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A local Gainesville volleyball club, Gainesville Juniors Volleyball, took home two big titles this weekend from the 51st Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) Junior National Volleyball Championship.
The AAU tournament is the world’s largest volleyball tournament. It’s hosted every year at the Orange County Convention Center (OCCC), in Orlando, FL. Competition is almost three weeks long (June 13th-July 7th) and it brings in over 117,000 athletes and coaches. It’s projected to bring in $760.8 million in economic impact to the Orlando area.
This past week, the girls’ tournament held various divisions from 10U through 18U.
Gainesville in the Championships
On Sunday, June 16th, the Gainesville Juniors (GJ 14 Stephanie) defeated A5 Volleyball from Georgia in two sets. They took home the 14 Elite Championship title.
The 14 Elite division Champions team only lost two of 28 total sets (26-2) this past week. Even more impressively, the team went undefeated in matches at the tournament.
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Securing one National title is hard enough as it is, but Gainesville Juniors Volleyball was the program to beat. They secured a second National title this past week.
The Gainesville-based 13 Premier team (GJ 13 Nicole) defeated Northern Lights Volleyball, from Minnesota, in two sets of the 13 Premier finals. They also had a perfect match record of 12-0, without losing any sets.
The Rest of the Tournament
The Boys’s Junior National Volleyball Championships is also included in this tournament, with 1,263 teams competing. There are more than 4,600 girls’ teams from all 50 states; including Canada, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands, traveling to compete for the national title.
There are 67 total divisions. The teams who didn’t play this past week will compete across three other waves, until the tournament concludes on July 7th.
The AAU is one of the largest, non-profit, volunteer sports organizations in the country, and it is also partnering with the Side-Out Foundation to raise money for breast cancer research. Participants are encouraged to wear pink on select days, as a part of the AAU Dig Pink campaign.
