U.S. men win beach volleyball gold medal

BEIJING -- On a roll. In a zone. At another level.Whichever phrase you preferred, Phil Dalhausser provided the perfect example at the time it mattered most.A force of nature at the start of the third set, Dalhausser's overwhelming blocking proved decisive as he and teammate Todd Rogers defeated Marcio Araujo and Fabio Magalhaes of Brazil 23-21, 17-21, 15-4 to win the men's beach volleyball gold medal Friday at the Beijing Olympics."I'm on cloud nine," said Dalhausser, the 28-year-old Florida native. "Best feeling I've ever had in my life. It's unbelievable."Rogers, his 34-year-old teammate, was just as effusive."The gold medal feels" -- he paused for a moment -- "absolutely fantastic."Which is the way Dalhausser and Rogers played in the third set.The U.S. duo raced to a 9-1 lead as Dalhausser logged a kill and five blocks, and had a five-point service run in a match when putting together more than two points at a time was extremely difficult."I got in a zone," Dalhausser said. "You know how athletes say you get in a zone, you see everything in slo-mo? That was it right there."Perfect timing for it, too."Rogers agreed."It's just a matter of time before he does it," he said. " ... You get in that zone, and that's what great blockers do. I've seen Phil do it, I've seen Ricardo (Santos, of Brazil's bronze-medal team) do it, I've seen Fabio do it."All the best blockers, they get on that roll, and when they do, good luck to you."What goes into that kind of a roll, Rogers said, is "impossible to explain to a layman."He just made some really, really good moves. ... He's got that intuitive feeling, and when he's on, he's on."Overall, the 6-foot-9 Dalhausser finished with nine blocks -- Magalhaes, his counterpoint for Brazil, had four -, and his blocking also played a roll in the Brazilians' 16 errors (to the U.S. team's 10), Araujo and Magalhaes frequently hit long or wide to get around his block. More than just a force at the net, he also had the team's only ace, and had as many digs (four) as Rogers, the FIBA World Tour's best defensive player the last two years.Araujo and Magalhaes jumped to an 8-3 lead in the first game, but the U.S. pair gradually came back."We got a little slow start," said Dalhausser, "but we pulled it together and got back into it, and came back to 11-10. .... And then it was just a side-out battle."Rogers said Dalhausser "got on a mini-roll, and that's what brought us back, and then my siding out steadied out."In the second, they led 13-10, but Magalhaes put together back-to-back service aces to draw his team even, then had a couple of key blocks of his own to help the Brazilians even the match.Between the second and third, Rogers and Dalhausser kept the conversation simple and upbeat."We just said one more set in the gold medal match," said Dalhausser. "This is what we're here for and this is what we've trained for. Let's just have fun."Rogers said he'd told Dalhausser, " This is the culmination of a dream, and let's see what happens.'"We didn't talk about winning the gold or winning the silver. We just said, hey, let's have fun. And I had a blast."And Dalhausser? He had a block party -- including one last block for match point."The best feeling ever," he said, of the moment when he realized he'd won the gold. "That's the best way to describe it."(Contact David Lassen of the Ventura County Star in California at dlassen(at)venturacountystar.com.)