Canada's Humana-Paredes, Wilkerson take home 2nd silver medal of Beach Pro Tour season
Toronto duo falls short against reigning world champion Americans in Ostrava final
The top Canadian beach volleyball duo of Melissa Humana-Paredes and Brandie Wilkerson finished with silver at the Beach Pro Tour Elite16 stop in Ostrava, Czech Republic.
The Toronto pair came up short against reigning world champions Kelly Cheng and Sara Hughes of the United States in Sunday's final, falling 2-1 (13-21, 23-21, 12-15).
Cheng led all players with 28 attack points to go along with two aces, while Hughes added 15 attack points to help hand the Canadians their first loss of the tournament. Wilkerson and Humana-Paredes each had 13 attack points, with Wilkerson also scoring two block points.
WATCH | Full coverage of women's final:
The Olympic-bound Canadians reached the final without dropping a set in five matches.
They ousted Latvia's Tina Graudina and Anastasija Samoilova 21-18, 21-18 in the semifinals earlier in the day, while the Americans advanced to the final with a straight-sets win (21-19, 21-18) over Brazil's Ana Patricia Silva Ramos and Eduarda Santos Lisboa in a rematch of last year's world championship final.
The Latvian duo went on to upset the top-ranked Brazilians in the bronze-medal match.
Humana-Paredes and Wilkerson also took home silver in March at the season-opening Elite16 tournament in Doha. They secured their berth for this summer's Paris Games by ranking among the world's top 17 teams based on their best dozen results in tournaments between Jan. 1, 2023 and June 9, 2024.
"We are so proud to finish our Olympic qualification with a medal," Humana-Paredes said. "We fought all week long, and things are clicking. We fell short in the finals by a couple points, but there is so much good to take from this and it's always a battle with Kelly and Sara."
Humana-Paredes and Wilkerson formed a team after they were both eliminated in the quarterfinals of Tokyo's 2021 Olympic Games with other partners. They took bronze in Ostrava last year.
The Canadians made their debut as a duo on the Beach Pro Tour in February 2023 and captured gold on home sand at the Montreal Elite16 event last July. They won Canada's first Pan Am Games medal in women's beach volleyball with silver last October in Santiago, Chile.
Humana-Paredes and Sarah Pavan of Kitchener, Ont., won a women's world title in 2019.
Canada will attempt to qualify additional teams for Paris at a NORCECA Continental Qualifier tournament June 19-24 in Tlaxcala, Mexico.
WATCH | Full match coverage: Humana-Paredes, Wilkerson vs. Latvia:
With files from Volleyball Canada and The Canadian Press
