Women’s Beach Volleyball | June 10, 2024
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – USC beach volleyball All-Americans and reigning world champions Kelly Cheng (Fullerton, Calif.) and Sara Hughes (Costa Mesa, Calif.); and men’s volleyball alumnus Andy Benesh (Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.) were officially named to the U.S. Beach Volleyball Team for the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on Monday, June 10.
The complete roster consists of two women’s pairs and two men’s pairs which qualified for the Paris Olympic Games. The beach volleyball competition will be contested July 27-August 10 in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower at the Eiffel Tower Stadium.
Cheng and Hughes are currently ranked No. 3 in the world FIVB beach volleyball rankings with 7,780 points. The other pair chosen to represent the U.S. women are LSU All-Americans Taryn Kloth and Kristen Nuss; the world’s No. 2-ranked duo with 8,440 points. Hughes, Kloth, and Nuss are each first-time Olympians. Cheng is now a two-time Olympian following a ninth-place finish in the 2021 Tokyo Games with partner Sarah Sponcil.
In the men’s competition, Benesh and partner Miles Partain are the fourth-ranked pair in the world with 7,100 points. Four first-time Olympians will represent the U.S. men as former NBA star Chase Bundinger and partner Miles Evans (the world’s 13th-ranked duo) will don the red, white, and blue in Paris.
All four U.S. beach volleyball pairs earned Olympic berths by finishing among the top 17 of their respective gender’s FIVB Olympic Rankings within the qualification period, which ran from Jan. 1, 2023, to June 9, 2024.
Cheng and Hughes are the defending world champions and are fresh off claiming gold medals at the final qualifying event on June 5-9 in Ostrava, Czech Republic. The Trojan duo will be coached by current USC associate head coach Gustavo Rocha who serves as co-head coach of the pair with Jordan Cheng. USC head coach Dain Blanton will serve as a sideline reporter with the NBC Sports broadcast of beach volleyball at the Paris Games.
Hughes becomes the third Olympian to have played for the USC beach volleyball program and joins Cheng (2020) and four-time All-American Tina Graudina (2020, Latvia). Graudina and partner Anastasija Samoilova are the No. 9-ranked pair in the world and in line to be selected again to…
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