COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (March 8, 2018) – Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena bounced back from a pool play loss and have reached the semifinals of the KANTARA Beach Volleyball Cup, an FIVB four-star event in Doha, Qatar.
Dalhausser and Lucena will play Russia’s 15th-seeded Oleg Stoyanovskiy and Igor Velichko in Friday’s semifinals. Netherlands’ No. 9 Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen will face Qatar’s eighth-seeded Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan in the other semi.
The pool play loss to U.S. teammates Jake Gibb and Taylor Crabb meant the top-seeded Dalhausser and Lucena had to play in the first round, where it beat 14th-seeded Canadians Grant O’Gorman and Ben Saxton (21-15, 21-15). In the second round, Dalhausser and Lucena beat Russia’s fourth-seeded Nikita Liamin and Viacheslav Krasilnikov (21-17, 21-15).
In the quarterfinals, Dalhausser and Lucena survived a marathon first set and beat Poland’s No. 2 Piotr Kantor and Bartosz Losiak (37-35, 13-21, 15-6) after Kantor and Losiak were forced to pull out due to injury.
The second round was tougher on the three other U.S. men’s beach teams competing in Doha.
Gibb and Crabb, the 16th seeds, battled before losing to Brazil’s No. 22 Saymon Barbosa Santos and Álvaro Morais Filho, 19-21, 21-18, 18-16.
No. 10 John Hyden and Theo Brunner fell to Brouwer and Meeuwsen, 27-25, 21-17.
Billy Allen and Ryan Doherty, seeded 25th, fell in the second round to Latvia’s Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Janis Smedins, 21-16, 21-18.