Some camping trip this was. Try 11 universities and three summer volleyball camps in five states in 25 days of driving hither and thither.

Thus was the lot of Osan American Cougars junior Nicole Sparks and senior Laura Vega, along with the latter's mom and dad Christine and Gualberto. Kentucky, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Virginia.

The goal: Exposure to smaller universities where students learn from professors rather than graduate assistants, smaller volleyball programs which afford more playing time than one might get at a Division I school, and exposure to cultures and creeds one would never see out here.

Catch their story in this week's Home Team page.