VNL quarterfinals set after China come back to beat USA

The quarterfinal duels of the Volleyball Nations League 2025 were determined on Sunday, after China staged a massive comeback against the United States to win 3-2 (18-25, 19-25, 25-21, 25-16, 18-16) and end the tournament’s Preliminary Phase in spectacular fashion in Arlington.

With all teams having completed their schedules, first-placed Italy will play eighth-placed the United States, second-placed Brazil will battle seventh-placed Germany, third-placed Japan will face sixth-placed Türkiye and fourth-placed Poland will duel with fifth-placed China in the first round of the VNL Finals, which are going to be held in Łódź, Poland, from July 23-27.

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The incredible reverse sweep against the Americans made the Chinese end their Preliminary Phase campaign with nine victories and 24 points and move one position up in the standings in the last day of matches, passing Türkiye, which ended with eight wins and 23 points.

Outside hitter Wu Mengjie was instrumental in the Chinese comeback, tallying an impressive 27 points, with 26 kills and one ace. Fellow outside hitter Zhuang Yushan also offered a strong contribution to the final result, adding 18 points, with 15 kills and three blocks.

“Our fans supported us a lot here, and we could only fight back for them,” Wu remarked. “We are a young team and have been playing with a lot of passion and energy. We’ll probably make mistakes at some point, but we’ll keep fighting all the time.”

American outside hitter Sarah Franklin was unstoppable and topped all scorers with a whopping 32 points (29 kills and three blocks). Opposite Taylor Mims had a solid performance off the bench, getting to double digits with ten points (nine kills, one block).

“I feel like we’re going to learn a lot from this and continue to grow,” Franklin reacted. “We saw a lot of good things on the court. China did a really good job of switching things up a little bit in the third and fourth sets, so I just think we could have been better at responding to that.”

Volleyball Nations League 2025: full schedule and results

Before the start of the women’s Finals, the VNL will have the third and last week of the Preliminary Phase for the men, which is going to have matches in Chiba, Japan, Gdańsk, Poland, and Ljubljana, Slovenia, from July 16-20.

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