Tayler Higgins’ mere presence on the Rainbow Wahine volleyball roster this year could cause a couple of immediate reactions:

That Dave Shoji guy can really coach, or, damn that guy is old.

Higgins’ coaches the past three years were Peter Balding at Punahou and Alan Lau, the setting coach for Kainoa Obrey’s Ku‘ikahi Club team. Balding and Lau both played for Shoji when he coached the Punahou JV volleyball team in 1974 and ’75 — the year he took over at the University of Hawaii.

There have been four national championships and 1,103 Division I victories since. Shoji begins his 39th season when practice starts Saturday at UH. In a month, he should be his sport’s winningest coach.

Balding and Lau, now close friends with their former coach, saw it coming. In 1974, Punahou scraped by Kamehameha in the first round. Shoji made major renovations in the second, tweaking his defense and going from what was then the standard 4-hitter, 2-setter offense to a somewhat revolutionary 6-2 offense, where setters hit when they rotate into the front row.

"All I remember was, the (Kamehameha) match wasn’t close the second time," said Balding, a PE teacher at Punahou who served as Shoji’s volunteer assistant a few years ago. "I remember thinking this was beautiful … the more we practiced it the more we realized this will work, we’ve got this special weapon. The game plan was exactly what we needed, but we also had the psychological part where we believed it would work. We knew we had the upper hand."

Lau grinned at the recollection. "We all bought in," he said simply.

For the most part, that’s the way it has been with the vast group of diverse personalities Shoji has brought to Manoa the past 38 years. He calls Higgins, who will try to replace all-region senior setter Mita Uiato in the future, "the face of the Rainbow Wahine in a very short time."

"There is no doubt she will be the next Robyn Ah Mow, the next Dani Mafua, whoever," Shoji said, ticking off a list of gifted Hawaii setters. "She is the next one. She has a great demeanor, she doesn’t get excited. She will have her moments of being nervous, obviously she has a lot to learn, but she has got the personality to be that leader."

Higgins, who was a "little keiki Rainbow Wahine camper" in third grade, calls Shoji "a legend."

"I really want to play for him and all the great players to come out of here," Higgins says. "Especially the setters like Robyn, Kanoe (Kamana‘o), and Mita is one of them now."

Higgins admits she "didn’t realize he (Shoji) was that old" until she saw a yearbook picture of her high school coaches playing for him. The thought of that, "of course, makes me feel old," says Shoji, who turns 67 in December. But at least "I know her coaches knew what they were doing."

There is a comfort in that, for Shoji and Higgins, who knows she could finish her UH career with someone else as head coach. Shoji has not decided when he will retire, but acknowledges the time is near.

"That would be a bummer," Higgins says. "He’s a great coach, but I think if worse comes to worst he probably will be able to almost hand-pick his replacement. He will have a pretty big say, so I trust they will have someone else good replace him. But I really don’t want to think about that."

Shoji’s SUP (Balding) and golf (Lau) buddies have, and their advice to those on the search committee is not to look for another Dave Shoji.

"If you go into it with the attitude you have to replace Shoji you are going to fail," Balding says flatly. "Nobody is going to replace that — somebody that’s put in 40 years of their life. If the next person lasts 10 years that would be huge."

Balding and Lau look to a future coach as someone who can not only draw X’s and O’s and recruit, but also "manage" all that goes into the only revenue-producing college volleyball program in the country.

In other words, they look at folks with Hawaii connections, mentioning names like Deitre Collins, Mike Sealy, Reed Sunahara, Laura Phillips Alford, Erin Berg and Scott Wong.

Lau takes Shoji’s circle of volleyball life a step further. Shoji’s kids — Kawika and Erik — are both playing professionally now and are in the Olympic pipeline. Their volleyball IQ is monstrous, and genetic.

"All I know is if Dave had his way — and I don’t know if he can hold on — but he’d stay on until Kawika could coach," Lau says. "He thinks Kawika has a great mind, which is true."