In his 15 years as Penn State's men's volleyball coach, Mark Pavlik is not accustomed to losing -- especially when it comes to recruiting premier Pennsylvania high school prospects.
But his recent loss in the pursuit of 6-foot-7 Daniel Tublin, a dynamic outside hitter from Fox Chapel High, illustrates the changing realities of men's volleyball.
Instead of going to national powerhouse Penn State, which is just two-and-a-half hours from home, Tublin signed a letter of intent to Stanford -- three time zones and a few weather patterns away in sunny California, the traditional epicenter for men's volleyball.
"Daniel's a great kid, and he's going to a great school," Pavlik said. "His signing with Stanford just shows how the sport has expanded."
Indeed, Tublin's cross-country odyssey points to a growing trend in men's volleyball.
As the sport's popularity continues to spike -- the number of high schools offering boys' volleyball grew from 1,716 to 2,045 between 2006 and 2008 -- collegiate recruiting has become less localized.
"It used to be that the West Coast schools would mainly recruit the West Coast kids, and a school like Penn State would get kids from the East, the Midwest and even Puerto Rico, developing talent bases in those areas," said John Speraw, coach of UC Irvine, the 2009 national champions.
"But now there's just more kids playing volleyball around the country and the landscape of recruiting has changed."
Speraw said club coaches, especially those from the East and Midwest, realize that attendance at the six major junior national tournaments throughout the year is crucial if their players want to get recruited.
Nearly 400 club teams attended the 2009 USAV Boys' Junior Olympic Championships in Atlanta in July.
Pepperdine coach Marv Dunphy said he rarely, if ever, takes recruiting trips to the East Coast because he knows he can see the top recruits from around the country in national tournaments.
"More boys have picked up the sport, and the talent in the East and the talent in the West is a lot more similar now than it was 20, 15, even 10 years ago," Dunphy said.
"And all of those guys, from the East and West, attend the national events, which have become huge."
The popularity of these tournaments has also helped East Coast schools like Penn State.
State College is more than 2,000 miles away from volleyball hotbed California, where youth volleyball feeder programs are comparable to youth soccer in East Coast suburbs.
Speraw said that because more kids play in California, there is a larger pool of skilled players. Meanwhile, Penn State doesn't have that local talent and has traditionally had to broaden its recruitment.
But Pavlik says the presence of national tournaments narrows the volleyball community and has helped the Nittany Lions land some of the nation's top scholastic recruits.
"Everyone goes to the same tournaments. It's not like we have to go searching under rocks to find these guys," Pavlik said.
"Not that these guys would even fit under rocks."
Especially not Jace Olsen, a highly touted 6-foot-7 middle blocker from Manhattan Beach, Calif.
Olsen, who was fielding offers from USC, UCLA and Hawaii, contacted the Penn State coaching staff early in the recruitment process, but first got face-to-face contact when they met last summer at the Junior Olympic Championships in Atlanta.
"After that, my interest in PSU really heated up," Olsen said.
Olsen, along with Newport Beach native Connor Curry, signed a letter of intent to join Penn State next season. The two will join Brad McCoy and Ian Hendries as the only California players on the Nittany Lions roster.
"I'm glad volleyball can give me the opportunity to go to a school like Penn State," Curry said.
"I've lived in California my whole life, and I just wanted to get out of the bubble."
