NORCECA: Dominican Republic Day 2 (Women)
Imara Esteves of Cuba shows the kind of effort that was necessary to compete against the United States in Tuesday competition. (photo: fivb.org)The Olympic Qualifying NORCECA event went into the second day of competition on Tuesday. The format takes two teams from each representing nation, and pit them against two teams from a competing nation, with the winning country sending both teams forward. It's a somewhat different format than usual, which generally includes single teams going on regardless of how their country-mates fare.
Full breakdown of Day 2 results and finals brackets after the jump:
Tuesday held the semi-finals. The two Canadian squads, Annie Martin and Marie-Andre Lessard of Canada-A and Heather Bansley and Liz Maloney of Canada-B, came up against tough Puerto Rican competition. The competitive match-up turned out to be more decisive than anticipated. The Canadian squads won the first three matches, making the fourth match more process than competition. The team of Canada-B went undefeated, while Canada-A eventually lost the last, and insignificant, match. They move on to play in the Finals on Thursday.
In the other semi-final, teams from Cuba and the United States met head to head. USA-B, composed of Whitney Pavlik and Jenny Kropp, pulled off an early upset to take out Cuba's A team of Imara Esteves and Kirenia Reyna. Unfortunately for the States, it would be the only upset of the day. Cuba's B-Team, Ion Canet and Niriam Sinal, went undefeated in their two matches. In a tense final match, the two A-Teams went deep into a third and deciding set before Cuba prevailed.
Cuba's teams will meet Canada in the finals, while Puerto Rico and the United States will play for bronze.
Those matches will be played on Thursday, April 22nd. Check back to Kill on Two for full coverage of the rest of NORCECA: Dominican Republic.
Canada 3, Puerto Rico 1
CAN-A d. PUR-B (21-8, 21-11)
CAN-B d. PUR-A (21-18, 21-17)
CAN-B d. PUR-B (21-17, 21-11)
PUR-A d. CAN-A (21-17, 25-27, 15-13)
Cuba 3, United States 1
USA-B d. CUB-A (21-19, 22-20)
CUB-B d. USA-A (21-13, 21-19)
CUB-B d. USA-B (21-19, 21-17)
CUB-A d. USA-A (27-25, 16-21, 15-13)