The Manhattan Beach Open, the Wimbledon of Beach Volleyball, took place this past weekend – featuring a 64-team draw, beautiful beaches, sunny weather and huge crowds, the tournament did not disappoint!
The mayhem and marathon of volleyball started with the qualifier on Thursday, with the 36th seeded team of Natalie Hagglund and Summer Ross, who, with a combined age of 33 years, 7 months and 11 days, became the youngest team ever to qualify for an AVP Main Draw! On the men’s side, the best story of the day came from Griffen Cogorno and Jordan Hove who made it to the main draw as the 74 seed. Main draw play started on Friday and the excitement on both the men’s and women’s sides continued through Sunday.

On the men’s side the bracket played out as one would expect, with the big exception of Nick Lucena and Brad Keenan (the 8 seed) knocking John Hyden and Sean Scott (the 1 seed) into the contenders bracket the fourth round. Hyden and Scott proceeded to take fifth, leaving the teams of Gibb/Rosenthal, Olson/Wong, Dalhausser/Rogers and Keenan/Lucena in the semis. The final two teams standing were Gibb/Rosenthal and Olson/Wong. Jake Gibb and Sean Rosenthal went on to win the coveted Manhattan Beach Open title for their first win of the season.

On the women’s side, a trend of upsets led to some great finishes by Angela Knopf and Chrissie Zartman (the 26 seed) who placed 7th and Tara Kuk and Kelly Wing (the 22 seed) who placed 9th. Though there were plenty upsets early, the top-seeds held strong. The teams of Branaugh/Youngs, Davis/Johnson Jordan, Hanson/Rutledge and Lima/Minello all survived the long tough battle to make it to the semis on Sunday. In the end, Nicole Branagh and Elaine Youngs went on to win their sixth event of the season and the biggest tournament in volleyball.

Other highlights this week included a preview to the Manhattan 6-man and a legends match featuring ex-superstars such as Sinjin Smith, Randy Stoklos, Scott Ayakatubby and Brent Frohoff. After this great weekend I can’t wait to see what Hermosa brings!!!