There was a phrase that when might have described Kelly Cheng and Sara Hughes: boring.
They have been enjoyable to observe, in fact, with their tempo units and choices and creativity. However so good have been they all through the 2023 Seaside Professional Tour season that there was little sense in paying a lot consideration to them within the early rounds of Elite16s. These pool play matches have been principally devoid of pressure. There was no clenching of the fists or holding of the breath. The sensation one had when watching Cheng and Hughes was paying homage to Phil Dalhausser and Todd Rogers or Misty Could-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings. Till the quarterfinals, there simply wasn’t a lot have to tune in.
That was the stratosphere by which Cheng and Hughes had entered.
Pool play? Why hassle tuning in?
At no level of their practically two-year-long rekindled partnership had they didn’t advance into the playoff rounds. Of the 9 Elite16s they’d performed getting into the 2024 season, they’d gained pool in seven of them, incomes a bye straight into the quarterfinals. Even once they didn’t, they nonetheless made it to the quarterfinals or past in all however one.
Higher to regulate the groups who have been a bit of extra unsteady, verify again in on Cheng and Hughes throughout the quarterfinals.
That was then.
That is now.
As it could possibly go along with groups who vault straight to the highest of the world, as Cheng and Hughes did once they gained the primary 4 tournaments they performed collectively after reuniting as companions, Cheng and Hughes have been those with the proverbial goal on their backs. Possibly there was an adjustment from groups or maybe there was a slowdown that’s inevitable to even probably the most dynastic of sports activities groups. Seemingly each.
Regardless of the case, there was and has been a change in 2024.
In Tepic, the second occasion of the season, they took second in pool and misplaced within the first spherical of playoffs to Brazilians Taina Silva and Victoria Lopes, a workforce to which they’d by no means earlier than misplaced. Within the ensuing two Elites, in Brasilia and Espinho, they gained simply three matches and misplaced 5.
In Espinho, for the primary time of their partnership, they didn’t break pool.
Had been they unhealthy losses? No, not most of them, anyway. These have been elite groups in Elite tournaments that have been successful principally shut matches over Cheng and Hughes, matches the world had merely develop into accustomed to them successful.
The sense of inevitability round Cheng and Hughes had waned.
Boring, they weren’t.
They usually definitely weren’t boring this week on the Ostrava Elite16. Their first match of pool play, towards Switzerland’s Nina Brunner and Tanja Huberli, was a stunner, a 16-21, 11-21 thumping that portended nothing of the run to come back.
Did something change after that Thursday drubbing?
Cheng gained’t say. Possibly after Paris, she mentioned, she’d let the world know.
Regardless of the secret, one thing definitely shifted. As a result of, in a single day it appeared, Cheng and Hughes resumed the shape that, final fall, led them to claiming the primary USA World Championship since 2009. They swept, in succession, China’s Xinyi Xia and Chen Xue, themselves coming off a gold medal final week in Stare Jablonki, Poland, and Germany’s Laura Ludwig and Louisa Lippmann, who punched their ticket to the Paris Olympic Video games. Within the first spherical of playoffs, they swept friends Betsi Flint and Julia Scoles. They have been out of the ninth-place rounds however removed from out of the woods, with No. 11 Germans Svenja Muller and Cinja Tillmann looming within the quarters, a workforce that had simply crushed them two weeks prior, 21-12, 21-16.
Appeared prefer it was heading that approach once more, too, solely even worse this time. A confounding 8-21 first-set was made solely extra puzzling by the scores that adopted: 21-18, 17-15 wins for Cheng and Hughes.
Boring?
Heavens, no.
They have been nothing if not probably the most fascinating workforce within the match, a riddle made much more enigmatic when viewing their semifinal matchup: World No. 1 Ana Patricia Silva and Duda Lisboa. In seven conferences with Brazil’s prime workforce, Cheng and Hughes had gained three, together with probably the most vital of all of them, a 21-16, 24-22 sweep within the finals of the World Championships.
Like Cheng and Hughes are actually, Ana Patricia and Duda have lengthy been one of the vexing groups on the planet.
“Tortured geniuses,” is the phrase Wealthy Lambourne usually makes use of when describing them on the printed of Volleyball TV.
They’ve gained 10 medals of their final 15 tournaments, six of them gold. They’re a near-unanimous choice as one of the best workforce on the earth. But typically they’ll simply… lose a set 12-21… and discovering an evidence for it’s as simple as bottling smoke. They’ll go away you as awestruck as they’ll dumbfounded, usually in the identical match, a lot much less the identical match.
So it’s with Ana Patricia and Duda — so it’s with Cheng and Hughes now.
Cheng and Hughes would win that semifinal, 21-19, 21-18, knotting the collection at 4 wins apiece, preserving one of the best rivalry on the Seaside Professional Tour as fascinating because the groups inside it.
However the job wasn’t carried out. Removed from it. A gathering with Canadians Melissa Humana-Paredes and Brandie Wilkerson awaited within the finals. They’d been on a tour de pressure, these Canadians. Parlayed a win in Huntington Seaside, the place they knocked out Cheng and Hughes within the semifinals, into 5 straight sweeps in Ostrava, outscoring opponents by 43 factors in 10 units.
However then right here got here Cheng and Hughes, instantly probably the most fascinating workforce on the earth, a workforce that had not been on as certain of a run as Humana-Paredes and Wilkerson, but the workforce who was instantly leaving little question in a 21-13 opening set win.
It portended the inevitable query: Was it sustainable?
No, due to course it wasn’t. Boring is now not allowed within the Cheng and Hughes camp.
A blowout simply wouldn’t do.
A sweep would elude Cheng and Hughes as they dropped the second set, 21-23, however the gold wouldn’t. They’d get better as soon as extra, as they’d this complete match, as they did after that opening match roundhouse they took from Switzerland and the 8-21 egg they laid towards Germany. They’d go on to win 15-12 within the third, claiming their first gold medal of the season, and their first because the World Championship final October.
What’s to come back later this 12 months, at their subsequent scheduled cease, the Paris Olympic Video games?
“Don’t depend us out,” Hughes mentioned.
No matter could come, it is going to definitely be a present price watching.
“Dream come true:” Tina Graudina, Anastasija Samoilova win bronze
Tina Graudina needed to snicker when the swimming pools have been launched for the Ostrava Elite16. In her pool have been Betsi Flint and Julia Scoles, Kim Hildreth and Teegan Van Gunst, and Ana Patricia Silva and Duda Lisboa.
After all it could be Ana Patricia and Duda.
Fifteen instances they’ve performed the Brazilians of their quick careers, and twice already in 2024, in pool play of back-to-back Elite16s in Brasilia and Espinho.
At this level, it simply wouldn’t be proper if pool play didn’t function one other bout between the 2.
4 matches later, within the bronze medal match, who would Graudina and Samoilova meet once more however Ana Patricia and Duda.
Getting into the Ostrava Elite16, Graudina and Samoilova had crushed Brazil simply twice. Within the Czech Republic, they’d double that complete, first with a win in pool (15-21, 21-18, 15-11) then with one other for the bronze medal (21-18, 21-19).
“We’ve performed towards them so many instances and so they’re such an excellent workforce and we’ve struggled to beat them,” Graudina mentioned. “To beat them in the identical match twice is a dream come true.”
