Todd Rogers and Phil Dalhausser have advanced to their fifth straight final four on the international Swatch-FIVB Tour. The local pro beach volleyball stars will play Germany’s Jonas Brinkermann and Julius Brink on Monday at the $600,000 Moscow Grand Slam in Russia.
Rain delays pushed the tournament to an extra day.
Top-seeded Rogers and Dalhausser have won three of four international events and all three tourneys on the domestic AVP Tour. The only tournament they haven’t won this year is the Shanghai Open in China, where they finished fourth.
Dalhausser and Rogers advanced to play the No. 3-seeded Germans by beating 18th-seeded compatriots Jake Gibb and Sean Rosenthal, 21-14 and 21-8, in 34 minutes followed by a 21-8 and 21-17 win in 37 minutes over 23rd-seeded Sebastian Dollinger and Stefan Windscheif of Germany.
In the opposite bracket, 17th-seeded Casey Jennings and Brad Keenan advanced to their first FIVB final four together, and they’ll take on No. 13 China’s Penggen Wu and Linyin Xu, who reached their 10th semifinal berth as a team. They made the Moscow final in 2008 and lost to Rogers and Dalhausser.
Jennings-Keenan opened play Sunday by eliminating 12th-seeded Grzegorz Fijalek/Mariusz Prudel of Poland 17-21, 21-15 and 15-13 in 54 minutes. They then beat Brazil’s Harley Marques and Pedro Salgado by forfeit as Salgado had to stop playing with a leg injury in the first game.
On the women’s side, Chen Xue and Xi Zhang of China defeated Americans Jen Kessy and April Ross, 21-17, 21-19, for the championship. The winners share $43,500 while Kessy-Ross split $29,500.
