Italy beat the USA to secure first Olympic title

Italy joined the restricted and prestigious group of Olympic champions in women's volleyball on Sunday, when they triumphed at the Paris 2024 Games, bringing an amazing end to 16 days of elite displays and incredible atmospheres at the South Paris Arena 1.

The number one team in the FIVB World Ranking, the Italians kept the excellent form they showed during the entire tournament to take down Tokyo 2020 champions the United States 3-0 (25-18, 25-20, 25-17) in the tournament's final.

With their victory in Paris, Italy are now the seventh nation to hold Olympic gold medals among the women, joining the former USSR (four), China (three), Cuba (three), Brazil (two), Japan (two) and the United States (one).

The gold won in Paris was also the first-ever Olympic medal for Italian women in volleyball - they needed seven attempts to do it and made it to the medal rounds for the first time in the French capital. Libero Monica De Gennaro was with the team in their last four campaigns and celebrated the biggest moment in Italian volleyball to date.

"This is really special," she said. "It was the dream of all of us players to play in a final and to get to win it, it's really something unique. We've worked hard for so many years to make it to this final and to get to experience it and get gold, it's really amazing. During my career, I've worked every day with the goal of getting better and preparing for this moment and this is a great reward for all the hard work we made."

The Italians were impeccable during the 16 days of competition in Paris and claimed the title with an undefeated campaign of six victories and just one set dropped.

"We're all very emotional and happy about all that happened," middle blocker Sarah Fahr reacted. "I'm very proud of everyone on the team because this was something we've been trying to achieve for a long time. We didn't expect to get to play so well against such strong opponents but we just tried to stay focused on every moment and accept whatever came our way. We have this little mantra of 'here and win' in our team and we really took it one step at a time and that made us stronger and ready to deal with any situation as a team."

For the USA, getting silver meant making a fifth-straight podium appearance after taking silver in Beijing 2008 and London 2012, bronze in Rio 2016 and gold in Tokyo 2020. Their roster in Paris contained nine Tokyo Olympic champions, including outside hitter Jordan Larson, who was present in the team's last four Olympic campaigns.

"It's bittersweet but mostly sweet," middle blocker Haleigh Washingon added. "It's hardware and it's second-best in the world. We went through so much adversity and for us to come out of this tournament with hardware, it's really great. You take the victories where you can get them. There's definitely the feeling that we could have done better in the final. But to be able to represent the United States again and to be able to compete at such a high level and still get a result, it gets me thrilled."

Star opposite Paola Egonu played her role perfectly in the gold medal match, leading the Italian offense with 22 points. Outside hitters Myriam Sylla and Caterina Bosetti also had solid scoring displays, tallying ten and nine points respectively.

"We just tried to play our game and remain stable throughout the match," Egonu said. "Our coaching staff did a great job of keeping us calm and focused here since the first match. It was a beautiful journey and this is really hard to describe. It means a lot to Italian volleyball and it shows that we are working the right way."

Head coach Julio Velasco also had a big role in the Itatlian title as he took the team to the top of the world in just four months of work, helping them qualify for Paris and win gold, besides having led the team to the title of Volleyball Nations League 2024.

“When I accepted the invitation to come coach the Italian national team, winning goal at the Olympics never crossed my mind,” he revealed. “I knew we were only going to have four months to prepare, so my main priority was to identify in which areas we could make some improvement. I trust the players a lot to make decisions on the court, so we give them the freedom to do it, especially in the difficult moments.”

The Americans made several substitutions during the match to try and find the best way to stop Italy and had in opposite Jordan Thompson, who came off the bench, their most productive player, with eight points. Outside hitter Avery Skinner added another seven.

"Knowing where we started at the beginning of this quad and even where we were two months, to be able to play for gold, we couldn't have asked for any more," setter Jordyn Poulter reflected. "Italy are the best team in the world. They could have been in the last quad too, but I think they had some little things to figure out. I think they felt very very confident and assured of what they were chasing coming into this final and I feel happy for them as a country and a program for getting their first medal and for it to be gold."

The Italians were more effective than the Americans in every scoring skill, beating their opponents in kills (45 to 35), blocks (11 to zero) and aces (seven to three), which made their higher numbers of errors (17 to 12) don't have much of an impact in the match.

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