United States did not give any break to Mexico

Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, July 10, 2012 - United States remained undefeated in the Men's Pan American Cup VII by defeating Mexico in straight sets (25-8, 25-16, 25-18) in just 69 minutes on Tuesday.

The winners dominated in attacks (42-23), blocks (11-7) and services (15-10). As in the opening on Monday, all American players had the opportunity to get playing time.

Troy Murphy (14 points) was the only player to reach double figures, but Taylor Sander (9), and Matthew Garrett Muagututia Rawson (both with 8) and Daniel McDonnell (7) also contributed to the triumph. For Mexico the best scorer was Leonardo Manzo with only seven tallies.

A disappointed Jorge Azair, the losing coach, admitted the mediocre performance of his players.

"They missed a lot, although we knew it would be difficult to defeat the United States and Brazil," he said. “So we must take advantage tomorrow against Venezuela to get a win in the pool. It should be a very even game, and what happened we can´t fix it.”

Shawn Patchell, the U.S. coach said: "At first we were concerned with the service of Mexico that we consider very good and focused on that aspect. Now I am proud of my boys because they received very well. We look forward to tomorrow's game against Brazil, but I trust my team.”

Kawika Shoji, Captain of the winners, whose parents are from Hawaii and Japan and plays for a club in Berlin, said: “I really respect a lot the team of Mexico, so we focused and did very well to get the victory and we all played during the match.”

Not so happy was Pedro Rangel, the captain of Mexico. "We knew it would be a difficult confrontation though we know the game of our opponents. We started well in all sets but could not close.  We must recognize that they increased their pace of play."