U-21 volleyball
Havana, October 6 (ACN) - The Cuban men's team lost 1-3 to Canada and will have to play the quarterfinals of the U21 men's volleyball Pan American Cup, held at the Ciudad Deportiva coliseum in Havana.
As expected, the match between Cubans and Canadians in the closing of the group phase of B, turned out to be very even, with the exception of the fourth and last match, in which the visitors took the lead in the final stretch and won 25-17, after one hour and 57 minutes of play.
The first segment was won by Jesús Cruz's disciples, who achieved a favorable score of 25-18, but in the second and third the roles were reversed on the court with identical scores of 25-23 for Ben Josephson's pupils, who advanced directly to Friday's semifinal.
According to the site www.norceca.net, the statistics of the challenge reflect better results in all orders for Canada, with 48 for 46 points in attacking, 10-7 in blocking, 10-3 in serving and 29-32 in errors committed that contributed goals to the rivals.
However, the top scorer of the match was once again Cuban Alejandro Miguel Gonzalez, with 24 points, 22 in attack, one in blocking and one in service, followed by Bryan Camino (13/12-1-0), while for the winners, Reeve Gingera (19/14-1-4), Brendan Mills (14/14-0-0) and Jacop Sargent (14/11-0-3) stood out.
Cuba, now in second place in segment B, will wait for the third place in group A for Thursday's quarterfinals.
In the other match of the B bracket, Haiti defeated Nicaragua 3-1 (18-25, 25-9, 26-24 and 25-21) on Wednesday, while in the A bracket, Mexico and the United States defeated Chile 3-1 and 2-0 (25-13, 15-25, 26-24 and 25-21) and the Dominican Republic (25-21, 25-15 and 25-21), in that order.
Canada, with three consecutive victories, led key B, followed by Cuba (2-1), Haiti (1-2) and Nicaragua (0-3), while in the absence of the postponed match between the Americans and Chile -to be played this Thursday-, the United States (2-0) leads key A, escorted by Mexico (2-1), Chile (1-1) and Dominican Republic (0-3).
The group leaders advance directly to the semifinals and the second and third advance to the quarterfinals, while on Saturday the medalists of the tournament, which awards two tickets to the world championship of the category in 2023, will be defined.
