Two out of eight American pairs are alive going into the final two days of the beach volleyball world championships in Stare Jablonki, Poland.
No. 3 women’s seed April Ross and Whitney Pavlik reached the semifinals with two wins Friday.
No. 3 men’s seed Phil Dalhausser and Sean Rosenthal are into the men’s round of 16 after beating fellow Americans Jake Gibb and Casey Patterson 23-21, 21-16.
“We would have preferred to have played them in the semifinal or the final, but we didn’t get a good Independence Day present with the draw,” Dalhausser said, according to FIVB. “It was a tight match for us, and we had a lot of luck because those guys played well. Jake and Casey made a few mistakes in the second set which made things easier for us.”
Ross and Pavlik face a German pair, seeded 17th, in the semifinals on Saturday at 7 a.m. ET. Universal Sports has the coverage.
The winner of that match advances to the gold-medal match against either No. 2 seed Xue Chen and Zhang Xi of China, who are world and Olympic medalists, or a 13th-seeded Brazilian pair at noon ET. The loser goes to the bronze-medal match at 11 a.m.
Ross and Pavlik look to keep a strong U.S. tradition at beach volleyball worlds, where an American female team has medaled at seven of eight tournaments dating to its debut in 1997. Of course, the dominant team of Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings is not playing this week, May-Treanor having retired and Walsh Jennings setting up for her 2013 debut with a new partner, which happens to be Ross, later this month.
The other U.S. women’s teams were eliminated Friday. No. 22 Lauren Fendrick and Brittany Hochevar fell in the round of 16 and No. 28 Jennifer Fopma and Brooke Sweat and No. 39 Summer Ross and Emily Day lost in the round of 32.
Olympians Dalhausser and Rosenthal are competing in their first major meet together after Dalhausser and Todd Rogers, Olympic gold medalists in 2008, split up following their elimination in the London Olympics round of 16. Rogers and new partner Ryan Doherty, a 7-foot-1 former minor-league pitcher, lost in the round of 32 to No. 2 seed Brazilians Alison and Emanuel 21-19, 21-12.
Dalhausser and Rosenthal will play a second match Saturday, a quarterfinal, if they beat a 10th-seeded Brazilian team in the round of 16 at 4:45 a.m. ET. They’re in the same half of the bracket as the defending world champs Alison and Emanuel, meaning they could face off in the semifinals on Sunday. The final is later Sunday. NBC has coverage from 2-3:30 p.m. ET.
The other U.S. men’s team, Nick Lucena and John Hyden, failed to get out of pool play.