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Has Beach Volleyball Finally Stopped Being a Poor Relation of Track and Swimming at the Olympics?
The amusing way a player said you’d know if it had “arrived”
Alix Klineman and April Ross may find themselves besieged by fans when they return to Southern California after striking gold in beach volleyball in Tokyo. But until recently, stars of their sport could step off planes unrecognized.
Volleyball became an Olympic event in 1964 and started to come into its own when Karch Kiraly drove the American team to gold medals in 1984 and 1988. Even then, it had a lower profile than marquee sports like swimming and track and field.
In The Story of the Olympics, Dave Anderson recalled that the 1984 U.S. volleyball team member Paul Sunderland had an answer for people who asked when he’d know the sport had left its mark on the world’s stage:
“It won’t have arrived until the people who see us in an airport stop asking us what basketball team we play for.”
