Moreno is making his mark at Y.
But it is Carlos' twin sister, Anna Laura, that BYU should really thank. After hearing her description of how good college players have it in the United States, Carlos was convinced to walk in his sister's footsteps.
Three years later, Carlos Moreno is the national player of the year and BYU is the NCAA men's volleyball champion. Moreno, the Cougar setter, has a laundry list of individual awards stemming from his play last season. Here's one more: the Deseret Morning News Athlete of the Month for May in the state of Utah.
But it might never have happened if his twin sis hadn't paved the way.
"She came to the U.S. first," said Carlos of Anna Laura, who played volleyball for Oral Roberts University in Tulsa. "She would tell me about the facilities and how they would practice with, like, 40 volleyballs in one gym. I'd never had that."
The idea of practicing with 40 volleyballs — while getting an all-expenses paid education — was too much to resist. Moreno decided he was going to take his considerable volleyball skills to the United States.
"I figured BYU was the best team because they'd just won," Moreno said.
So knowing little English and even less about the new culture he would be living in, Moreno came to Provo.
"It was crazy," he said. "I came straight from it being summer in Brazil — having never seen snow in my life — to here when it was cold. I was like 'what is this?' It was major culture shock."
BYU's Honor Code was new to him as well, but Moreno wanted to make the most of his opportunity.
"I tried hard to learn the language and adapt myself to being at BYU," he said. "I knew I must learn English to survive (in the classroom)."
The transition was aided by the fact that a couple of his teammates were also Brazilian and could relate to what he was going through — and speak Portuguese to him when needed.
The learning curve on the volleyball court wasn't as difficult. Moreno became a starter after just two weeks on the team, averaging 14.14 assists per game as a freshman. He began turning even more heads as a sophomore, leading the Cougars to the national championship game while earning second-team All-America honors in 2003.
Then this recently completed season he was a consensus first-team All-American — and the first Cougar to ever win the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) National Player of the Year award. On top of that, he was the MVP of the NCAA tournament.
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