Mason, Ohio, USA, May 20, 2016 – Paced by four teams from the host country United States, the men’s quarterfinals will be played early Friday evening at the FIVB Cincinnati Open, presented by AVP. Joining the four American Teams in the quarters will be two teams from Canada and one each from Australia and Brazil.
The event, which is one of the last three Olympic qualifiers through the FIVB World Tour is being held through Saturday at the prominent Lindner Family Tennis Center in Mason, Ohio and the seventh tournament in the stretch of eight straight events on the FIVB World Tour. Next week the FIVB World Tour returns to Russia for the double-gender FIVB Moscow Grand Slam.
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Men - Qualification resultsWomen - Qualification resultsMen - Main draw resultsWomen - Main draw resultsVideosMen's Main Draw PhotosWomen's Main Draw PhotosIn tonight’s quarterfinals, USA’s top-seeded Jake Gibb and Casey Patterson will play an all-American match against USA’s 10th-seeded Ryan DohertyJohn Mayer followed in order by USA’s fourth-seeded John Hyden/Tri Bourne meeting Brazil’s 13th-seeded young lions Gustavo Carvalhaes/Saymon Barbosa, an all-Canadian matchup between Canada’s seventh-seeded Josh Binstock/Sam Schachter playing Canada’s 11th-seeded Grant O’Gorman/Sam Pedlow and in the final men’s match of the day, USA’s second-seeded Phil Dalhausser/Nick Lucena will face off against Australia’s ninth-seeded Isaac Kapa/Christopher McHugh.
The double-gender $150,000 FIVB Cincinnati Open, presented by AVP, started Tuesday and concludes on Saturday. It is the 14th men’s event of the season and 11th women’s stop on the 2016 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour that started with three events at the end of 2015.
Five of the eight quarterfinalists had a bye in this morning’s round of 24 before winning their Round of 16 matches. Having to win two matches already today are USA’s Doherty/Mayer, USA’s Hyden/Bourne and Canada’s 11th-seeded Grant O’Gorman/Sam Pedlow.
USA’s Hyden/Bourne, one of the three teams that have already played twice today, will face a rematch from their three-set pool play lost to Brazil’s 22-year-old Carvalhaes/Barbosa. On Thursday, Brazil’s Carvalhaes/Barbosa came from behind to defeat USA’s veteran Hyden/Bourne, 18-21, 21-15 and 15-10.
While Brazil’s Carvalhaes/Barbosa only had to play a second elimination round match because they won their pool, USA’s Hyden/Bourne enter their quarterfinal rematch after winning twice today. The Americans opened the day by defeating Canada’s 26th-seeded qualifier Felipe Humana-Parades/Christian Redman, 21-16, 21-15 in 29 minutes. They earned their quarterfinal spot by coming from behind to defeat Mexico’s sixth-seeded Lombardo Ontiveros/Juan Virgen in three sets, 15-21, 21-14 and 15-13 in 42 minutes.
After getting by Mexico, USA’s Hyden said, “We came out kind of slow. We switched it up to the other guy. We started with the left-sider then moved to the right-sider. We kept after him and made some plays. That win was big and this next one will be even bigger.”
Regarding the rematch with Brazil, Hyden added, “As long as we are playing our game and playing well. We had them yesterday but had a little breakdown towards the end. Same thing, but do it throughout the entire match this time. It's more us. We need to take care of the ball and if we play our game we'll come out with a victory.”
USA’s Dalhausser/Lucena earned their way into the quarterfinals by coming back to win over Germany’s tough, fifth-seeded Jonathan Erdmann/Kay Matysik, 16-21, 21-18 and 15-10 in 41 minutes.
After winning their second round match against Germany, Lucena said, “They are a top 10 team in the world. We had to side out at a high level and Phil came up big in the end with blocks. We sided out well and made a couple plays that made the difference in the second set. This week has been intense but fun to play in your home country. Right now we have this tournament and two more to go. We're trying to get a win here. We take it one tournament at a time and try to win every tournament we play in.