admin

HERMOSA BEACH, Calif. — The young women on the Concordia beach volleyball team knew, in their hearts, there was little to chance of their moonshot request actually landing.

But still: They had to ask.

They had seen the posts on Instagram, that April Ross — the April Ross — was getting her masters in coaching at Concordia, a small, Lutheran university in Irvine, California. There was also, they couldn’t help but notice, an opening for the graduate-assistant coaching position. What if their coach, Jenny Griffith, gave Ross a call. Would the three-time Olympic medalist want to serve as their graduate assistant coach?

“In my mind, I’m thinking there is no way she’s ever going to coach for us,” Griffith said. “I asked her and she was like ‘Yes.’ Before I even told her what she would do, she said she’d love to do it.”

And thus Concordia became home to the most overqualified graduate assistant coach in the country.

On the outside, it would appear that the next chapter of both April Ross’ career and life began there, in Irvine, the moment she accepted that graduate-assistant position in the fall of 2022. She had made no public announcement about a retirement as a player, and she had remained quiet on anything regarding starting a family. But Ross had foreseen the change coming, despite forgetting the fact that she had, years earlier, foreseen it herself, even enlisting others to help her remember doing so.

More than a year before, in the lead-up to the Tokyo Olympic Games, Ross had asked her coach, Angie Akers, and partner, Alix Klineman, to remind her to write a letter to herself, one “that convinces me,” Ross said, “not to go to Paris [Olympics in 2024].”

But in the chaos of COVID and bubble events and tests and quarantines and strange travel and three straight fifths leading into Tokyo, Akers and Klineman forgot to remind Ross, and Ross forgot to remind herself.

That letter never did end up getting written.

It’s an amazing thing, the way the human mind can warp or simply forget the most trying times in their lives. After winning gold in Tokyo and becoming the first female beach player to win an Olympic medal of all three colors, Ross felt, she said, “more relief than celebration. At the same time, as it went on, I was very grateful. A lot of peace around my career. As time went on, I think I got kind of confused about what I wanted next.”

A letter, then, could have been useful. A reminder of the obscene commitment required to become not just an Olympian, but a gold medalist. Not just a great, but one of the greatest. Not just a winner, but the third-winningest player of all time. Without that letter to herself, Ross had forgotten the stress that comes with the pursuit of something nobody else in the game had ever done. She had forgotten how skewed her life had become, missing precious time with friends and family in the name of another Olympic medal. And with that forgetfulness, Ross simply resumed the same pattern she had fallen into since beginning her first chase of an Olympic Games in 2007.

“What I knew was playing and going for the Olympics and quad after quad,” she said. “Once I knew Alix was not going to continue for a while and I needed a new partner, that’s what I focused on.

“Once I solidified a new partner for a quad I was like ‘Oh my goodness, what about trying to have a family and other stuff that matters in life?’ I started to have a lot of anxiety about that, what should I do? I did this thing, and I could keep going, but is that what I really want to do? I was at this gnarly crossroads where I had to make a really tough decision and I didn’t know what I wanted.”

So she tried to do both. In the off-season following Tokyo, Ross and Kelly Cheng penciled in a commitment to make a run for Paris. Everything about that team made perfect sense. Here was the best defender on the planet, on the heels of an Olympic gold medal. And here was Cheng, 24 years old and one of the most promising talents in the United States, a blocker who had qualified for Tokyo with Sarah Sponcil, becoming the youngest team in USA history to do so. Cheng was all in.

Was Ross?

For the first time in her career, she didn’t know. There had never been a question mark regarding her commitment to anything, let alone her career as a player. What she did know, however, is that there is no room for doubt on the World Tour. There is no half in, half out in the pursuit of the highest level in the sport. It wouldn’t have been fair to Cheng for Ross to only half commit. So Ross ended the partnership before it began and picked up Emily Day who, like Ross, was pursuing a masters and who, like Ross, had similar desires to start a family (Day is currently pregnant and due this summer).

They played just two tournaments together, Ross and Day, finishing with a pair of fifths in a Challenge and an Elite16 in Mexico.

“It still felt like too much,” Ross said. “As time went on, I was like I really do want to try to have a family, I want to give this a shot, and my shoulder blew up. I couldn’t really play and I wanted to step away and give my body a rest so we could have a family. That period was really tumultuous for me. Once you step away and you’re not 100 percent in it, what am I going to do with the rest of my life?

“I wasn’t ready for it. Now I had to figure it out. What’s going to be meaningful for me to do? What’s going to make me feel fulfilled in life? Having such a strong purpose my entire life is such a blessing and I didn’t realize what a blessing it was and then once you step out of that, what is my purpose? How am I going to fill that void?

“That’s why coaching ended up appealing to me so much because I could have an impact on younger people and help them chase their dreams and to me that’s really meaningful to have a hand in because of all of my experience. That was what my journey was like after the gold medal.”

Finding another excuse to go to the beach

It’s an easy thing, for a world-class athlete to get bored. For nearly two decades, Ross’ days had been full of movement — practice, lift, stretch, massage. The occasional double-day here and there. Beach workouts on Saturdays. Throw in some film and proper nutrition and it’s 10 p.m. Now, with no events on her calendar as a player, she looked at her days and saw an open canvas and no certain way of filling it.

“When you have nothing to do, a lot of things sound appealing,” Ross said. “You’re sitting at home, twiddling your thumbs, and maybe you should give it a shot. I always put it off. I always thought I was going to play forever.”

She debated getting into real estate. Even, heaven forbid, a “real job,” she said with a laugh. “It’s like, ‘No.’

“Finding another excuse to go the beach every day and have something to do — I stepped away from playing to work on this [getting pregnant] and I was like ‘OK, I need to figure out something to do.’ ”

In the fall of 2022, she found that something in the USA Volleyball gym, lifting next to Betsi Flint. Flint had recently split with Cheng after a successful year on both the AVP and Beach Pro Tour and was developing a new partner in Julia Scoles. With only a few weeks to prepare for an Elite16 in Torquay, Australia, and Flint’s usual coach, John Mayer, bogged down in the fall season at LMU, Flint and Scoles were in need of a coach.

“I’m around,” Ross told her. “If you ever need help on the beach, just let me know.”

Flint called Scoles, a 25-year-old who had just won the AVP Rookie of the Year, and asked her what she thought. The answer was exactly as you’d expect.

“Are you kidding me?” Scoles said. “Yes!”

For two weeks, then, Ross coached Flint and Scoles, prepping them for their first tournament as a team. It went well enough: a silver medal at the Elite16, with a semifinal win over Australia’s Taliqua Clancy and Mariafe Artacho, the very team Ross beat in the gold-medal match in Tokyo. With Ross still very much available for the 2023 season, it was an easy decision for Flint and Scoles to make when USA Volleyball asked who would be coaching them for the upcoming year: Three-time Olympic medalist April Ross.

Flint was still curious, though, how committed Ross would be. She was new to coaching, and despite her unreserved pedigree as a player, “a lot of times,” Flint said, “players don’t always make the best coaches.”

And then, on the first day of practice, Ross showed up with a whiteboard and a countdown to World Champs and Flint’s and Scoles’ next tournament. She had a practice plan and an open mind.

“She’s 100 percent in everything she does. She doesn’t know how to give less,” Flint said. “That was really cool for us to see.”

April Ross: ‘A woman of character’

Griffith can relate. Like Flint, she wasn’t sure how Ross would approach coaching Concordia, a Division II school that few outside the state of California know even exists. As a player, Ross’ credentials have earned her a permanent residence in the GOAT pasture. And here she was, coaching a small school with a number of players who were new to the game. And here she was, showing up exactly how she shows up to everything in life: Completely present, completely bought in.

“I was nervous,” Griffith said. “You have the best player in the world coming and it was super nerve-wracking to start. She’s very humble and very respectful and she was always asking things like ‘I don’t want to overstep my bounds, what do you think of this?’

“Her character is one that she’s going to do everything she does with excellence. When she makes decisions, she’s making it fully or she’s not going to do it at all. She is probably the most professional person, not just because she’s a professional athlete but she’s also that way as a person, a coach, just how she approaches relationships. She’s very intentional, and she doesn’t just say things to say things. She’s super confident and knows who she is and is so good at thinking through something and then speaking. She doesn’t just say things willy nilly. She’s just a strong person with a very sound mind. It blew me away and humbled me.”

Griffith was almost embarrassed when she told Ross the various hoops Ross had to jump through in order to become an NCAA-certified coach. Yes, even Olympic gold medalists have to finish six hours’ worth of modules and various other tasks of mostly paperwork that took around a month.

“I just kept thinking that I was going to say something and she’d say ‘It’s just not worth it.’ But she would do what she had to do and get it done quickly and say ‘What’s next?’ She is a woman of character,” Griffith said.

It is a cliché in life that one should never meet your heroes, for you’re only doomed to be disappointed. So the saying goes, anyway. A good chunk of the Concordia players have April Ross posters on the walls of their childhood homes. It was April Ross they were watching on TV, competing in AVP finals and Olympic Games. It was April Ross who inspired many of them to first pick up a ball and head to the beach.

Two of the players even grew so starstruck in those early days with Ross on staff that “they were just frozen,” Griffith said with a laugh. “We had our banquet at the end of the year, and they were saying it’s a once in a lifetime thing to have someone like April coach them. She was their hero to all of them, and to be able to be coached by your hero, and for her to be that person of character and everything you hope them to be. The girls were blown away because she was everything you would hope someone like that would be.”

Even Scoles, an AVP champion herself who has made three straight semifinals and two finals this season, has to “remind myself every day at practice, ‘Don’t fangirl, she’s your coach!’” Scoles said. “That’s April Ross! On our court! I feel like we have a special relationship as well, she kind of roasts me. I don’t want to say little sister but I feel the love and also she makes fun of me, but it’s OK.

“I feel so honored that she is my coach and I just don’t want to feel a certain level — I think a healthy pressure. Whenever she’s in our box, I want to implement what we’ve been working on. I want to make her proud and I know she gives so much to us and her time and her energy. I want to make sure I’m giving everything back. It’s not an easy feat to be a coach and invest everything. I want to take advantage of it.”

The clock is now ticking on Ross’ availability as a coach, at least for now. The day after helping Flint and Scoles to a final at AVP Huntington Beach, Ross made the announcement she had been hoping she’d be able to make for more than a year: She is pregnant, expecting a baby this October.

Five months into her pregnancy, it’s still difficult for Ross to process what her body, which has been so loyal and predictable for the previous 40 years, is going through. As she sat on the couch during a podcast, she checked her watch, which measures her heart rate and heart rate variability.

“My heart rate is 90 right now,” she said, shaking her head in an amused sort of way. “I’m so used to it being in the 40s when I was playing. My resting heart rate when I was in peak shape was low 40s, and now it’s 87. It’s the hardest thing my body has ever gone through. All the training, all the playing, does not compare. I can tell how hard my body’s working right now. It’s kind of blown my mind.”

After simply coaching Flint and Scoles in Huntington Beach, she felt as if she played the entire tournament. Upon returning to her home in Manhattan Beach, she hit the bed and slept for 11 straight hours.

“I felt so crappy in the first trimester I didn’t work out one time. Three months of not working out,” she said. “I just started getting back into the gym and oh my gosh. I’ve never been this weak in my life. I’m so stiff, I’ve always been flexible, and I realized how well I took care of my body and how much rehab and prehab and stretching and I always thought some of it was going to stay. It’s so enlightening. Now I know for the rest of my life, once I get back in shape I can’t let off the gas. Today I did the lightest arms and I was straightening my hair and it felt like my shoulder was going to fall off.”

She won’t need that right shoulder, which has helped her earn more than $2 million in prize money, for anything more than serving and hitting down balls in practice for at least another year. But after a year or so more of coaching, of learning the new rhythms of being mom? Ross plans on returning to the beach as a player. Another Olympic race is unlikely, but the AVP?

“I want to play a couple tournaments at least and if it goes terribly it’s still a good excuse to have a retirement ceremony and say goodbye to everybody and if it goes great then hey, I’ll keep going and maybe have a second wind here,” she said.

“In my head I’m just taking a break. I didn’t want to announce a retirement because I want to keep the door open to coming back.”

Millie Bright and Bethany England have been included in the England Women squad for the 2023 Women’s World Cup, while Beth Mead has not made the 23-player list.

Chelsea defender Bright has not featured since March after picking up a knee injury, but was expected to be included for the tournament, which begins on July 20 in Australia and New Zealand.

Lucy Bronze too has been sidelined since picking up a knee injury against Chelsea in the Women’s Champions League semi-finals, but is also expected to be fit for the tournament

Tottenham striker England – who scored 12 goals in just 12 WSL games for Spurs following her record-breaking January move from Chelsea – has also been called-up by Wiegman.

She was part of the Euro 2022-winning squad, but has missed out on international football since September. However, her fine club form has seen her earn a recall in time for the summer’s tournament.

There had been some hopes among England fans that Mead may have been included after her ACL injury in November, but she has not been named. Lionesses captain Leah Williamson and Fran Kirby also miss out with injury.

Manchester United captain Katie Zelem will also feature in her first major tournament squad, having been cut from Wiegman’s initial 28-player squad before the Euros last summer. Niamh Charles, Laura Coombs, Lauren James, Esme Morgan and Katie Robinson will also feature at their first senior international finals.

Wiegman has also named three standby players – goalkeeper Emily Ramsey, defender Maya Le Tissier and forward Jess Park – who will train with the squad at St George’s Park ahead of the tournament.

Ramsey will leave the group prior to departure for Australia. Le Tissier and Park will travel with the Lionesses and will be included in preparations. England can include one of their standbys in their 23-player squad up until their opening match against Haiti on July 22, should another player pick up an injury or fall ill.

Telford: Bright and Nobbs call-ups welcome

Former England goalkeeper Carly Telford speaking on Sky Sports News:

“It’s good to see Millie Bright on that list. I think we’ll all be relieved about that.

“She’s [Wiegman] gone with experience in Jordan Nobbs. It’s great to see her back, along with Katie Zelem – I think they’re going to be important.

“There’s some freshness in there. Katie Robinson’s a very exciting prospect. No Jess Park, which is disappointing, but her injury towards the end of the season probably hindered her a little bit.

“Beth England has proved herself as a forward, an out-and-out No 9. She’s been to a major tournament and how she pushes the group is something Sarina has probably looked at.

“It’s a solid squad. It’s got good versatility and good depth.

“I don’t think there will be too many who expected to be in the squad and will be disappointed to have been left out. It’s more about surprise inclusions. Sarina’s pretty set in her ways.”

England Women squad in full

Goalkeepers: Mary Earps (Man Utd), Ellie Roebuck (Man City), Hannah Hampton (Aston Villa).

Defenders: Millie Bright (Chelsea), Lucy Bronze (Barcelona), Jess Carter (Chelsea), Niamh Charles (Chelsea), Esme Morgan (Man City), Alex Greenwood (Man City).

Midfielders: Keira Walsh (Barcelona), Georgia Stanway (Bayern Munich), Ella Toone (Man Utd), Jordan Nobbs (Aston Villa), Laura Coombs (Man City), Katie Zelem (Man Utd).

Forwards: Alessia Russo (Man Utd), Rachel Daly (Aston Villa), Lauren Hemp (Man City), Chloe Kelly (Man City), Lauren James (Chelsea), Katie Robinson (Brighton), Bethany England (Tottenham).

Standby players: Maya Le Tissier (Man Utd), Jess Park (Man City), Emily Ramsey (Man Utd).

DETAILS

AFTER several years of posturing and false starts, Errol Spence Jnr, the number one ranked welterweight, will take on number two, Terence Crawford, in a mouth-watering 12-rounder at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on July 29. Premier Boxing Champions promote and Showtime PPV broadcast in the US. A UK broadcaster is yet to be confirmed.

---

HOW BIG IS IT?

PLENTY of educated voices in the industry are calling this the most-anticipated contest in boxing since Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao at last came together in 2015. That was indeed a ginormous event but this one, if we’re honest, is very unlikely to match it. Though hardcore fans will lap it up, neither Crawford nor Spence are close to being the household names that Mayweather and Pacquiao were back then. Why? Simply, this is the first truly big fight either of them has had and neither has captured the public’s attention like their predecessors.

Nonetheless, expect it to perform well both at the box office and on pay-per-view, at least in the context of the current era. But it would be a surprise if this crossed over to the point that your average London cabbie has any idea who either fighter is before or after the event. In America, the noise will be louder, but here in the UK it will barely register to the wider public.

Regardless, in our little boxing bubble, it will feel like party time in the days leading up to the event. Embrace every moment.

---

FORM

CRAWFORD, 39-0 (30) and 7-0 (7) at welterweight, is the man with the best form purely by virtue of his superior level of activity in recent years. His most worthwhile victories in the division came against Shawn Porter (rsf 12) in November 2021, Egidijus Kavaliauskas (w rsf 9) in December 2019 and Jose Benavidez Jnr (w rsf 12) in October 2018. His most recent outing came in December 2022, when he trounced David Avanesyan in six.

The 27-0 (22) Spence Jnr, meanwhile, has seen out of the ring problems limit his time in the ring. The opening bell will end a 13-month hiatus since the career welterweight stopped Yordenis Ugas in 10 rounds back in April last year. Before that, he was out for 14 months after outpointing Danny Garcia in December 2020. That followed a points win over Shawn Porter, 15 months prior. Spence, then, can boast just three outings in the last 48 months.

In truth, neither can claim to be particularly nuanced in the art of building a superfight.

---

COMMON OPPONENTS

THOUGH Crawford also trumps Spence in this department, it’s important to note that both Kell Brook and Shawn Porter were past their best by the time they encountered Terence.

Spence impressively halted Brook in 2018 in the Englishman’s first loss at 147. Though Kell had his moments it was clear that Spence was a special talent as he broke down the home fighter in Sheffield to score an 11^th round triumph. By the time Brook lost to Crawford in four, three years later, he was not the same force.

Crawford followed that success with a 12^th round stoppage of the always gutsy Porter, who then immediately retired, in 2021. Though by then, Shawn was two years older than when he gave Spence his hardest fight when losing over 12 memorable sessions.

---

AGE & EXPERIENCE

IT’S tempting to say that 35-year-old Crawford and 33-year-old Spence are already past their best but if one is being completely fair, we’re yet to see evidence of that. Which is different to when Mayweather and Pacquiao came together eight years ago; that bout was in the making since 2009 and in the six years it took to get them in the ring, Pacquiao lost twice and Mayweather’s form had noticeably dipped.

Even so, their combined age of 68 is four more than the sum of Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas Hearns when they had their rematch in 1989 – eight years after their titanic opener. Times have changed since then, however.

Crawford’s experience at world level is greater, by virtue of belts also won at lightweight and super-light (where he won all four). Yet Spence is the naturally the bigger man and though boxing has been little more than a hobby in recent years, he’s beaten a better quality of opposition in the weight class.

---

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE

In boxing terms, huge. Not only is it vital that the sport highlights it’s capable of making fights everyone wants to see – this has been the consensus number one matchup among fans for years – it will also mark the first time the welterweight division has had a universally recognised leader since 2016.

All sanctioning body belts are up for grabs so expect the usual ‘undisputed’ and ‘four-belt era’ fanfare as the sanctioning bodies’ presidents, with extortionate sanctioning fees filling their pockets and garish belts in hand, jostle for attention in centre ring before the fight begins. To Boxing News, however, such nonsensical terminology – and expense – is wholly unnecessary; this, very simply, will crown the world welterweight champion.

In fact, this bout is so well-matched it offers the perfect chance for promoters, boxers and broadcasters to get on board with a simpler, cheaper system. One that doesn’t need bogus belts to sell a bout and one where the fighters don’t have to stump up a hefty slab of their purse for the privilege. Don’t hold your breath on that.

But all cynicism aside, this is the most important fight that can be made outside of the heavyweight division.

---

WILL IT ENTERTAIN?

THOUGH predicting how thrilling a contest will be is an impossible task, the manner in which both go about their business suggests this one will deliver in a way that Mayweather-Pacquiao did not.

---

WHO WINS?

We’re a long way off from shutting the curtains to the outside world, losing ourselves in their styles and gameplans, attempting to find out how their respective camps have treated them, and locking down a prediction. But, at this early stage, the odds that slightly favour Crawford (4/5 to Spence at 11/10) seem about right.

He’s been the more active, he’s arguably the more versatile and he has a mean streak that very few, if any, in the sport can match. That he has a fitting dance partner in Spence, however, is exactly why this is the can’t miss event of 2023.