For most Radford University athletic teams, victories over Virginia and Virginia Tech in the same season would be reason enough for celebration.

Mick Turk, coach of the Highlanders' club rugby team, has loftier goals in mind.

Radford is headed to Palo Alto, Calif., where it will meet Utah Valley State on Saturday for the Division II national championship.

It will be the second trip west in two weeks for the Highlanders, who last week participated in the Elite 8 tournament in Albuquerque, N.M., where they beat No. 1-ranked Coast Guard 48-15 and No. 10 Michigan 48-12.

Turk, a Radford resident who owns a dry-cleaning business and trades stocks, was not around for the founding of the Radford Rugby Club in 1988 but has been the coach for the past 13 seasons. He led the Highlanders to a national championship in 2003.

Turk, 45, played rugby collegiately at the University of Alabama-Birmingham and for the Roanoke Rugby Club for five years after returning to Virginia.

Radford's rugby club operates outside the Radford athletic department, and Turk relies on past players to help spread the word and alert potential players.

"We host a high-school tournament once a year in March," he said. "We've mostly got kids from the D.C. area and the Tidewater area. Probably a third of them are local. They're ex-football players, ex-wrestlers, ex-soccer players. It's across the board."

Radford goes into the weekend with a 14-3 record, including the triumphs over Tech and UVa, a pair of Division I club rugby participants.

Turk came into the season thinking the Highlanders could win it all and thought they "had a real good shot last year, but we had a couple of key injuries hurt us," he said.

The Highlanders draw as many as 300 fans to their games adjacent to the Dedmon Center, and Turk praises the administration for its support.

"In the end, the university probably pays for half of our expenses," he said. "This time, they've paid for our flight. We also have a foundation account at the university that our alumni has contributed to over the years and we used that to fund our way to Albuquerque."

Recruiting

Kansas is the destination of Tyshawn Taylor, a 6-foot-3 guard from Jersey City, N.J., who had been released from a letter-of-intent to Marquette after coach Tom Crean went to Indiana.

Taylor took a visit to Virginia Tech during the fall and both the Hokies and Virginia had expressed an interest when he became available this spring.

n UVa is among the finalists for Wesley Witherspoon, a 6-8 forward from Lilburn, Ga., who has said he will announce his college choice today.

Witherspoon, brother of one-time Virginia Tech forward Wynton Witherspoon, took an official visit to Memphis last weekend and the Tigers are seen as the team to beat after losing to Kansas in the NCAA final.

Transfers on parade

The last two Roanoke Times selections for Mr. Basketball in Virginia are both searching for a new college home, Vernon Macklin after two seasons at Georgetown and Julian Vaughn after one season at Florida State.

The Tallahassee (Fla.) Democrat has mentioned George Mason as a possible destination for Vaughn, who played at South Lakes High School in Reston before transferring to Oak Hill Academy for his senior year.

Vaughn averaged 3.0 points and 2.3 rebounds for Florida State in just over 13 minutes per game.

n Eric Wallace, who made an oral commitment to Virginia in the summer of 2007 but later signed with Ohio State, has decided to transfer after playing in 15 games for the Buckeyes and averaging 1.8 points and 1.3 rebounds.

Macklin, from Portsmouth, and Wallace, from Kernersville, N.C., played at Hargrave Military Academy in back-to-back seasons.

Free agents

Four ex-Hargrave football players were selected in the NFL draft, as opposed to the eight or nine that had been anticipated, but free-agent signings have elevated the number of ex-Hargrave players landing with NFL teams to double digits.

George Washington High School, Hargrave and Clemson product Chris McDuffie signed with the Kansas City Chiefs.

n Vince Redd, a two-year football letterman at Virginia before transferring to Liberty, has signed a free-agent contract with the New England Patriots. Redd, a 6-6, 260-pound outside linebacker, was an All-Big South selection in his only season with the Flames.

Another of the Flames' all-conference players, offensive linemen Stephen Sene, has signed with St. Louis.