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It’s a distinctive model of coaching that Kristen Nuss and Taryn Kloth have taken to within the lead-up to the AVP Atlanta Gold Sequence, which begins on Friday and can be streamed on Bally Dwell and ESPN+. They had been lively on Wednesday, positive, however there was no sand in sight.
Nor was there a seashore volleyball.
As a substitute of passing and setting and hitting volleyballs at Atlantic Station, Nuss and Kloth had been 45 minutes down the street, in Flowery Department, operating routes and catching passes from Desmond Ridder, the sophomore quarterback of the Atlanta Falcons.
“You can say I had somewhat enjoyable,” Nuss stated.
Atlanta has lengthy been a metropolis the place Nuss and Kloth have had somewhat enjoyable. It’s the website of their first AVP as professionals, and consequently the positioning of their first AVP win, when the 2 doe-eyed rookies marched by way of the qualifier and 5 straight principal draw matches to assert their first of 4 victories and counting.
“I don’t know if I ever anticipated myself to win an AVP,” Nuss stated later that summer season. “I did assume we had been going to do effectively. I believed our recreation would transition to the professionals. In faculty, particularly on the highest courts, you’re taking part in towards groups who may play on the AVP. However profitable it — Atlanta had such a bizarre feeling. Going into it, nobody anticipated us to win this factor. However may we win it? I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m going in anticipating to win. Clearly if we play effectively, profitable is a excessive chance, however I by no means go in considering ‘This recreation’s ours.’ ”
There’s an opportunity that thought course of has modified. Since their first victory in Atlanta in 2021, Nuss and Kloth have gained tournaments everywhere in the world, from Australia to Brazil, Turkey to Phoenix, Chicago to Mexico. This week, nevertheless, would be the stiffest take a look at but on the AVP. For the primary time all yr, everybody can be residence.
Kelly Cheng and Sara Hughes lead the seeding, as they need to: Since teaming up in November of 2022, they’ve but to drop a single AVP match, profitable in Huntington Seaside, New Orleans, and Huntington Seaside once more.
Melissa Humana-Paredes and Brandie Wilkerson, contemporary off their first Elite16 gold medal of the year in Montreal, search their second AVP win of the yr after taking the season-opener in Miami.
Terese Cannon and Sarah Sponcil made the ultimate right here a yr in the past, shedding a thriller to Geena Urango and Julia Scoles. It’s been a mercurial yr for these two, snaps of brilliance — a silver medal on the Ostrava Elite16, bronze on the Itapema Problem — intermixed with bouts of unusual finishes — seventh in New Orleans, a pair of 13ths in Gstaad and Montreal. But they’re nonetheless very a lot the identical group who gained Hermosa a yr in the past and who has victories over practically each elite group on this planet. To tab them because the winners would hardly be a stretch of the creativeness.
Then there are, in fact, the newest winners, Sarah Schermerhorn and Corinne Quiggle, who shrugged off what had been their worst stretch of tournaments to this point and flew by way of the sphere in Hermosa, profitable 5 straight matches to choose up their first AVP title as individuals and a team.
Certainly, storylines and elite groups abound this week in Atlanta. Beneath is an inventory of all the pieces you must find out about this weekend’s AVP Gold Sequence.
Can Megan Rice do it once more at AVP Atlanta?
Previous to AVP Hermosa Seaside in early July, Megan J. Rice — to not be confused with the Florida-based Megan Rice — had by no means made a Professional or Gold Sequence principal draw. She wouldn’t have made Hermosa, both, had Toni Rodriguez not tweaked her knee in Denver per week earlier than. However Rodriguez did tweak her knee, and Savvy Simo wanted a last-minute fill-in. In got here Rice, who turned out to be the pickup of the yr, as the 2, unbelievably, made the finals.
As soon as once more, Rice is a last-minute fill-in. This time, it’s Betsi Flint who gave her the decision. Flint’s ordinary accomplice, Julia Scoles, tweaked her knee within the finals of the Montreal Elite16 on Sunday and is opting to sit down the weekend out.
“On account of a minor damage that I don’t wish to make worse,” Scoles stated of her withdrawal. “I’m selecting to relaxation as a substitute.”
So it’ll be Rice and Flint this week, seeded seventh, in Atlanta, matched up within the first spherical with Deahna Kraft and Zana Muno.
Whitmarsh success runs deep in Atlanta
Twenty-seven years in the past in Atlanta, Mike Whitmarsh and Mike Dodd had been awarded the primary seashore volleyball silver medal in an Olympic Video games. They placed on a scintillating run to the finals, profitable 4 straight matches to earn a crack on the gold medal towards Karch Kiraly and Kent Steffes. It wasn’t meant to be, nevertheless, as Kiraly and Steffes gained, 12-5, 12-8, in an old style, sideout-scoring match in entrance of a sold-out stadium in Atlanta.
This week, Whitmarsh’s daughter, Jaden, can be taking part in in simply her second profession principal draw, alongside Carly Skjodt. Her first went effectively sufficient. Partnered with UCLA teammate Devon Newberry, Whitmarsh turned the darling of the match, upsetting the eight and three seeds to complete seventh. Now with Skjodt, with whom she took a 3rd within the Denver Tour Sequence to qualify for Atlanta, Whitmarsh will play Nuss and Kloth within the first spherical.
Baseypalooza involves Atlanta
There’s greater than a good likelihood you’ve by no means heard of Lars and Gage Basey. Brothers from Lyons, Colorado, they haven’t traveled a lot relating to seashore volleyball. With simply 4 AVPs on their resume, the Baseys are one thing of native heroes in Denver. Two years in a row, they’ve commanded a crowd of 1000’s, piling up one upset after another. This previous July 4 weekend, for the Denver Tour Sequence, they shocked Brenden Sander and Taylor Sander, and Jeremy Casebeer and Alvaro Filho. That punched their ticket to Atlanta, the primary Professional or Gold Sequence principal draw for each of them. They aren’t the one Colorado group within the combine, both.
Does Mike Groselle nonetheless have the AVP Atlanta magic?
In Atlanta of 2021, Mike Groselle, an enormous man with little on his skilled resume, engineered the upsets of the season alongside DR Vander Meer. After sweeping their approach by way of the qualifier, the 2 discovered themselves matched up with Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena. Such matchups are sometimes listless affairs, the highest seed lazily caring for the underside seed. This was no such listless affair. As a substitute, Groselle and Vander Meer shocked Dalhausser and Lucena (21-19, 13-21, 15-11) after which backed it up with one other win over Troy Subject and Eric Beranek. They’d lose the subsequent two however nonetheless end an admirable fifth, which stays Groselle’s career-high. Now with good buddy and fellow Colorado resident Nate Yang, Groselle will look to seek out extra of the Atlanta magic.
Does Seaside Professional Tour success translate to native dominance for Andy Benesh and Miles Partain?
With back-to-back-to-back medals on the Seaside Professional Tour, Andy Benesh and Miles Partain have taken management of the American race to the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. They lead in each gross factors and common factors per occasion, to the extent that it’s troublesome to see a approach wherein some other American group will even get near passing them. However will that success abroad translate to dominance on the AVP?
Up to now, sure. They’ve performed only one AVP this season, in Huntington Seaside, and so they gained, beating Tri Bourne and Chaim Schalk in an extended and entertaining last. It wasn’t straightforward, nevertheless. They needed to make their approach by way of the contender’s bracket after a quarterfinal loss to Bourne and Schalk, and required all three units to beat Theo Brunner and Trevor Crabb within the semifinals.
Atlanta, nevertheless, has been good to Partain, residence to Partain’s first AVP win a yr in the past with Paul Lotman.
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