{"id":1027,"date":"2010-08-18T15:20:13","date_gmt":"2010-08-18T21:20:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.nsr-inc.com\/\/?p=1027"},"modified":"2010-08-18T15:20:13","modified_gmt":"2010-08-18T21:20:13","slug":"di-prospect-hoffman-chooses-dii-seattle-pacific","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/di-prospect-hoffman-chooses-dii-seattle-pacific\/","title":{"rendered":"DI Prospect Paige Hoffman Thrives at DII Seattle Pacific"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the fall of 2005, sophomore Paige Hoffman<\/a><\/strong> was wondering what she would do if not recruited to play college volleyball.\u00a0 After all, her older sister, Lauren, was a senior and one of the best outside hitters in their league, yet she was getting zero attention from coaches.\u00a0 Making matters bleaker was the fact that Cathedral Catholic High<\/a><\/strong> in Encinitas, California had a very good volleyball program and still no college coaches were anywhere to be seen, much less beating her door down.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Paige was recruited mostly by NCAA DI programs before deciding on DII Seattle Pacific.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When NSR<\/strong> area scout Dwight Castimore<\/a><\/strong> (San Diego) strode into the Cathedral gym to scout a volleyball match, he had no idea that within a few days both sisters would be under his wing in pursuit of their dreams to play in college.\u00a0 Their mother, Trish, convinced that she and her girls needed the help of professionals, enrolled Lauren and Paige and from that point on their hopes rested on the shoulders of NSR<\/strong> and Dwight.<\/p>\n

The six-foot Lauren had hoped to be noticed and picked up by a major DI program.\u00a0 However, getting involved in the recruiting process so late meant that most of the country’s top teams had already secured commitments for her class. Nonetheless, she got plenty of notice from smaller programs and two full-ride offers from mid-major Division I schools, Loyola of Baltimore<\/a><\/strong> and Manhattan<\/a><\/strong> (NY).\u00a0 But the prospect of traveling the length of the country to play was unappealing to Lauren, so she opted not to play in college.\u00a0<\/p>\n

By signing on with NSR<\/strong><\/a> as a sophomore, Paige had the luxury of seeing which level of volleyball she could expect to play in college by gauging the questionnaires she was receiving from college coaches.\u00a0 “After starting with NSR<\/strong>, I began getting questionnaires from everywhere,” Paige said.\u00a0 At six-two, Paige got interest from about 50 colleges ranging from the Ivy League<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0to the Atlantic 10<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0 “Nothing really felt right to me, so when I didn’t respond to them, most of those opportunities went away.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

She did, though, decide that a big school wasn’t for her.\u00a0 Paige told Dwight that she was more interested in going to a smaller school.\u00a0 That’s when Dwight picked the phone up and called the head volleyball coach at Seattle Pacific University<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0from the highly competitive NCAA<\/strong> DII<\/strong><\/a> Great Northwest Athletic Conference<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0 Once Head Coach Chris Johnson<\/a><\/strong> saw Paige’s NSR<\/strong> online video, he contacted her.\u00a0 “He wanted her right away,” said Dwight.<\/p>\n

Accepting the only official visit which she would take as a senior, Paige\u00a0drove the 20-hour trip north, a tad out of her original 6-hour limit.\u00a0\u00a0The wintertime climate in the Seattle area was\u00a0a shock after having rarely ventured out of Southern California, but two things swayed her.\u00a0 “First, is it absolutely beautiful here.\u00a0 It is like being on vacation nine months of the\u00a0year.\u00a0 And, the team dynamics were incredible which is so very important to me.\u00a0 The\u00a0people here\u00a0were so nice and the\u00a0girls on the team\u00a0were so kind to me.\u00a0 Driving home I decided I would go to Seattle Pacific.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Seattle Paciific's beauty and team dynamics were the right fit for Paige.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Paige has never regretted her decision.\u00a0 “I love it here.\u00a0 It is the perfect school for me.\u00a0 If it weren’t for NSR<\/strong> and Dwight, this would have never happened.\u00a0 And, financially, my parents pay less for me to\u00a0 go to SPU than they did for me to attend high school,” she laughed.\u00a0 With a\u00a0total student body enrollment of 4,000,\u00a0the school’s low student-to-teacher ration fits right into\u00a0Paige’s needs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Every one of my professors knows me by name.\u00a0\u00a0They are so helpful here, always open to helping me with anything I need,” she said.\u00a0\u00a0Obviously it has\u00a0paid off.\u00a0 Paige has been on the Dean’s List each\u00a0semester since her arrival to maintain her\u00a0academic scholarship.\u00a0 That, along with “two\u00a0small loans” and her athletic\u00a0award, which increases this year, makes college very affordable for her family.\u00a0 She currently maintains a 3.6 GPA and plans to earn her MBA upon graduating two quarters early next year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Paige has made her mark on the school in other ways as well.\u00a0 This past year\u00a0SPU’s\u00a0athletic department heads\u00a0selected\u00a0Paige as one of two student-athletes to represent the school at the NCAA Division II Leadership Academy<\/a><\/strong> held in Portland.\u00a0 The conclave occurs only every few years bringing outstanding DII student-athletes together to discuss leadership and its impact on their teams, schools, communities and conferences.\u00a0 Paige returned to help lead SPU’s Student-athlete Advisory Committee.\u00a0 She along with respresentatives from\u00a0every SPU sport, meet regularly to organize and\u00a0spearhead volunteer efforts around the\u00a0Seattle area.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

And, what about this year’s\u00a0team?\u00a0 “I think we will have a great team.\u00a0 It is a really good mix of veteran\u00a0players and newcomers.”\u00a0\u00a0Paige was no slouch her sophomore season.\u00a0 One of just two Falcons\u00a0to play in all 113 games, she hit at a .252 clip (10th in the conference) with 180 kills, and had 69 blocks which tied\u00a0for the second-highest total on the team.\u00a0 With a career-best 9’10” approach touch, there’s no reason to think her stats will suffer anytime soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the fall of 2005, sophomore Paige Hoffman was wondering what she would do if not recruited to play college volleyball.\u00a0 After all, her older sister, Lauren, was a senior and one of the best outside hitters in their league, yet she was getting zero attention from coaches.\u00a0 Making matters bleaker was the fact that … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1027"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1027"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1027\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1027"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1027"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsr-inc.com\/scouting-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1027"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}