Top local women’s beach volleyball pair, Ayana Dyette and Nancy Joseph sealed a ticket to the Central American and Caribbean (CAC) Games scheduled for Mexico, in November when they won their best-of-two series against Elki Phillip and Pauline Woodroffe at Saith Park, Chaguanas, Beach Volleyball Facility, on Sunday.
The tournament was expected to be a four-team one, but with Malika Davidson and Chelsi Ward at the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games in China, and Apphia Glasgow and La Teisha Joseph absent, the second-leg of the qualifiers was a two-team affair between Dyette and Joseph, and main rivals, Phillip and Woodroffe.
And despite only playing one match, Dyette and Joseph did not have things all their way though as they needed to come from a first set deficit to earn their victory, 12-21, 21-13, 15-13 to stretch their unbeaten run to nine tournaments locally for the season.
Last month, Dyette and Joseph took the bold step towards earning the lone ticket to represent T&T in the women’s competition in Mexico when they played unbeaten in the first of three, four-team round-robin qualifiers at Chaguanas.
The experienced duo, who have been T&T’s lone women’s representatives on the Norceca Beach Volleyball Circuit this season, outplayed FIVB World Under-21 Championships participants Ward and Davidson 21-11, 21-17 before powering past Phillip and Woodroffe 21-9, 21-13, and Glasgow and Joseph 21-16, 21-8 to end with a 3-0 record.
Phillip and Woodroffe took second spot with a 2-1 mark after beating Glasgow and Joseph 21-10, 21-16, and Davidson and Ward 17-21, 21-14, 21-19 while Glasgow and Joseph defeated Chelsi Ward and Malika Davidson 15-21, 21-14, 15-11 for third.
So far this season, Dyette and Joseph were 12th in the fifth leg on the sand courts of Huixquilucan, Toluca, Mexico, in June after starting off with an 11th-placed finish in the Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands followed by 12th in Guatemala City and a best so far of seventh, in Antigua, Guatemala, during the third leg.
After missing out on the sixth and seventh legs of the tour in North Bay, Canada (July 9-14) and Varadero, Cuba (August 20-25), the local women will return to the tour for the eighth leg in Puerto Rico from September 17 - 22.
The remaining legs will then take place in Chula, Vista, California, USA, (October 1-6); Vera Cruz, Mexico, (October 15-20), Costa Rica, (October 22-27) and the final leg for a third straight year, in T&T, Pigeon Point to be exact, from November 12-17.