International men’s volleyball: Garcia stands out for Lube as former AVCA POYs loom large

Editor’s note: Blair Lambert covers international men’s volleyball for VolleyballMag.com, focusing on Americans playing abroad and will have updates throughout the professional 2022-23 season. Got a note about a player or a comment? Email blairlambert2@gmail.com

When Aleksander Nikolov made the decision this summer to leave Long Beach State after his freshman season to play professional volleyball in Europe, it was a surprising but not an unexpected move. After all, the 2022 AVCA Division I-II Player of the Year was a starting outside hitter for the Bulgarian national team in the Volleyball Nations League.

He signed with Lube Civitanova, the defending Italian SuperLega champions. The club had lost Osmany Juantorena, and needed a reinforcement on the left side. It was expected Nikolov would be behind Marlon Yant, a Cuban outside hitter who had a breakout season during Lube’s 2022 championship run.

An injury to Yant led to a few experimental lineups, including putting Ivan Zaytsev, a long-time opposite for the Italian national team, in the outside hitter role. However, in the last three matches, both Garcia and Nikolov have found themselves in the starting lineup. That included a league match against unbeaten Sir Safety Perugia on October 26, the SuperCoppa semifinals against Modena on October 31, and the SuperCoppa finals against Perugia again on November 1.

What makes it noteworthy is that two of the past three AVCA Division I-II players of the year have been in the starting lineup of one of Europe’s most prestigious clubs. Garcia won the award in 2020 after his junior season at BYU.

Lube fell in five sets to Perugia in the SuperCoppa final. It was the first time that Perugia had been taken to five sets all year.

Garcia scored 21 points in the final on 19 kills (.333), a block and an ace. Nikolov started the first two sets but was used as a substitute in the last three. He finished with four points on a kill (hitting minus .500) and three aces. Garcia led Lube in the semifinals against Modena as well, finishing with 11 kills (.292), three aces, and a block. Nikolov added 12 kills (.571) and two aces.

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