Brazil’s Pedro/Evandro wins battle of Olympians over USA for gold at FIVB Long Beach Grand Slam

Long Beach, California, USA, August 28, 2016 — Perhaps the most dangerous Beach Volleyball player on the planet struck at just the right time for Brazil on Sunday. The 6-foot-11 Evandro Goncalves made the big plays to aid ailing teammate Pedro Solberg as the Olympians captured the gold medal at the ASICS World Series of Beach Volleyball FIVB Long Beach Grand Slam.In the final event of the 2016 FIVB World Tour, Evandro/Pedro scored a 21-19, 17-21, 15-9 win a battle of Olympians over Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena of the United States, giving the Brazilians their second gold medal of the season. The 2016 FIVB World Tour regular season concluded in the United States with the ASICS World Series of Beach Volleyball on a colorful purpose-built venue at Alamitos Beach.It was the second time in less than two months that Pedro/Evandro stopped Dalhausser/Lucena in a final. The Brazilians scored a tough straight-set win to capture the Gstaad Major in July.In a matchup of two teams smarting from a disappointing Rio 2016 Olympic Games, Evandro/Pedro restored some confidence in themselves.“It means me and Evandro, even after the Olympics where we didn’t do what was expected, we are still strong and even after a hard moment we came back strong so I’m very happy for that,” said Pedro, who captured the 17 th title of his career. “I’m happy to see how this team can work even in tough situations.”The situation was tough almost from the start. Lucena and Dalhausser never trailed and built a 17-14 lead in the first set before Evandro came up with two big blocks to spark a 5-0 run. The Brazilians put the set away with a crushing hit from Evandro from the right side.Dalhausser returned the favor from the net in the second set. His block of Pedro gave the Americans a two-point cushion and they closed out the set with a 5-2 run.The Brazilians never trailed in the third set and Evandro’s block on Lucena gave them an 8-4 lead as Evandro’s serving began to take effect.“At the beginning he was trying to serve too strong and our tactics were working more on Nick than on Phil today, so we started to serve Nick more and we …

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