, Minn., had been stabbed to death during an apparent robbery attempt. His wife, Barbara, while trying to help him, had been seriously wounded in the attack that also injured an unnamed Chinese tour guide.

Their daughter, Elisabeth "Wiz" Bachman, a former Olympian who was with them at the time, was not hurt.

She was the one who called McCutcheon. She is his wife.

"My first thought was, obviously, how do I get there, I've got to get to my wife, and I've got to support her," he said Monday evening in his first interview since the incident.

McCutcheon left his team and has not been back. He left Olympic dreamland and has not been back.

In some ways, everyone involved in these Beijing Games left that protective five-ring bubble and has not been back.

You can light Olympic torches on every crowded street corner and recite Olympic oaths until you are blue in the face, but even here, even now, nothing is sacred, and nobody is truly safe.

An aging couple travels halfway across the world to cheer for their son-in-law coach, they buy a tour package, they buy tickets, a big week at the Olympics, and what happens?

Less than 24 hours after the opening ceremony, they are stabbed in an act of violence so senseless, the alleged assailant, Tang Yongming, immediately committed suicide by jumping 130 feet off a Drum Tower balcony.

"Life's not fair, but it's never going to be about that kind of stuff," said McCutcheon, 38, a New Zealand native who lives with his wife in Irvine. "At the end of day, it happened, and it seems the sooner we can come to grips with that, the better off we're going to be."