U.S. upsets No. 1 Brazil for World League title
From USAV
The U.S. Men’s National Team defeated the world’s No. 1 Brazil 3-1 (31-29, 21-25, 25-20, 25-23) on Sunday, to clinch the FIVB World League gold medal for a second time in the team’s history.
Taylor Sander (Huntington Beach, Calif.), led Team USA in points for the third-consecutive match. Sander notched 24 points in the contest on 22 kills, earning him MVP honors of the tournament. He was also named Best Spiker.
Team USA handled three key phases of the match with Brazil, winning in attacks (60-51), blocks (14-11) and digs (42-40), on their way to the 3-1 win.
Matt Anderson (West Seneca, N.Y.) added 23 points to the gold-medal win, with 22 points coming by way of attacks.
Half of the 14 blocks for the U.S. Men came from David Lee, adding to his 12 points on the night. The trio of Micah Christenson (Honolulu, Hawaii), Max Holt (Cincinnati, Ohio) and Sander each contributed two blocks.
Erik Shoji (Honolulu, Hawaii.) led the U.S. with 12 digs on Sunday with only two faults at the libero spot, while Anderson picked up 10 digs on no faults.
Setter Christenson had 39 running sets and 62 still sets on 102 attempts against Brazil.
Sander and Garrett Muagutia (Oceanside, Calif.) had 16 excellent receptions each on Sunday, while Sean Rooney (Wheaton, Ill.) picked up 14.
Brazil’s Wallace De Souza finished with 16 points on 14 attacks to led his team in the match.
With the win, the U.S. joins Brazil (9), Italy (8), and Russia (3) as teams that have won gold more than once at the FIVB World League.
The last gold-medal win for Team USA at the FIVB World League came against Serbia in 2008.
Next up for the team will be the USA Volleyball Cup against Iran in August.
Italy won the bronze medal after defeating Iran in straight-sets, 25-22, 25-18, 25-22.
http://youtu.be/pw6rVXyzFco
Brazil x USA – Final – 2014 FIVB Men’s World League
Replay. You are Welcome.
thank you.
Terrific!! Fantastic!! Great win for the USA volleyball national team.Didn’t make a difference if there were local players or not, the players played as a team and won as a team…they are to be congrats but I guess they have no time to sit on their laurels with the USA Volleyball Cup coming up in late August.
They play Iran in 4 friendlies, which don’t count toward ranking. the win today definitely does.
Wow!
It has been funny to now be cheering for Taylor Sander since he’s no longer playing for BYU.
5. I have cheered for Taylor Sander while he was playing for BYU since Oceanic Cable doesn’t allow viewers to watch men’s volleyball matches if they don’t subscribe to Oceanic Cable (even though there is no cable in my neighborhood), while I could watch BYU TV volleyball matches for free. Seeing Sander’s high level of play I kept thinking that he’ll be a great asset for the future USA team. I’m surprised he made World League MVP on his very first world class tournament. That’s awesome!
In fact, most USA players come from opponents’ teams like Destinee Hooker (Texas) and Alicia Glass (Penn State) who have beaten our UH teams before. So I always bear in mind that our star opponents at the collegiate level are our future national players rather than “foes” to hate. I have a lot of respect for them. The same applies to Eric Shoji who played for Stanford. So it’s easy for me to cheer them now playing for the USA team.
WThe rich keeps getting richer. Khalia Lanier went with USC. She is one to watch.
The rich keeps getting richer. Khalia Lanier went with USC. She is one to watch.
I love how Sanders last match for BYU at Hawaii was a 3-0 beat down…that was a ego-popper for him for sure…
Anybody know if they will continue with the neon yellow/green libero uniform? I understand it wasn’t suppose to be intended but i dig it and wonder if it will continue.
Cindy,
The US U21 roster has been published.
Congrats to Fey, he’s probably gonna start, hope he has a s successful tourney for the US.
And boy I really hope Paulina Prieto from PSU transfers to Hawaii. She looked really good last season against Texas and Florida.
12. What makes you say that, do you know something about Prieto that’s floating around? Shoji definitely needs a proven high level D1 outside hitter. Currently I see only Nikki holding her own, Greeley and Passi are unproven unknowns, Olevao and Long are underachievers that need to show vast improvement. Five outside hitters for the three positions is the thinnest I’ve seen on any Shoji team.
Prieto would be a great addition to UH. We need another power hitter on the outside, and she also has a great serve. I know it’s a long shot, because she’d be so far from home.
I see! After some FBI work, the talk on the subject of Penn St 2014 is all about Prieto not on the 2014 roster. Homesickness?, maybe Jade Vorster, Sydney Shinn among other Florida girls can fill her in on playing in Hawaii, the closest to Florida’s settings. Her family and friends can watch every match Hawaii plays at home on Youtube, they wouldn’t miss one serve. A post interview after the match with her would be great!
15. not sure about your comment on Vorster since she has graduated and will be playing as a grad student at Liberty in North Carolina.
Forgot to mention Brittany Tiegs, also a Florida girl. I’m talking about Vorster, Shinn and Tiegs all of them from far away Florida, sharing their experiences with Prieto about playing and living in Hawaii, where it’s the closes you’ll get to the environment of Florida. Just saying………
I’m about 99.9 percent sure Paulina won’t come to hawaii. Is it a possibility? Yes. Is it likely? No.
We go through this every time a player from a top program disappears from a roster, it’s actually comical. 🙂
18. me too, just making small talk.
19. it’s off season till next month, nothing else to talk about from far away Hawaii.
OH2: 4-passing. Chemistry!
19. And every time this happens, you get bothered for some reason. Relax aunty.
21.^^^^^ :>) thank you.
HAHAHAHA. You know nothing. Long has been a non-factor. And she has never been used to pass. She’s a server.