ADELAIDE, Australia — Late on Monday night, three-time Australian Olympian Mariafe Artacho Del Solar made her debut on the Volleyball TV commentary. A rookie herself on the comms, she was explaining the rookie — and even veteran — nerves when it comes to competing in a World Championships, or Olympic Games the biggest stages in the sport in which she made a half-dozen appearances.
Her message, to paraphrase: Just survive until the technical timeout.
Then, it’s game on.
Only, on Tuesday night in Adelaide, neither USA Volleyball team — James Shaw and Chaim Schalk, Julia Donlin and Lexy Denaburg — did much surviving. Both were getting blown out in their respective matches; Donlin and Denaburg went down 13-8 to Switzerland’s Anouk Verge-Depre and Zoe Verge-Depre, a team they hadn’t taken a set off of in two previous matches; Schalk and Shaw fell behind quickly in what would become a 21-13 rout at the hands of Argentina’s Nicolas Capogrosso and Tomas Capogrosso.
But then, as Artacho Del Solar so presciently predicted, the teams, both with a World Champs rookie — Denaburg and Shaw — settled in. The magnitude of the atmosphere became, simply, another match.
Game on, indeed.
After the technical timeout in the first, Donlin and Denaburg would match the Verge-Depres for the remainder of a 21-16 opening set loss, jump on them in a 21-16 second set win, and close it out with an emphatic 15-11 victory over the No. 11 seeded Swiss.
At the same time, on court three, Schalk and Shaw made for a similar rebound, countering with a 22-20 second set win and a matching 15-11 third set victory, sealing up a win over a team against whom they also had never beaten.
The victory puts both USA Volleyball teams into Thursday’s round of 16. Shaw and Schalk will match up with Cuba’s Jorge Alayo and Noslen Diaz, who won an excellent match over Andy Benesh and Miles Partain, 21-18, 19-21, 15-12. Benesh and Partain settled for 17th.
Donlin and Denaburg will play Paris Olympic gold medalists Ana Patricia Silva and Duda Lisboa, who narrowly escaped Puerto Rico’s Allanis Navas and Maria Gonzalez, 24-22, 21-19 in the first round.
Reka Orsi Toth celebrates a win over Germany/Volleyball World photo
Valentina Gottardi, Reka Orsi Toth win thriller over Cinja Tillmann, Svenja Muller
In August, Italian star Valentina Gottardi admitted her love for the biggest stages of this game. She lives for the biggest crowds, the biggest stakes, the biggest everything.
“I like the pressure,” she said, “and I think I’m really good at using it. When there’s a crowd, a big crowd, I think that they are there for me and I need to show them what I am capable of. I love when we play in big stadiums, full of people, and we can feel them inside the court. I love it.”
She displayed this as a teenager in 2022, when she and Marta Menegatti shocked the beach volleyball world with a fifth-place finish at the Beach Volleyball World Championships at home in Rome. Now, in her third World Championships at just the age of 22, she’s doing it again in Adelaide.
Gottardi and Reka Orsi Toth had the most difficult draw of the tournament, earning Germany’s top pair, Cinja Tillmann and Svenja Muller, the team who knocked them out for fifth at this year’s European Championships. Gottardi and Orsi Toth embraced the pressure, winning 21-12 before coming back to win in the second, 25-23, fending off multiple set points before flipping it to their advantage.
Now, in the round of 16, they’ll have another pair of excellent Germans in Louisa Lippmann and Linda Bock, whom they beat in a thriller in Hamburg in August, 18-21, 21-17, 18-16.
Melanie Paul, Lea Kunst continue Cinderella run
Who would have thought, heading into these World Champs, that two German pairs, with still another to play on Wednesday (Sandra Ittlinger and Anna Grune), would be through to the round of 16 — and neither of them would be Cinja Tillmann and Svenja Muller?
Melanie Paul and Lea Kunst, the 36th-seeded wild cards, continued their magnificent run on Tuesday, sweeping young Dutchies Emi van Driel and Wies Bekhuis, 21-17, 21-19. The win advances Paul and Kunst into the ninth-place rounds in their World Championships debut. It’s the first two-set win during their 4-0 run in Adelaide, and on Thursday, they’ll have a crack at the highest-seeded team yet: Latvia’s Tina Graudina and Anastasija Samoilova.
Jonatan Hellvig blocks Bartosz Losiak/Volleyball World photo
Sweden rediscovers form at the right time — again
Sweden’s David Ahman and Jonatan Hellvig are becoming the kings of laying an egg in pool play and resuming their top form when it matters most. A year ago at the Paris Olympic Games, they halted a 17-match win streak by losing twice in pool play before erupting for a torrid run to a gold medal.
Lightning is striking again, this time in Adelaide.
Again, Sweden barely survived pool, breaking the Pool of Death on points, earning a can’t-miss match against Poland’s Bartosz Losiak and Michal Bryl in a rematch of the 2023 World Championships semifinals — in the first round of the 2025 playoffs.
Unlucky for Poland, Sweden figured it out, playing their best beach volleyball of this tournament at the right time, sweeping Losiak and Bryl, 21-18, 21-18 in one of the most unjust first round draws since Cuba’s Jorge Alayo and Noslen Diaz went 3-0 in Paris pool play, only to get the best team in the world in the first round. Sweden will meet France’s Remi Bassereau and Calvin Aye in the round of 16.
Cherif Younousse, Ahmed Tijan fend off George, Saymon
In three matches of pool play, Qatar’s Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan were barely tested, with only one set coming within three points. On Tuesday night on center court, they were tested and then some by Brazil’s George and Saymon, who peaked at the perfect time in 2025.
Twice, Cherif and Ahmed led at the technical timeout, and twice, George and Saymon pushed back. The Brazilians, in fact, came back from down 8-13 in the second to claim a 20-18 lead. A sideout for Qatar preceded an error on Saymon — caused by service pressure on a devilish float — which begat a four-point run that sealed it.
Qatar has now matched their previous career-high finish at a World Championships and will meet white-hot France’s Teo Rotar and Arnaud Gauthier-Rat in the round of 16.
World Champs defense stays in tact for Ondrej Perusic, David Schweiner
Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner jokingly refer to themselves as hobby players, seeing as Perusic is now splitting his time on the beach as a new dad and a man with a full-time job.
I’d like to have a hobby like theirs.
The Czechs look better than they did in 2023, when they won the tournament, surviving a belter against Chile’s Marco Grimalt and Esteban Grimalt, 21-14, 25-27, 15-10 that saw Marco put on one of his best performances of the year.
No team in history has repeated as men’s World Champs. Their next test will come Thursday, against Portugal’s Joao Pedrosa and Hugo Campos, who knocked off Chase Budinger and Miles Evans in a surprisingly easy sweep, 21-16, 21-19.
Martins Plavins doing Plavins things/Volleyball World photo
Wednesday’s Beach Volleyball World Championships Men’s Match of the Day
Martins Plavins and Kristians Fokerots vs. Nils Ehlers and Clemens Wickler
Few men play better in big-time scenarios than Martins Plavins, who came off the reserve list of the European Championships a year ago with a young kid named Kristians Fokerots — whom he coaches in U22 events — and won the whole thing.
Who did they play in the finals? Germany’s Clemens Wickler and Nils Ehlers.
Who do they play in the first round of playoffs at the 2025 World Champs? Wickler and Ehlers.
They’ve only played twice, and Plavins and Fokerots have won both previous matchups, both in three sets.
Make time for this one.
4 pm local
12:30 am EST
9:30 pm Pacific (Tuesday)
Katja Stam and Raisa Schoon in their win over France/Volleyball World photo
Wednesday’s Beach Volleyball World Championships Women’s Match of the Day
Katja Stam and Raisa Schoon vs. Xinyi Xia and Xu Yan
Two of my favorite defenders, Katja Stam and Xinyi Xia, going at it head to head for the second time ever and first time since Montreal of 2023. Xia had a former World Champ in Chen Xue blocking for her then, but the 21-year-old Yan has been impressive in their three matches together in Adelaide.
9 pm local
5:30 am EST
2:30 am Pacific
