Keenan and Patterson defeated Fuerbringer and Lucena, the silver medalists at last week’s FIVB World Tour event in Quebec, 13-21, 21-18, 15-13 in 53 minutes.
Keenan and Patterson move on to Wednesday’s qualifying round, where they will face….
The U.S. men’s teams that will begin play in Thursday’s main draw are Quebec winners Phil Dalhausser (Ormond Beach, Fla.) and Todd Rogers (Santa Barbara, Calif.); Quebec bronzed medalists Jake Gibb (Bountiful, Utah) and Sean Rosenthal (Redondo Beach, Calif.) along with the returning team of Casey Jennings (Las Vegas, Nev.) and Kevin Wong (Honolulu, Hawaii).
In the women’s bracket, Akers and Branagh were given the top seed in qualifying and received a bye to the second round where they defeated the British 16th-ranked team of Denise Johns and Lucy Boulton, 21-14, 24-22 in 39 minutes.
Akers and Branagh are ranked 19th in the main draw and will play in Pool C. On Wednesday, the will open again Czech Republic’s 14th-ranked Hana Klapalova and Lenka Hajeckova before moving on to face China’s third-seeded Chen Xue and Xi Zhang. On Thursday, they will complete pool play against Brazil’s 30th-seeded Liliane Maestrini and Angela Vieira.
Among other U.S. women’s teams, Misty May-Treanor (Santa Monica, Calif.) and Kerri Walsh (San Jose, Calif.), seeded second, will play in Pool B. They will open play Wednesday against Greece’s 18th-seeded Vasiliki Arvaniti and Maria Tsiartsiani and then play Switzerland’s 31st-seeded Joana Heidrich and Isabelle Forrer. On Thursday, May-Treanor and Walsh will go up against Switzerland’s 15th-seeded Simone Kuhn and Nadine Zumkehr.
Jen Kessy (San Juan Capistrano, Calif.) and April Ross (Costa Mesa, Calif.), seeded fifth, will play in Pool E and will start against Georgia’s 28th-ranked Cristine Santanna and Andrezza Martins das Chagas on Wednesday before facing Germany’s 21st-seeded Karla Borger and Britta Büthe. On Thursday, Kessy and Ross will go up against Germany’s 12th-ranked Katrin Holtwick and Ilka Semmler.
Lauren Fendrick (Carlsbad, Calif.) and Brooke Hanson (Woodland Hills, Calif.), ranked 17th, will play in Pool A, where they will open Wednesday against Brazil’s top-ranked Juliana Felisberta da Silva and Larissa Franca. In the afternoon, they will go up against Czech Republic’s 16th-seeded Kristyna Kolocova and Slukova Marketa. On Thursday, Fendrick and Hanson will play Poland’s 32nd-ranked Sylwia Pilarek and Aneta Gancarczyk.
For more information on the 2011 FIVB Beach Volleyball Swatch World Tour, please visit http://www.fivb.org/EN/BeachVolleyball/Competitions/WorldTour/2011/index.asp.
Source: FIVB Media Relations and Publications
Photo: FIVB Media relations and Publications