Guatemala prevails in Central American Battle

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic, April 25, 2019 – Guatemala beat Nicaragua in straight sets 3-0 (25-11, 25-23, 25-16) in a Pool A match between traditional Central American rivals participating in the U19 Boys’ Pan American Volleyball Cup on Thursday at Ricardo Georiber Arias Pavilion in Santo Domingo.

The problems of Nicaragua with their reception caused the one-sided first set. From then on, the two teams engaged in an interesting and familiar battle. Guatemala improved to a 1-1 record while Nicaragua dropped to 0-2.

Guatemala held an 11-2 advantage in the aces category and made only 9 unforced errors to 21 by the Nicaraguans. Both teams had 29 attacks and Nicaragua blocked better 10-7.

Carlos Hoil, David Ismalej, Jason Hernandez and Jose Carrillo each scored 11 points for Guatemala.  Marcial Sandoval and Steven Lozano had 12 and 11, respectively, for the defeated side.

Reider Lucas, coach of Guatemala: The goal was attained which was to win this match and much better by 3-0 because is a confidence builder for the boys since this is the first tournament for some of them. The objective is to adjust the team to the level of future competitions.”

Jorge Mena, coach of Nicaragua: “The kids are very young and could not play against Guatemala. The rest for us is to continue working in order to have a better show in the next match.”