AVP U26 Long Beach!!!!

Kim DiCello and I won the AVP U26 in Long Beach this weekend!!!!! It was sooo exciting!!!

There were 4 USA teams (the teams going over to Turkey) entered in the tournament and we had a great showing! The two mens teams played each other in the finals with Stafford Slick and Mark Van Zwieten (the U26 team) beating Madison McKibbin and Tony Ciarelli (the U23 team) for first place! It was a really exciting match... three games, 15-13 in the third!

Kim and I played four matches yesterday and ended up 4-0! Our first match was against the other USA team (Jazmin Machado and Caitlin LeDoux) and we went 3. They played great and it was a really good match. Our second match was against Cayley Thurlby and Briana Hinga and we won that in two but the second game was super close! 24-22 was the final score of the second game and it was so fun to be in a situation like that! Our third match was against the first seeded team (Kim and I were 3rd) and we won in two games, 21-14ish in both games. We ended up playing Cayley and Briana again in the finals! It was super fun and both games were back and forth up until the 21 time out. When the total of my score and my opponents score equals 21 we take a technical time out. For example, the score could be 11-10. And then Kim and I were able to pull away at the end!

It was a really fun day and we ended up having a great time going out to dinner after and celebrating the two USA victories! It ended up that the USA Women finished 1st and 5th, and the men 1st and 2nd! Go USA!

And PS Thanks to my new apparel sponsor Rox Volleyball!!! They provided me with some awesome gear to play in!!!