May 21, 2010
STANFORD, Calif. - Stanford setter Kawika Shoji has made the United States A2 national men's volleyball team that will compete at the Pan American Cup beginning Monday in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Shoji, the AVCA National Player of the Year, left soon after leading the Cardinal to its second national championship, a sweep over Penn State at Maples Pavilion on May 8. After over a week of tryouts, Shoji made the team.
"Making this roster is a huge step for me individually and for the Stanford program," Shoji wrote in an e-mail. "It allows me to get in the gym to train with the best players in the country and is an important start to my hopefully long journey with the national team.
"It is also a tribute to the Stanford program because it shows what kind of caliber players we have here. The Stanford program, with Coach Kosty at the helm, prepares its players for the next level."
The A2 squad acts as the U.S. national team's "B" team. The full national team is preparing for the World League season, which begins June 4.
The Pan Am Cup is an annual event created by NORCECA, the governing body of international volleyball in North and Central American and the Caribbean. The U.S. has won the past two years and three times overall since the event was created in 2006.
The nine-team event is broken up into first-round groups of three. The U.S. plays Mexico and Puerto Rico in Group B. The top two advance to a playoff round.