Guadeloupe edge U.S. Virgin Islands

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic, November 3, 2012 – Guadeloupe overcame U.S. Virgin Islands in a thrilling five-set battle (19-25, 25-17, 34-32, 20-25, 15-11) to equalize their win-loss record at 1-1 in the NORCECA-C First Round Tournament of the 2014 FIVB Men’s World Championship on Saturday evening.

Loic Couchy was the best scorer of Guadeloupe with 19 points followed by Heindrik Perot and Ludovic Baltyde with 13 and 11 respectively. Jelani Richards had a match-high 20 points for U.S. Virgin Islands while Shimoi Van Holten and Anthony Pippen finished with 16 and 10.

“The key of the match for us was to comeback to take the third set,” Guadeloupe’s coach Ismael Olivier commented afterwards. “It is the third time we play USVI in the last few months and every game has been very difficult.”

“My guys were a little bit tired as we spent a lot of energy in the third set,” U.S. Virgin Islands’ coach Mark Daniel stated. “It was a good match and we improved from the morning match.”

“It was a very tough match and we followed the coach’s instructions to win,” Couchy said.

Van Holten said: “We made some necessary adjustments but we are not 100 percent yet. I hope we can improve for tomorrow’s matches.”