2017 FIVB WORLD LEAGUE – GROUP 1

Group 1 Semifinals

July 7, 2017

Curitiba, Brazil

FIVB World League Semifinals

Schedule/Results

The first semifinal on the day features the United States and Brazil. USA will be playing in a hostile environment, as a France win yesterday meant the U.S. would take on the defending Olympic Gold medalists as opposed to Canada.

Overall, Brazil comes into the match with an 8-3 record. They went 6-3 with 19 points in the first stage, good enough for the two-seed. That was followed by two wins in the Final Six – a 3-1 win over Canada and a five-set victory over Russia yesterday.

The United States squeaked into the Final Six after going 4-5 (14 points) in the first three weeks. They’re 5-6 overall after splitting matches between France and Serbia, but they’ve won five of their last eight after they started the tournament at 0-3.

Brazil was the runner-up of the 2016 FIVB World League. They made it through to the semifinals in part by defeating the United States (who made it as far as the Final Six) in five sets that year. The winner of this edition will meet the winner of France/Canada in the championship match, while the loser will play the losing team of France/Canada for third.

Watch the full live video below:

Editor’s note: Video not made available in the United States. If you are not in the United States, but an error in YouTube’s geolocation service is still blocking your access, you can use a program like TunnelBear to redirect to the proper country.