ATLANTA — LSU volleyball players Brittnee Cooper and Elena Martinez led the United States Women’s National A2 Red Team to the championship of the Open Division of the USA Adult Open Volleyball Championships at the Georgia World Congress Center last week.
The USA A2 Red Team defeated Huskies VBC, the University of Washington’s collegiate team, in the gold medal match. The United States team won the first two games before falling in game three of the championship match. Martinez led the defensive effort as the U.S. Red Team closed out the match with a win in game four. Martinez also handled 22 serves from the libero spot for the match, committing just one reception error.
USA Volleyball held two tryouts at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs in March to assist in the selection of the A2 Red and Blue Teams. The two sessions of tryouts also doubled as evaluation periods for the A2 program as well as the U.S. Women’s National Team which will compete at the Olympic Games.
In the Open Championships, the USA A2 Red Team rebounded from a close 3-2 loss to Smack Trim in the first round of pool play to defeat Rusty Wahine, 3-1; Legion Red, 3-0; and the Exterminators, 3-1, to win Pool 2 and advance to gold medal bracket play. The United States team then knocked off Legion Red, 3-0, and Get Low, 3-2, to advance to the Gold Medal championship where the Red Team defeated the Huskies VBC, 3-1.
The 2007 Southeastern Conference Defensive Player of the Year, Martinez, earned honorable mention AVCA All-America honors. The New Orleans native broke the 21-year old conference record for digs in a single season and recorded the 11th most digs in a single season in NCAA history. Averaging 5.61 digs per game, Martinez led the conference and ranked 35th nationally. Recording 20 or more digs in 21 of LSU’s 33 matches, she broke the school record with 43 digs against Alabama.
Ranked fourth in the SEC and 31st nationally in blocks per game as only a sophomore, Cooper recorded four double-doubles on the season. Against Notre Dame, the Houston native recorded a career high 13 blocks to go along with a career best 21 kills. Finishing the year with 1.42 blocks per game, Cooper ranked 10th in single-season blocks per game in LSU history. Also posting 152 block assists, Cooper tied for the fifth most single-season block assists in school history.
The USA Volleyball High Performance pipeline A2 Teams have been competing in the Open Division since 2003. Their only other championship in the event was in 2004. The USA A2 Program is the only team with more than one Women’s Open Division title in the last eight years.
The U.S. Women’s National Training Team finished second to The Exterminators in its first Open competition in 2003, then rebounded to win the gold in 2004 in a rematch of the previous year’s championship. In 2006, the USA Blue A2 finished second to The Exterminators at New Orleans. Last year, USA Red finished with the silver medal after falling to Westwood VBC (UCLA) in the finals.
USA Volleyball has showcased its USA Adult Open Volleyball Championships for 79 years since the organization’s founding in 1928. Except for 1943 and 1944 during the height of World War II, the Open has been a mainstay celebrating adult volleyball nationally. The event is one of the largest national championships in any sport in the United States, and the Open has featured the sport of volleyball from coast-to-coast.