For multiple years as a teenager in his native Greece, Costas Theocharidis searched for a solution to an ongoing conundrum. He excelled in volleyball and in school, but his options often included one or the other: turn professional and put his education on hold, or go to college and leave volleyball behind.
Though aware of the NCAA as an avenue to pursue both, collegiate men's volleyball programs were only permitted to divvy up 4.5 scholarships per team at the time. Theocharidis didn't want his parents to pay for his schooling, so he wasn't going to play for anything less than a full scholarship.
After receiving the fateful offer from University of Hawai‘i head coach Mike Wilton, Theocharidis arrived in the Islands ready to embark on a journey that became so much more than merely his college destination. Theocharidis immediately and continuously provided return on investment to the only school that offered him a full ride. The 6-foot-2 outside hitter was a first team All-American as a true freshman and the AVCA National Player of the Year as a sophomore. His junior year was capped by a national championship in 2002, the first in program history. He wowed the Hawai‘i crowds with his dynamic play. He still refers to his former teammates as his brothers for life to this day.
"It's one of those things that when you feel deeply ingrained in the fabric of the UH community, those bonds don't just kind of fade away, right? They're always going to be there," Theocharidis told Aloha State Daily in a recent interview. "UH was the the reason why I left my small town in a rural, remote part of northeastern Greece back in '99 and made that leap of faith. I will forever be indebted to my coaches, coach Mike Wilton and his assistant Tino Reyes, for literally going all-in on me and offering me an athletic scholarship and helping realize my dream of coming to states to study and play at the college level."
Despite his accomplishments on the court in a Warrior uniform, Theocharidis' name became mired in controversy as the subject of an NCAA investigation.
In the fall of 2003, the NCAA stripped Hawai‘i of its 2002 men's volleyball national championship. It was determined that Theocharidis played in 22 matches with other professionals in Europe before enrolling at Hawai‘i in 1999. Theocharidis did not receive any money for playing the matches in question, nor did he sign a professional contract or have an agent. Still, the NCAA ruled that Theocharidis broke amateurism rules. The University of Hawai‘i was fined $5,000 and ordered to return the 2002 championship trophy. Theocharidis was also ordered to return all of his individual awards.
Before it was taken away, Hawai‘i's four-set victory over Pepperdine in the 2002 national championship match gave the school its first-ever NCAA championship in a men's team sport. Watch the team's celebration, read about the welcome the Warriors received back home, hear about the bonds members of the team still hold dearly, then try to tell Theocharidis that championship wasn't real.
"The championship point, I remember that very clearly," Theocharidis said. "As a team, we worked really hard for it. We were basically on a three-year crusade to make it happen. Memories of a lifetime. I will never forget those memories, and it was it was pretty special moment. I would say it's up there in the top three, top five memories of all time for me in life in general. To have it taken away, obviously that was a pretty gut-wrenching experience. It's one of those things that I didn't necessarily deal with at the time, and over the years it was something that was always in the back of my mind."
Volleyball may have ended unceremoniously for Theocharidis, but his education continued. After earning a business administration degree at UH, he worked in private wealth management, where his first job in the field was for a firm in Mānoa. He then got a job at Merrill Lynch in Boston before briefly moving back to Europe to get a master's degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science
Following his time in London, Theocharidis worked in corporate finance in New York. His family has made Boston home for the past handful of years, and he's currently working in real estate development. He's also an assistant coach for the MIT men's volleyball team.
As the years went on, Theocharidis still felt as though he never got closure during his time playing volleyball at UH. He spent four years cementing himself as one of the program's greats, only to see it taken away over a matter of months. Feelings of angst had festered.
Stripped 2002 national title notwithstanding, the University of Hawai‘i men's volleyball program won national championships in 2021 and 2022. A pair of Greek standouts in outside hitter Spyros Chakas and opposite Dimitrios Mouchlias were key members of the team, and Mouchlias reached out to Theocharidis. Following their conversations, Theocharidis decided to take in some UH matches at the Stan Sheriff Center during the 2023 season "for the first time in many, many years," he recalled.
Theocharidis also went to Virginia to catch the team during the 2023 Final Four. Though Hawai‘i's quest for a threepeat was thwarted by UCLA in the national championship match, witnessing the program's rise evoked countless memories for Theocharidis, who realized he had many unresolved feelings about his time as a Warrior. Since then, he has authored a pair of books documenting his experience with UH. "Costas: Warrior for Life: Thriving within the chaos," and "Warrior for Life II: Strength & Honor," are both available on Amazon.
"I do address my personal journey from Greece to Hawai‘i, and having the ride of a lifetime, discussing this whole eligibility ruling and the stripping of the championship," Theocharidis says. "It allowed me to a certain extent to get some closure on the whole thing, and it allowed me to move on with my life as well, because it's something that you cannot change. Whatever happened, happened."
On Friday evening, all those emotions will be revisited yet again as Theocharidis becomes inducted into the UH Athletics Circle of Honor for the Class of 2026 at the Stan Sheriff Center. The announcement was made over a year in advance during a Hawai‘i women's volleyball match on Oct. 12, 2025.
"I'm very thankful to the committee members for taking this very bold step and inducting me," he said. "When you contextualize it, you bring in the full picture of all the stuff that happened in the past, and I'm sure it was not an easy decision. I'm just hoping that the '02 team at some point will be able to join in the Circle of Honor because we did it as a team, and I was surrounded by awesome teammates."
Since Theocharidis' playing days, the nature of college athletics has changed dramatically. Most notably, the introduction of new name, image and likeness (NIL) rules in 2021 have allowed collegiate athletes to get paid, with some even earning more than the pros. Even Baylor men's basketball center James Nnaji, the 31st overall pick of the 2023 NBA Draft, returned to play 18 games for Baylor in the 2025-2026 college basketball season.
The new rules have caused some entities to undo past rulings, such as Reggie Bush getting his 2005 Heisman Trophy back in 2024 after being stripped of it in 2010.
Might the ruling on the 2002 Hawai‘i men's volleyball be revisited, ending with the championship banner being re-raised in the Stan Sheriff Center rafters?
"I have no control over those things, right? I'm just hoping that the university will step up and recognize that great team," Theocharidis said. "The controversial decision to take away the 2002 championship made me a pariah overnight in college sports. You have active student-athletes basically playing at the highest level in in the Olympics with professional teammates, obviously. And where we are nowadays, the whole concept of being a student-athlete with the existence of transfer portal and NIL, being a student is the priority, right? Getting that degree, graduating, is supposed to be the priority. At least that was my priority when I came to the to the states. I wanted to get a degree.
"I'm cautiously optimistic that the 2002 team, to a certain extent, will eventually be recognized as well, but all those things take time. I don't know when or If it's going to happen, but I'm doing the best I can to actually raise the issue, make everybody aware of that, because again, you have a new (university) president and AD. I'm hoping that at some point, we'll come full circle, and that team will be recognized, and then the banner will be re-raised in the arena."
Christian Shimabuku can be reached at christian@alohastatedaily.com.
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