New faces join USA women for VNL third round; men’s, women’s standings updated

14-2.

That’s the combined record of the USA men and USA women in Volleyball Nations League.

Now, the men are taking a break as the international, multi-city tournament moves into the third round of women’s play.

The USA women are in Suwon, Korea, where the Americans will play Poland — the team with it is tied atop the standings — Bulgaria, Germany and China.

Coach Karch Kiraly has a roster of 14 that includes:

Setters — Lauren Carlini, Micah Hancock
Outsides — Kara Bajema, Kelsey Robinson Cook, Ali Frantti, Kathryn Plummer,
Opposites — Annie Drews, Jordan Thompson
Middles — Brionne Butler, Anna Stevenson Hall, Dana Rettke, Haleigh Washington
Liberos — Morgan Hentz, Justine Wong-Orantes

“Excited about the challenge of two pairs of back-to-back matches and certainly the first one we’re going to face, against Poland on Wednesday. Poland gave us a drubbing last year, in early October in the World Championships in Poland. They appear to be playing some very good volleyball.”

Here are the women’s standings after two rounds:

WOMEN’S STANDINGS
Country, match record, sets record

 1. Poland, 7-1, 21-7
2. USA, 7-1, 23-10
3. Türkiye 6-2, 20-8
4. China, 6-2, 20-10
5. Brazil, 6-2, 20-10
6. Germany, 6-2, 19-13
7. Japan, 5-3, 19-12
8. Italy 5-3, 18-17
9. Serbia, 3-5. 16-20
10. Canada, 3-5, 16-20
11. Dominican Republic, 3-5, 15-21
12. Netherlands, 2-6, 11-18
13. Thailand, 2-6, 11-1
14. Croatia, 2-6, 8-18
15. Bulgaria, 1-7, 8-21
16. Korea, 0-8, 1-24.
Based on points and sets ratio, Poland has the edge over the USA.

Bajema, Robinson Cook and Carlini are playing for the first time in this VNL. The USA roster includes six members of the 12-woman team that won gold in the Tokyo Olympics, Hancock, Drews, Robinson Cook, Thompson, Washington and Wong-Orantes.

Two others are recovering from injuries, veteran outside Jordan Larson and middle Chiaka Ogbogu. Kiraly said the original plan was for Ogbogu to play in this round, but she needed more time to heal.

“We’ve got four really quality opponents here. Bulgaria seems to be playing better, Germany seems to be playing better and China’s going to be a handful, too. They’ve got a lot of good wins,” Kiraly said.

“All focus on Poland but just a great week of challenges that should be really good for us. As we talk about often, we’ll need to be 14 deep here and in another sense we are 35 deep, with the 21 who have been also a part of this first half of the season, either with training or traveling to other parts of VNL.”

Women’s schedule

In Suwon, Korea, Germany plays the Dominican Republic and Bulgaria plays Korea. In Bangkok, Thailand, Croatia play Canada and Thailand plays the Netherlands.

Wednesday, the USA gets things going against Poland. Before the day ends in North America, Japan plays Türkiye, China plays Serbia, Brazil plays Italy and Poland plays Germany (on Thursday in Korea).

Men finish second round

The USA wrapped up Saturday with a sweep of sweep of Poland and the Americans are now off until July 5, when they not only get to play at home, but where they train in Anaheim, California.

The USA in this tournament swept Netherlands, swept Italy, swept Canada, and lost in four to Brazil before taking a break. In the second round in Rotterdam, Netherlands, the Americans beat Serbia in four before sweeping China, Iran and Poland. For eight matches, the USA is 22-4 in sets. Only Japan (8-0, 24-7) is ahead in the standings.

Read more about the USA men in our Saturday recap.

There were four men’s matches Sunday:

Poland beat Italy in four behind 20 kills from Bartosz Kurek.

Cuba beat Bulgaria in five as Jaime Herrera had 21 kills and six of his team’s eight aces. Bulgaria’s Alex Nikolov, the former NCAA player of the year for Long Beach State, had 21 kills, a block, an ace and four digs.

Serbia staged a big rally to beat the Netherlands in five, surviving a wild fourth set 22-25, 25-21, 21-25, 35-33, 15-9. Miran Kujundzic led Serbia with 20 kills, four blocks and two aces and Drazen Luburic had 18 kills, a block and an ace.

And Brazil stayed two games back of the overall lead as it beat host France in four as Alan Souza had 23 kills, hitting .440, and a block. Lucarelli Souza had 11 kills, a block and three aces.

MEN’S STANDINGS
Country, match record, sets record

 1. Japan, 8-0, 24-7
2. USA, 7-1, 22-4
3. Brazil, 6-2, 22-12
4. Slovenia, 6-2, 22-12
5. Poland, 6-2, 18-16
6. Argentina, 5-3, 20-13
7. Italy, 5-3, 16-11
8. Netherlands, 4-4, 18-14
9. Serbia, 4-4, 15-15
10. France, 3-5, 14-16
11. Iran, 2-6, 10-19
12. Cuba, 2-6, 10-22
13. Canada, 2-6, 9-21
14. China, 2-6, 8-21
15. Bulgaria, 1-7, 10-21
16. Germany, 1-7, 9-22

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