VUVB adds Polish Middle Blocker Paulina Krawczyk to recruiting class
VINCENNES, Ind. – The four-time defending NJCAA Division I Region 24 Champion Vincennes University volleyball team made another big addition this week to their 2025 recruiting class in six-foot middle blocker Paulina Krawczyk.
Paulina joins the Trailblazers from Strachanow, Poland and attended high school at I LO im. Tadeusza Kościuszki w Turku.
Paulina plays for the Polish club team UKS Piątka Turek under Head Coach Andrzej Malczewski.
Paulina joins the Trailblazers after a very accomplished career for her club team, where she guided them to a silver medal in the 3rd Women’s League in 2020-21, a bronze medal in 2021-22, earned semifinals promotion to the 2nd Women’s League in 2021-22 and 2023-24 and is playing in the semifinal of the 3rd Women’s League currently.
“As I’ve said before, we do graduate a lot of front row players,” VUVB Head Coach Gary Sien said. “I always like to recruit hitters or players who can play multiple positions. Paulina is primarily a middle but she can also hit outside pretty well too. We have position openings in all front row spots, so I just don’t think you can go wrong with bringing in players that can fill a number of spots. It also gives us the option to move players around depending on the system and the players’ abilities. If you don’t recruit with versatility in mind, you just don’t have that option.”
“For someone like Paulina, she definitely fits the bill of being someone who has that versatility,” Sien added. “She also has a lot of experience. Her first year in the 2020-21 season, she was playing in the Senior league when she was 14 years old. So she’s someone who has quite a bit of experience from a very young age playing at a high level and playing against people who were four or five years, if not more, older than her.”
“Paulina has been playing with our volleyball club since 2020,” Malczewski said. “She is a middle blocker, but her role as a player is significant, making 14-15 points per match. She is characterized by her speed, sportsmanship and power. Her jumping abilities are very good. She moves well on the court and is good at defense. Her spikes are very good and serves high quality.”
“She is very ambitious and is a ‘warrior type,” Malczewski added. “Paulina is aware of how important weight training is and is focused on the gym as much as the volleyball court.”
Paulina is the daughter of Katarzyna and Tomasz and her major is still undecided.
Paulina is the third VUVB signee that stands over six feet tall, joining six-foot outside hitter Kenli Sullivan (Bloomington, Ind.) and six-foot-two middle Taryn Thuis (Linton, Ind.) in the 2025 VUVB recruiting class.
This group will have some big shoes to fill at the next for the Trailblazers, joining a VUVB squad coming off a 30-13 season last year and winning VU’s fourth straight Region 24 Championship.
“We typically look for players from countries that have a very strong volleyball systems,” Sien said. “If you look at the lasts Olympics, both the men’s and women’s teams for Poland did extremely well. But that’s not a surprise because if you’ve been following them from the Olympics before, you could see this coming. It’s not by happenstance that this occurs. It’s the result of a great system that they have. Poland, Italy and Turkey, if you are looking at Europe, I think those are the top three countries in general that have pretty strong systems and professional leagues out there too.”
“It’s just been a much bigger sport over in Europe for decades,” Sien added. “Although the United States is developing. We now have three professional leagues in the U.S. Indianapolis just started their professional team back in January and they are hosting that league’s All-Star game this year. So it’s pretty exciting to see all of that happening.”
“We do graduate, it’s true for anybody at this level anyway, some pretty substantial players,” Sien said. “Not only for their abilities but for their leadership and the way they develop the culture of this team. So this year we are going to have to bring in players who are going to have to reestablish that culture. The culture of responsibility, accountability, knowing that this opportunity is great and while we’ve accomplished some things over the past few years, there are still greater things to accomplish as a program.”
“That’s been our theme as we recruit this year is, while it’s great to have these four Region Championships, it’s time to go beyond that,” Sien added. “It starts with having players with athletic ability and we’ve been blessed over the years to always have that. I’m very confident that the culture will be reestablished and I really like the group that we have. We have some really good, responsible players coming in. Winners, players coming from winning programs who have done very well both individually and team wise.”
The Vincennes University Athletic Department is excited to welcome Paulina Krawczyk to the 2025 Trailblazer recruiting class.
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By Joe Wallace