Kristen Nuss was coated in sand, dulling her neon two-piece swimsuit. A white lei hung round her neck as she tried to stability her champion’s plaque awkwardly in a single hand.
“This factor is heavy,” she mentioned, “my arm is getting sore.”
Regardless of her and associate Taryn Brasher repeating as AVP Manhattan Seashore Open champions — grinding out a 15-21, 21-18, 15-13 victory over former USC standouts Megan Kraft and Terese Cannon — on Sunday, the load of each the {hardware} and the title wasn’t misplaced on Nuss.
“That is Wimbledon,” Nuss mentioned. “It’s the granddaddy of all of them. My mother at all times mentioned she wished me to play at Wimbledon. … That is positively one of the coveted trophies proper right here.”
Companions since 2021, Nuss and Brasher have been greeted with a roar earlier than the primary serve. On the opposite aspect of the online, Kraft and Cannon appeared to be the underdogs to the Paris Olympians.
However as the previous Trojan duo snatched the opening set, followers pressed shoulder to shoulder alongside the railings and bleachers, pulled into the opportunity of a rally from the defending title-holders.
Kraft’s heavy serve and Cannon’s lengthy attain on the web gave them the primary recreation at 21-15. Through the changeover between video games, Brasher and Nuss zeroed in on the cracks by serving collectively and passing cleaner.
“We don’t like first units,” Nuss joked. “That’s one thing we’ve realized this 12 months particularly … we must always simply not play the primary set. However we all know we will battle again it doesn’t matter what.”
Kristen Nuss dives for a ball throughout the girls’s championship match on the Manhattan Seashore Open on Sunday.
(Katelyn Mulcahy / For The Instances)
Down three factors within the second set, Nuss and Brasher rallied and took a 21-18 win. And within the third set, with the groups even at 5, Nuss — the smallest participant on the sand — swung above her measurement, disguising her photographs by glancing a technique and spiking the ball the opposite.
“There may be nothing — no deficit — that’s going to scare Kristen,” Brasher mentioned.
Beneath the scorching Manhattan Seashore solar, followers stayed jammed alongside the railings. However the second remaining wouldn’t comply with the identical fairytale ending.
For Phil Dalhausser and Trevor Crabb, this 12 months’s Manhattan Seashore Open doubled as each a curtain name and an opportunity to win a title.
Miles Evans, left, and Chase Budinger have a good time after profitable the Manhattan Seashore Open males’s title Sunday.
(Katelyn Mulcahy/For The Instances)
For the previous, it was the ultimate time he’d ever tower over California sand — a four-time Olympian, Worldwide Volleyball Corridor of Famer and seven-time Manhattan Seashore Open champion competing within the second-to-last AVP occasion of his profession. Crabb entered the weekend trying to win the match for the second straight 12 months.
However Chase Budinger and Miles Evans had different plans, racing by way of the ultimate and burying the storybook ending 21-19, 21-16 to clinch the boys’s title.
Budinger and Evans tipped their caps to Dalhausser — recognizing the veteran who’s a legend within the sport.
“[Dalhausser] is one of the best participant to ever play the sport,” Budinger mentioned. “So each time I step on the court docket taking part in towards him, I actually attempt to cherish these instances with him — these recollections, these battles — as a result of he’s such an unbelievable participant.”
Dripping in champagne and holding his plaque, Evans mentioned the triumph was validation for all of the work the duo has put in to interrupt by way of since pairing up in 2023.
“Hopefully that is the start of nice issues for us,” he mentioned.
