Siblings Karissa Cook and Brian Cook led their teams to gold medals at the four-player beach volleyball competitions Wednesday at the World Beach Games in Qatar.
Each team avenged a loss in pool play. The women lost to Brazil in straight sets but took a convincing 21-16, 21-9 win in the final. The men lost to host Qatar, one of its two losses in pool play, before charging back to win the rest of its matches in straight sets, including a 21-18, 26-24 win in the final.
Karissa Cook, who played as a setter for Stanford’s indoor volleyball team and played for Hawaii’s beach volleyball team as a graduate student, had five kills and five blocks in the women’s final. Former Hawaii indoor player Emily Hartong also accounted for 10 points with six kills and four blocks. Geena Urango, who played indoors and on the beach at Southern Cal, had eight kills.
Cook, Hartong and teammates Allie Wheeler and Katie Spieler played together to win a snow volleyball competition in Moscow over the winter.
Brian Cook, who also played at Stanford and has played for the U.S. indoor team, led the U.S. men with nine kills and six blocks in the final. Taylor Crabb, who played at Long Beach State and recently won the AVP Hawaii Open with Jake Gibb, had 11 kills and a block.
Elsewhere on the last day of the World Beach Games, the U.S. women’s 3x3 basketball team shot just 34% from the field in a 14-12 loss to Brazil.
The U.S. finished the inaugural edition of the World Beach Games with four gold medals and four bronze. Spain had the most gold medals with seven; Brazil had the most medals with 12.
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