PARIS — You want pretty?
They’d rather be gritty.
And that is the USA women’s volleyball team in a nutshell at the Paris Olympics, as the Americans finished pool play with a sweep — not an easy sweep, by any means, but a sweep nonetheless — of France and await their Tuesday quarterfinal assignment.
In their first Olympics match the Americans lost their first two sets to China, came back, but then lost in five. Against Serbia, they won the first two sets before holding on to win in five.
And against France, those first two sets of a 29-27, 29-27, 25-20 victory, well, sacrelebleu!
This team is certainly hard to get a handle on.
“Good,” USA setter Jordyn Poulter said. “That means our opponents can’t either.”
Meanwhile, the USA men know who they play late Monday night in South Paris Arena. They are the second seed and play Brazil. A more detailed look at the men’s quarterfinals follows.
The Americans simply could not shake winless France in the first two sets as Le Bleu thrilled the home crowd by not mailing it in even though they could not make the quarterfinals.
“France is not one of the top 10 teams in the world, clearly,” said USA coach Karch Kiraly, one of the world’s most decorated players on both the beach and indoors. “When I was a player the biggest struggles I found was playing against that next level of teams. I would sometimes of fall into the trap of expecting things to come a little easier than they did. The other teams might do something that is surprising or unorthodox than that next tier, and I think we probably fell into that trap a little.”
A blessing in disguise?
“I think we are benefitting from it. Nothing has come easy for us in three matches for us here,” Kiraly understated.
“But that’s exactly what’s going to happen in two days and we can’t have shown any more grit than we have shown in this tournament, and our grit is going to get us as far as we can go, two days from now and hopefully a lot farther. We don’t know who we’re gonna play yet, but it’s going to big a best test, and so this is right along with this theme. I think we’re better prepared than if things had gone easily.”
They certainly did not go easily in those first two sets.
“Give France credit,” Kiraly said. “They played well. We responded.”
The USA was up 22-17 in the first set but France refused to fold and scored the next six points, taking a 23-22 lead on a killy by Amandha Sylves. Annie Drews, who continues to sparkle in these Games, had back-to-back kills. The USA had set point at 25-24 and 26-25, but trailed 27-26 before kills by Avery Skinner, Drews and then Skinner again.
The second set was eerily familiar. The Americans were up 20-14 on a kill by Jordan Thompson, but France would not go away, taking a 21-20 lead on a kill by Lucille Gicquel.
Drews gave the USA set point at 24-23 but France went ahead 25-24. France had set point again at 26-25 and at 27-26 before Drews tied it with a back-row attack. A French attack error by Helena Cazaute and a block by Poulter of Cazaute ended it.
The third set was tied 13-13 before the USA went on a 6-1 run and never led by less than three after going up 20-15.
Drews led with 15 kills and a match-high 15 digs Middle Chiaka Ogbogu had eight kills with no errors in 13 attacks, three blocks and two aces.
“It’s the Olympics,” Ogbogu said. “I think it’s going to be a grind every time.”
The other middle, Haleigh Washington, had nine kills and two blocks.
“Those two (middles) have been amazing,” Kiraly said.
“We know the Olympics is a weird tournament and weird things happen,” Washington said. “It was such an incredible environment and we knew we were going to be pushed by France and they pushed. It was awesome, so competitive. It just about could we clean up and move through the muck and I think we could do that just a little bit faster.”
Kathryn Plummer and Skinner started at outside hitter. Plummer had six kills, three blocks, five digs and two aces, and Skinner had four kills and six digs. But with his team down 21-20 in the second set, Kiraly brought in his veterans to replace them both, Jordan Larson and Kelsey Robinson Cook.
Cook had two kills and a block and made some big plays on defense. Larson had a block and a key set as both finished the match.
“We’re doing a really nice job of carrying the momentum we had in our first match into now,” Robinson Cook said. “I think it’s clear that we’re going to need everybody. That’s just the theme of this tournament. We have such great players on and off the court you have to scout every single person.”
Setter Jordyn Poulter had a kill, a block and an ace to go with seven digs. Libero Justine Wong-Orantes had 10 digs.
The USA held a 12-6 blocks advantage
France, which went 0-3 in Pool A and didn’t win a set, played hard to the end.
“I imagine they had a lot of adrenaline coming into this game,” Ogbogu said, “and they responded well.”
Halimatou Bah led with 12 kills, a block and an ace. Sylves had 11 kills and two blocks, Gicquel had eight kills, a block and an ace, and Helena Cazaute had eight kills and and ace.
“Annie Drews’ line is ‘gritty not pretty,’ and I think that’s what we did,” Poulter said. “It’s an honor to play against the home country in their last match in the Olympics and they put a lot of heart and soul into their performance and we have been battle tested going into the quarterfinals.
“We’re right where we want to be.”
After the first USA match, Kiraly replaced setter Lauren Carlini with official alternate Micha Hancock because Carlini was injured. Carlini practiced Saturday and is almost ready to return.
“We. haven’t made a decision yet,” Kiraly said. “After practice yesterday she said she wasn’t quite there and she doesn’t want to set herself back by rushing and then maybe not being able to be ready for the quarterfinals and also wants to do what’s best for the team with two healthy setters. Jordyn Poulter has been through a lot, so whoever is backing her up needs to (be capable to) play a whole match. So that’s part of the equation, too.”
Kiraly said a team makes a roster decision and submits at night. In this case, the next decision will be made Monday for Tuesday’s quarterfinal.
“I would say it’s more likely than not she will be back,” Kiraly said. “But we don’t need to make that decision until before the bulletin goes out tomorrow night at 10 or 11. The decision is simple. You just let the proper people know this player is recovered. It doesn’t require any kind of medical certificate. It does require one when you take somebody off.”
In the first match Sunday at South Paris Arena 1, Italy (3-0) blasted Türkiye (2-1) in Pool C, getting to 3-0 with the 25-14, 25-16, 25-21 victory.
Italy, 9-1 in sets, set itself up to be the top seed in the quarterfinals.
Paola Egonu led Italy with 18 kills, a block and an ace, and Myriam Sylla had 10 kills and a block. Melissa Vargas led Turkiye with 13 kills.
Two high-stakes matches were later Sunday in Pool A, China (2-0 was to play Serbia (1-1) and Brazil (2-0) was to play Poland (2-0) in Pool B. Only Brazil or Poland can beat out Italy for the top seed in the quarterfinals.
The seeding:
The USA (3-0) plays Brazil (1-2) at 9 p.m. local time Monday. The USA opened with a Pool C sweep of Argentina, went five with Germany and then beat Japan in four. Brazil finished third in Pool B.
Poland (2-1), second in Pool B, plays Slovenia (3-0), which won Pool A.
Then it’s Italy (3-0), which won Pool B, vs. Japan (1-2), which finished third in Pool C.
The third quarterfinal pits France (2-1) and Germany (2-1). France, which won the Tokyo Olympics, finished second in Pool A and Germany was second to the USA in Pool C.
The USA played Brazil in Volleyball Nations on June 20 in Manila, Philippines, and came away with an up-and-down five set victory. 25-21, 18-25, 25-21, 22-25, 15-9.
TJ DeFalco led the USA with 18 kills and three aces. Max Holt had nine kills, five blocks and two aces, Matt Anderson had 11 kills and a block, and Garrett Muagututia had seven kills and two aces.
Alan Souza led Brazil with 23 kills, a block and two aces and Lukas Bergmann had 17 kills and two aces. Neither has been a factor for Brazil in these Olympics.
The post Olympics volleyball: “Gritty not pretty” USA women sweep France; men to face Brazil appeared first on Volleyballmag.com.
