Puerto Rico’s Navas & Gonzalez push through to Veracruz quarterfinals

At their first appearance on the 2025 Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour, Puerto Rico’s Allanis Navas & Maria Gonzalez made it from Wednesday’s qualifications all the way to Saturday’s quarterfinals at the Veracruz Challenge in Mexico. Another two pairs that emerged from the qualifiers - New Zealand’s Shaunna Polley & Olivia MacDonald and Netheralnds’ Katja Stam & Raisa Schoon – also advanced to the last eight, along with three teams from the United States and two from Czechia.

· Watch the Veracruz Challenge on VBTV

In Friday’s sixteenthfinals, Navas & Gonzalez, seeded 28^th in the 32-team women’s main draw, battled it out for a 2-1 (21-12, 15-21, 15-8) victory over seventh-seeded Mila Konink & Floor Hogenhout of the Netherlands, with a match-high 20 points from Navas and another 12 from Gonzalez. The Puerto Rican duo went on to produce a 2-0 (21-18, 21-19) sweep of their eighthfinal match with sixth-seeded Ukrainians Yeva Serdiuk & Daria Romaniuk. This time Gonzalez was the best scorer of the game with 22 points, including four kill blocks, while Navas chipped in with another 11. While Navas & Gonzalez are in their first Beach Pro Tour appearance of 2025, they have been having a very successful season on the NORCECA Beach Volleyball Tour, collecting six gold and one bronze in seven appearances so far.

In Saturday’s quarterfinals, the Caribbean team will take on Czechia’s Katerina Pavelkova & Anna Pavelkova. The 18^th-seeded twin sisters, who turned 20 on Thursday, also recorded two victories in the Veracruz knockouts on Friday – 2-0 (21-14, 21-13) over Switzerland’s Annique Niederhauser & Menia Bentele in the sixteenthfinals, and 2-0 (21-19, 22-20) over USA’s Alaina Chacon & Morgan Chacon in the eighthfinals.

As pool winners, 24^th-seeded qualifiers Polley & MacDonald of New Zealand skipped the first elimination round. In the second, they hammered out a 2-0 (21-11, 21-16) shutout of 15^th-seeded Czechs Kylie Neuschaeferova & Martina Maixnerova to progress to a quarterfinal clash with 14^th-seeded Americans Hailey Harward & Molly Phillips. To get there, Harward & Philips survived two tie-breakers on Friday. They took a 2-1 (21-19, 18-21, 15-10) sixteenthfinal win over compatriots Abby Van Winkle & Deahna Kraft, before upsetting second-seeded Australians Taliqua Clancy & Jana Milutinovic in a 2-1 (16-21, 21-19, 15-11) eighthfinal.

26^th-seeded Dutch stars Stam & Schoon, who also took off from the qualifiers and won their pool, went on to produce a 2-0 (21-15, 21-12) sweep of their eighthfinal against French Olympians Lezana Placette & Alexia Richard on the way to a quarterfinal meeting with third-seeded Czechs Marketa Svozilova & Marie-Sara Stochlova, who also won their round-of-16 fixture in straight sets, 2-0 (21-11, 21-19) against Ukraine’s Inna Makhno & Iryna Makhno.

There will be at least one American team among the semifinalists, as top-seeded Corinne Quiggle & Chloe Loreen will face compatriots Kylie Kuyava-De Berg & Xolani Hodel in one of the quarterfinals. In the eighthfinals, Quiggle & Loreen mastered a 2-0 (21-16, 21-17) shutout of Poland’s Marta Lodej & Urszula Lunio, while 21^st-seeded DeBerg & Hodel came back from a set down against Canada’s Marie-Alex Belanger & Lea Monkhouse to celebrate a 2-1 (23-25, 21-17, 15-12) victory.

Saturday’s women’s program in Veracruz features both the quarterfinals, getting underway at 14:00 local time (20:00 UTC), and the semifinals set to close the competition day in the evening.

VW Beach Pro Tour Veracruz Challenge: schedule and results

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