AVP ATL 2022
Chris Lomongo
1985-2022
Life isn’t always about volleyball, so this article is going to start out by explaining why I had Mongo written on my back all weekend long… Unfortunately, last weekend the Louisiana volleyball community, especially White Sands & Seegar Sandbar, lost a very special person, Chris Lomongo (aka Mongo). Mongo was one of the first people who really welcomed me into the beach community. During one of the summers in my early high school years I reffed at White Sands. I was very shy growing up, but Mongo had a way of always making me feel so comfortable. No matter who he was taking to or with, there was always one thing they walked away with, a smile. His love of life and people was contagious. Mongo was a big supporter of Taryn and I – TKN. He was always repping his gear proudly, and I knew this because he would constantly send me texts before tournaments wearing it, like the picture seen to the right. I wish this tournament would have gone a little better for us I know win or lose Mongo will be up there looking over us with a big smile!
After a quick 1-hour flight we had arrived in Hotlanta. It was lunch time so we quickly checked-in and headed out to figure out what the food situation looked like around us. The Atlanta venue is one of my favorites, if not my favorite. The hotel is a 5 min walk from the courts and to get to the courts you have walk through a greenspace area filled with a ton of restaurants, stores, and additional space for vendors to come in on the weekend and set up their stands. Also, the courts are set up on top of tennis courts so there are already stands set up. Additionally, the sand is brought in, so you do not have to worry about shells or anything cutting you in the sand. My body appreciates that.
Our initial plan was to get food and then head to the courts to get some touches in; however, everyone else had the same plan… there were no courts open. It was a sign to head to the World of Coke. I mean we were in Atlanta, had nothing else to do with it storming and I am a big Coke Zero fan so we had to go. I do not think our uber driver loved our decision because in a snarky way he said, “you all must not be from here because no one from Atlanta ever goes to the World of Coke.” We learned some pretty interesting things about Coke, watched some videos that needed some updating, and got to taste Coke products from all over the world.
The second episode of AVP Uncovered came out Thursday so we headed to our hotel room to watch. If you have not watched the first episode you are missing out and if you didn’t catch the second one, you are missing out even more. Watch it right now (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0LbqrsssWs )… so good! It was very fun for us to relive those moments right before competing in the same tournament. Still think it is so crazy how that was the tournament that they chose us to be filmed. Also, crazy that it was only 1 year ago. Still hard to wrap my head around everything we have accomplished this past year.
Before heading to bed that night, I may have played a little prank on Taryn. You can ask Taryn about it, and I’ll leave it at that (I think I’m funny)
Our first match was an afternoon game which meant we could have a relaxing morning or so we thought. We enjoyed our hotel breakfast and made our way back to our room. Taryn put the key up to the door, but the black box gave us a red light. She tried again but the same result happened. Taryn headed to the elevator while I started to pace the hallway because I had to use the restroom. I got excited when I heard Taryn’s flip flops hitting the floor heading in my direction knowing she probably had a new key in hand. My excitement quickly faded when the new key did not solve the problem. My pacing began again, and Taryn headed to the elevator. Taryn did not come back up for at least 10 minutes… those 10 minutes felt like 45 minutes to me (I HAD to use the restroom). I again heard her flip flops giving me excitement but was saddened when her face showed the opposite. She said an engineer had to come up. I thought she was joking but when I realized she was not I became the one headed to the elevator and I headed straight to the lobby restroom. We sat in the hallway for 2 hours. (I hope everyone saw my Instagram story) We watched the service guy try to use two hangers to try and break into the room. Still not sure the thought process behind it but it was definitely keeping us entertained. After Jill Trahan sternly told the front desk we had to play a game in an hour, we finally got into our room because the service guy got permission from the GM to drill a giant hole into the door (thanks Mrs. Jill). We had 10 minutes to get dressed and head to the courts for our 1 o’clock game.
Our bracket looked identical to Ft. Lauderdale with the first matchup being against fellow Tiger Katie Dickens & her teammate Jen Keddy. It’s always a fun battle when playing against them. We were able to get the W and then head back to the hotel to figure out our room situation. We had a couple hours until our next game, so we got settled into our new room, put on the AVP YouTube channel to watch some games and pulled out the cards to continue our King’s corner battle (I am getting destroyed). After a couple of hours in the room, it was time to walk to Publix to get a ‘pub-sub’. While eating our sandwich in the room we heard some thunder and then shortly after the rain came. The AVP was forced to go into a rain delay. We patiently waited for updates from the AVP while checking the radar and watching the weather from the hotel room. We received an email from the AVP around 6pm stating that they were pushing all the winner’s bracket round 2 games to the next morning, so our matchup with the Brazilians had to be put off for a day. After the rain subsided, we headed to the players tent to check out dinner, but we arrived too late. Everything was gone except for the chicken, so we made a plate and then met the TKN crew at a restaurant to add in some carbs and vegetables to our dinner.
That evening around 9:30, while we were chilling in the room, the fire alarm starts going off. We both looked at each other to make sure we heard the same thing. I immediately put my shoes on, grabbed the key, and then poked my head out the door to see if other people were heading to the exits. Taryn was a little more laid back than me, but I said bye and joined the others to the exit (Taryn eventually reluctantly followed). There was no fire. The alarm stopped sounding after about 15 minutes of going off and everyone headed back to their rooms.
Saturday morning went a little better than Friday. We successfully returned to our hotel room after breakfast and then made our way to the courts for a familiar matchup, the Brazilians. The team we always go to three with – not this time thankfully! We were able to pull it off in 2. Just like Friday, we enjoyed a pub sub, watched more volleyball, and played more cards. We are both very into playing solitaire with the cards, but I, unfortunately, went winless on the weekend and Taryn had to keep rubbing it in my face that she won (maybe she didn’t rub it in my face but I did not win and sometimes I am a sore loser). Because of the Friday rain delay, we had a very long break in between our matches. Our game against Sponcil/Cannon was slated for 6pm. All the games prior to ours were going 3 so we knew gametime would be much later. At around 5-4 in the first set of our game, a nice streak of lighting hit the sky right behind the serving Sarah Sponcil. Taryn and I looked at each other to which I said, “did you see that?” right before Sponcil delivered the serve. Taryn saw it as well and 2 points later we were instructed to head to the athlete’s tent, another rain delay. We sat in the tent for about 3 hours waiting for a decision to be made. At around 9:50pm all the athletes started to grab trash bags to put over themselves to make the 5 min walk to the hotel in the torrential downpour that was happening.
We got back to the hotel around 10:15pm and had to shower and get to sleep because we were playing at 8am the next morning in a modified format. They changed the format to 1 game to 28 because there was impending weather supposed to take place around 2pm on Sunday and there were still a lot of games to be played. We came out flat and Sponcil/Cannon did not. We got our butt’s kicked.
We found ourselves again in the 5th place contenders bracket match against Urango/Scoles and just like in Ft. Lauderdale, we made too many errors which led to a loss and the end of the tournament for us. Another 5th place finish. Another tournament ended in anger and frustration. Another tournament left us wanting more and knowing we are capable of more. Another tournament where we must learn. I cannot speak for Taryn, but I am getting pretty sick of learning and think she would agree with me.
In the long run we will be better for this. Losing forces us to have those tough conversations that we would not have if we were winning. It’s never fun but it’s needed, so we will keep learning and growing. We hope you keep following along and supporting us. We could not do what we do without the support of all of you. TKN Nation was in full force this weekend and we certainly felt the love. Big thanks to those who came and to those who watched. We will keep striving to make you all proud! Now, it’s time to move on and focus on the next one… THE Manhattan Beach Open.
By: Kristen Nuss
