Former UCSB star Brooke Hanson pulled off perhaps the biggest win of her pro beach volleyball career on Thursday, as she and partner Lauren Fendrick upset top-seeded Juliana-Larissa of Brazil in the second round of the FIVB World Tour Shanghai Jinshan Open in China.
Julianna-Larissa had won the first two tournaments of the season. The American qualifiers beat them 21-14, 23-25, 20-18 in a marathon match that lasted nearly an hour.
“It’s our first victory against them, I liked it a lot,” Fendrick told FIVB.org.
“They are the best team in the world!” Fendrick, shouted after smashing a ball for the match winner. “Brooke served the ball very well and we had a lot of opportunities to side out.”
Hanson-Fendrick will next play ninth-seeded Huang-Yue of China.
On the men’s side, locals Todd Rogers and Phil Dalhausser extended their FIVB World Tour winning streak to nine straight sets by sweeping the Polish team of Mariusz Prudel-Grzegorz-Fijalek 21-17, 21-14. It was the third straight win in Shanghai for the reigning Olympic and World Tour champions, and the No. 1 team in the world.
“They did not play very well, they can play much better if everything is OK, but they missed a lot of services,” Rogers told FIVB.org.
Dalhausser and Rogers now move on to the fourth round of the winners’ bracket on Friday morning and take on compatriots Nick Lucena-Matt Fuerbringer, who came from one set down to upset Chinese fifth seeds Wu Penggen-Xu Linyin, 14-21, 21-18, 15-9.
Jake Gibb and Sean Rosenthal also joined USA’s unbeaten club with a 21-17 and 21-9 victory over third seeds and 2009 FIVB Beach Volleyball Swatch world champions Julius Brink/Jonas Reckermann from Germany.
