U.S. Takes Silver, Bronze in Prague, Myslowice

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (May 22, 2011) – The U.S. men’s team of Phil Dalhausser and Todd Rogers took silver at the Prague Open, while the U.S. women’s team of Jen Kessy and April Ross captured the bronze medal at the Myslowice Open. Both events were single-gender stops on the 2011 FIVB Beach Volleyball SWATCH World Tour.

Second-seeded Emanuel Rego and Alison Cerutti of Brazil defeated Dalhausser (Ormond Beach, Fla.) and Rogers (Santa Barbara, Calif.) 21-19, 21-14 in the gold-medal match on Sunday. Both teams advanced to the final match with 5-0 records in the tournament.

Courtesy of FIVB Todd Rogers and Phil Dalhausser with their silver medals at the 2011 Prague Open on the FIVB Beach Volleyball Swatch World Tour.  With the loss, Dalhausser and Rogers had a 40-match FIVB win streak snapped dating back to last year. The duo had won nine consecutive FIVB Beach Volleyball SWATCH World Tour events in which they had entered, including the Brasilia Open and the Shanghai Open to begin the 2011 season. 

“We knew that they were coming after us,” Rogers said after the gold-medal match in a FIVB press release. “They changed a few things, really surprising us. Next time it will be our turn to mix things up and surprise them. It is just like playing a chess game.” 

“We will go back to the States now and practice hard for the Beijing Grand Slam and the World Championships in Rome,” Dalhausser added.

The Brazilian victory by Alison and Emanuel was only the second in their career over Dalhausser and Rogers, who are the defending 2008 Olympic Games gold medalists.  Emanuel was a gold medalist at the 2004 Olympic Games.

Kessy (San Juan Capistrano, Calif.) and Ross (Costa Mesa, Calif.) defeated the fourth-seeded German team of Sara Goller and Laura Ludwig 23-21, 21-15 in 39 minutes to claim the bronze medal. Kessy and Ross lost their semifinal match to eventual champions Sanne Keizer and Marleen Van Iersel of Netherlands, who defeated Italy’s Greta Cicolari and Marta Menegatti 21-17, 21-18 in the gold-medal match.

In its bronze-medal match, the second-seeded Kessy and Ross rallied from a 14-11 deficit in the first set to win the extended 23-21 set.

“In the first set, we were making errors, but that’s fixable,” Ross said in the FIVB press release. “We were upset with our defense yesterday, so we tried to come up with a better strategy.”

Kessy and Ross earned a spot in the semifinals after capturing four victories throughout the week.

“Taking nothing away from this match, I really wanted to win yesterday’s match [which they lost 21-15, 21-18], but to come back in this match was good,” Ross added in a FIVB press release. “It’s definitely satisfactory to get on the podium. The weather threw us yesterday and being that serving is such a strong part of our game, we had a hard time. We did not play well. In our minds, this is all good preparation for the Grand Slam in Beijing [June 7-11] and World Championships [in Rome June 13-19].” 

Complete information about the FIVB Beach Volleyball SWATCH World Tour Myslowice Open is available on the FIVB website.

Complete information about the men in the FIVB Beach Volleyball SWATCH World Tour’s Prague Open is available on the FIVB web site.

For the complete schedule and updated results of the matches, visit the FIVB web site and click here.

Tags: 2011 FIVB World Tour, 2011 SWATCH World Tour, April Ross, Beach, Beach Volleyball, FIVB, FIVB beach, FIVB World Tour, Jennifer Kessy, Philip Dalhausser, Todd Rogers