A system and method for storing data in a network computing environment. The network includes a source server that will receive data to be stored from a client and target servers that have locally attached physical storage media. A server-to-server protocol is used to establish a communication connection between the source server and target server while programming allows the storage of the data from the source server on the physical storage at the target server, while also creating a virtual volume at the source server on which the data is also stored. From the perspective of the client, the data appears to be stored at the source server on locally attached storage media. The present invention eliminates the requirement for actual physical media locally attached to the source server.