Cross Country, Volleyball
Favorite athlete: Ashton Eaton
Favorite team: PSU men's volleyball
Favorite memory competing in sports: Winning an AAU volleyball tournament this past winter
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: While playing on the JV team, I blocked the other team's serve.
Music on iPod: Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Black Keys, Jack Johnson
Future plans: Attend Penn State University followed by dental school
Words to live by: "Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude."
One goal before turning 30: Have a career as an orthodontist
One thing people don’t know about me: I go sailing on the Chesapeake Bay during summer
By GORDON GLANTZ
If coaches could go shopping for ideal players, you might be surprised at what would fill up their shopping carts.
And you just might find them at customer service, trading in one superstar for a coachable player willing to work at his craft and improve with each passing season.
This makes athletes like Souderton senior Mike Pagan, the Univest Featured Male Athlete of the Week, a hot commodity.
“Mike is just a good kid,” said Souderton volleyball coach Dave Stastny. “I have coached him since he was a freshman (when Pagan played junior varsity). He has grown into being both a great person and a great athlete.
“He treats everyone – coaches, players – with respect. He’s not a vocal kid, but he is a leader by example. He’s not a yeller. He’s more about talking to other players. We talk about the past, present and future and how you can’t do anything about the past or the future and to focus on the present and take it one play at a time. He’s good at that. He’s into that.”
Pagan – who was junior on the varsity squad last year flanked by older brother, Jack, and younger brother, Luke – has made his greatest leap, in terms of improvement, this past offseason in anticipation of what has been a seamless transition from middle hitter to the more vital outside hitter spot.
“He worked real hard this past offseason,” said Stastny, adding that coaching all three Pagan brothers, and now Mike and Luke, is “a neat little thing, not just for me and the team but for those guys. It helped us. They all liked the game.”
Pagan referred to being one of three brothers on the team as a “fun time” that was both unique and beneficial.
“It’s not an experience most other people get to have,” he said. “It improved our team having three players thinking the same way.”
And they carried the game into the home and plotted ways for improvement.
“Yes, of course we did,” Pagan confirmed. “It gave us more time to talk to each other about how to improve as players and as a team.”
Of his improvement, Pagan cites hard work and natural growth.
“In my freshman year, I was behind everyone, physically,” he said. “In my sophomore and junior years, I grew taller and I also paid more attention to getting stronger, all-around.”
According to Stastny, Pagan’s body has caught up to his 6-3 frame.
“I’ve seen growth from him every year,” said the coach. “This year, though, has been the biggest step. He was always a lanky kid and his body was a bit ahead of him. He has grown into himself. He has done a lot of working out, and jumping, on his own.”
Learning By Doing
Stastny’s preaching about getting better by actively honing your craft found a willing choir member in Pagan.
“I took that to heart,” said Pagan. “It’s all about experience. I played a lot of AAU and club volleyball. The more I played, and got stronger, the better I got – especially, this past offseason.”
The offseason included a 15-week program focusing on jumping, which ran parallel to the cross-country season.
“That was tough,” he said, adding that the volleyball training ran a bit counter to excelling in cross-country because it is “not designed to be one of the best runners on the team.”
This season, the Indians were a hard-luck 5-3 in their first eight league games, having only been soundly beaten once.
“We’ve been competitive,” said Stastny. “We’ve been in every match, except one. Mike has been a big contributor. He is doing well. I really enjoy coaching him.”
Pagan believes the best is yet to come for the team he helps to captain.
“This team, in particular, has a lot of room to grow, mentally, with our attitude,” he said, adding that the Indians are relatively inexperienced but allowing that “we still have a lot of talent.”
If they put it all together.
“If we can grow, I think we can have success in the postseason,” he said, adding that he also thinking ahead to the legacy of the program left by two-thirds of the Pagan Bros.
“This is my fourth year, and we have really tried to grow the program,” he said. “I’m seeing some success with that I’m seeing more enthusiasm for the program.”
Part of Pagan’s regiment is to run for the cross-country team in the offseason. By his own admission, he is not a standout, describing himself as “adequate.”
Still, according to his coach, John Donahue, his presence was felt.
“He was a good strong leader for many of the JV kids in big invitational meets,” said Donahue. “He was a strong role model to middle of the pack runners that sometimes get overlooked in a large program. He cared about the squad a lot, (and) he would organize team activities. I know that he is a very strong student but I have not had the pleasure of teaching him.”
Court to the Classroom
Stastny is not a teacher at the school, and Donahue has not had him in class, but they both see the clear correlation between Pagan’s work ethic as an athlete to that of a student.
“He is very well-rounded, and I know he does very well in school,” said Stastny.
That would be an understatement.
Pagan, with an AP-heavy schedule, boasts a weighted GPA of 4.9. He is a member of the National Honors Society and Future Business Leaders of America, for which he recently attended a leadership conference.
“I got that from my family, as a whole,” said Pagan, who is bracing for an onslaught of AP tests in early May. “My parents (Mary and John Pagan) encouraged success in the classroom.
“It has always been academics first. Since sports takes up quite a bit of mandatory time, you have to think about making good use of your time on the weekends – other than catching up on any schoolwork that you may have pushed aside.
“I’ve always had the support of my parents, especially my mom. Whenever I felt stressed, she said ‘just do what you need to do to get it all done.’ But, by no means, has it been easy.”
In a perfect world, Pagan would be able to play volleyball in college, but Title IX has all but wiped out men’s volleyball programs at anything but the big-time Division I level.
Even though he is 6-3, Pagan knows the deal and has no delusions.
“They are all, like, 6-7 and come from California,” he explained.
Instead, he will attend the Penn State Honors Program and major in chemistry. Right now, he is thinking dental school and then being an orthodontist.
And still play volleyball, the sport he fell in love with after following the trail blazed by his older brother.
“They have a great club team,” said Pagan, who has some contacts within the club team. “That will be fun.”
Pagan thanked his parents for “pushing us to succeed, but not enough to turn us against them.”
He added: “They have always given us a lot of support.”
And the coachable athlete gave a shout out in that direction.
“Both of my coaches,” he affirmed. “When you are with the same coach for four years, they have to have some impact on you. They get to know you as a player – or a runner – and you see the product of their efforts.”
