FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Do you think they knew each other well, the four finalists of AVP Fort Lauderdale?
All four — Geena Urango and Julia Scoles, Hailey Harward and Tina Graudina — cut their teeth at USC, though that’s far where their familiarity ends. It is, rather, merely where it begins.
Less than three months ago, Scoles, Harward and Graudina won an NCAA Championship together when they beat Florida State in the championship match. The court 1 duo for that team? Harward and Graudina, who won the final 30 matches of their season together.
When the matches were over, practices finished, studying complete, where would Graudina, Harward, and Scoles retreat? Their house. Where they all lived. Together.
Yes, this beach volleyball world is a small, beautiful and sometimes comically tight-knit one. Only one weekend ago, in Atlantic City, a pair of roommates — David Lee and Chase Frishman — played against one another in the finals of a Tour Series event. On Sunday in Fort Lauderdale, Harward and Scoles, roommates and close friends, did the same.
It was Harward and Graudina who prevailed, beating Urango and Scoles, 19-21, 21-15, 15-6, finishing off a perfect week in Fort Lauderdale, winning all five matches, extending their winning streak as a team to 35 straight.
“I love this tournament,” said Graudina, who was playing in just the second AVP tournament of her career. “This is the best one I’ve ever been to. It’s such a party. I’m not kidding, this is truly the case. I’m just doing my thing and I know she’s incredible.”
Indeed, Harward is a sensational talent, a 24-year-old from Phoenix who is, like many of her NCAA peers, making a breakthrough on the AVP Tour this season. The sand that was melting the bottoms of flip flops? The 100-plus-degree heat index? The dehydration that caused many to cramp and others to get sick, sometimes in the middle of matches? None of it seemed to bother Harward in the least, as she made an average of 6.50 digs per set, hit just shy of .400, and tied for third — alongside Graudina — with nine aces for the tournament.
“When this one’s over,” USC coach and AVP color commentator Dain Blanton said, “nobody is going to say ‘I wish I gave more effort.’ ”
There was no gas left in the metaphorical tanks. Urango left one rally in the third set so covered in sand she lived up to every syllable of her nickname: Sandy Churango. Scoles was, quite literally, sick at…
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