Post by Phaedrus on Aug 5, 2008 21:04:17 GMT -5
Here are a couple of articles on Flo Hyman from George Vecsey of the New York Times. He was quite taken with her after meeting her for the first time in LA. After her death he always wrote an article introducing the winner of the Flo Hyman Award. Maybe this will fill in the blanks as to why old folks like me will always bring her up when we talk about the hey day back in 1984. Note that Vecsey mentions how close the team was, they couldn't help it, they were all starving together and they have played together for years.
By the way, I had written Vecsey for a copy of these articles and he was gracious enough to send them to me.
SPORTS OF THE TIMES; VOLLEYBALL's TEAM AMERICA
Published: August 5, 1984
LONG BEACH, Calif.
They are a real team, the most cohesive unit America will field in these Summer Games. They have been together as long as the current Boston Celtics or New York Islanders, and they are just as close on the court.
They are no all-star team thrown together for the Olympics, no beachgirl cast recruited from a soft-drink commercial. They are a mixture of black and white and Oriental heritage, role players who became a team in nearly 10 years of throwing their bodies on the hard floors of their Orange County retreat, upon command from their coach, Arie Selinger.
They are the women's volleyball team, and they are so close they can fine-tune their game in the middle of a match, so close they can come from behind three times in one night against China, the world champions of women's volleyball, as they did in a psychologically crucial match Friday, 15-13, 7-15, 16-14 and 15-12.
They are not only cohesive, they are charismatic, from their driven Polish-Israeli-American coach to players like Flo Hyman with her swooping spikes and Debbie Green with her winning smile and her brilliant sets, or passes, and Rita Crockett, all 5 foot 8 of her, with her 40-inch vertical leap, and, of course, the role players, the quiet ones like Julie Vollertsen who come off the bench for the big plays.
Now this team is ready to seek its place among American fans as the ice hockey team of the 1984 Summer Games. Tonight, the United States plays Peru in the semifinals, while ''we let the two Oriental teams take care of each other,'' as Selinger labelled tonight's Japan-China semifinal.
The United States and China both had 2-0 records Friday and had qualified for the semifinals, but the winner would face Peru - merely the fourth or fifth best team in the world, considering the missing Soviet Union team - and Friday's loser would have to play Japan tonight.
In each of four games Friday, the United States fell behind China. In the first game, the score was 10- 7 when Peter Ueberroth, the president of the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee, entered unobtrusively on his rounds of as many sites as he can visit.
On Thursday, Ueberroth had wandered into a water-polo game with the United States behind, 3-2. He is scrupulous, as a good host, to never show a sign of rooting, yet by coincidence the water polo team rallied to win, 10-4, in his presence.
The women's volleyball team is far too resourceful to need a visit from Mr. No Frills, but it is nice to know he is available as a good-luck object, kind of like a rubber ducky that superstitious swimmers keep in the pool with them.
From that deficit in the first game, the United States rallied for a 15-13 victory, with Miss Hyman, at 6 foot 5, slashing overhand spinning serves that barely go over the net and explode downward like a Fernando Valenzuela screwball.
''Most women hit a looping serve but I wasn't doing too well with my serve, so Arie told me I should go back to my old spin serve,'' said the selfstyled Old Lady. ''I hit it with the side of my hand, and sometimes it works.''
The Americans sleep-walked through the second game, 7-15, and were down, 11-9, despite 6 points while Miss Hyman was serving, in the third game. Still, Miss Hyman didn't think she was playing well - she is 30 years old, ancient for her sport - and neither did her coach.
Several players have talked in the past about Selinger's hard- driven ways, but in this Olympic week, Flo Hyman has volunteered a ringing defense of him as being far short of an ogre. After nearly a decade, when he says she is playing weakly, she has been around too long to think he may be wrong.
''I thought Flo was 60 percent in the first game, 50 percent in the second game and 15 percent in the third game,'' Selinger said later.
Debbie Green agreed. She is another gem on this only-in-America team, of Korean and Caucasian ancestry, with a smile that never leaves her mouth or eyes. She is small and plays the setter position, pushing soft passes into the air for the spikers.
''I may screw up, but I'll pull it together,'' Miss Hyman said later. ''My setter had trust in me, so I had trust in me.''
Selinger also suggested that the setter was not getting the ball high enough for the spiker. In a timeout in the third period, setter and spiker looked at each other with the experience of nearly a decade together, and they adjusted.
''It isn't hard to adjust,'' Debbie Green said, looking up toward Flo Hyman. ''Not with her.''
With the ball at the right height, Miss Hyman began spiking again and Miss Vollertsen came off the bench to serve for 3 straight points. The third game ended when the "Official" ruled that a Crockett spike hit the floor before touching a Chinese player's hand.
''I don't think the ball touched the floor,'' said Yuan Weimin, the coach, via a translator. ''But since the referee did the judgment, I have no right to say anything. It's possible the referee did the wrong judgment, but the main point is that we didn't do well.''
China went ahead again, 11-7, in the fourth game, but Miss Green was far above strategy by now, well into intuition. Her back to the net, she floated sets to heights where Miss Hyman, Miss Crockett, Miss Vollertsen and Paula Weishoff could hammer them home.
And when China's best player, Lang Ping, floated a long return of Rose Magers's serve, this summer's Team America had won a devastating victory, leaving Chinese reporters to ask their coach why he couldn't do anything about it, and he responded that his players were not ''emotionally stable.''
The Americans tried to keep their stability. Miss Hyman has said that participating in the Summer Games in her home town ''is a nice way to go out,'' and that if a gold medal comes along, ''so much the better.''
But there is so much more to it than that. This is an aging team that stayed together after the 1980 boycott. It lacks the tradition of Japan and the youth of China. It is a dynasty without a championship, and now it is two unpredictable matches away.
Copyright New York Times 1984.
By the way, I had written Vecsey for a copy of these articles and he was gracious enough to send them to me.
SPORTS OF THE TIMES; VOLLEYBALL's TEAM AMERICA
Published: August 5, 1984
LONG BEACH, Calif.
They are a real team, the most cohesive unit America will field in these Summer Games. They have been together as long as the current Boston Celtics or New York Islanders, and they are just as close on the court.
They are no all-star team thrown together for the Olympics, no beachgirl cast recruited from a soft-drink commercial. They are a mixture of black and white and Oriental heritage, role players who became a team in nearly 10 years of throwing their bodies on the hard floors of their Orange County retreat, upon command from their coach, Arie Selinger.
They are the women's volleyball team, and they are so close they can fine-tune their game in the middle of a match, so close they can come from behind three times in one night against China, the world champions of women's volleyball, as they did in a psychologically crucial match Friday, 15-13, 7-15, 16-14 and 15-12.
They are not only cohesive, they are charismatic, from their driven Polish-Israeli-American coach to players like Flo Hyman with her swooping spikes and Debbie Green with her winning smile and her brilliant sets, or passes, and Rita Crockett, all 5 foot 8 of her, with her 40-inch vertical leap, and, of course, the role players, the quiet ones like Julie Vollertsen who come off the bench for the big plays.
Now this team is ready to seek its place among American fans as the ice hockey team of the 1984 Summer Games. Tonight, the United States plays Peru in the semifinals, while ''we let the two Oriental teams take care of each other,'' as Selinger labelled tonight's Japan-China semifinal.
The United States and China both had 2-0 records Friday and had qualified for the semifinals, but the winner would face Peru - merely the fourth or fifth best team in the world, considering the missing Soviet Union team - and Friday's loser would have to play Japan tonight.
In each of four games Friday, the United States fell behind China. In the first game, the score was 10- 7 when Peter Ueberroth, the president of the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee, entered unobtrusively on his rounds of as many sites as he can visit.
On Thursday, Ueberroth had wandered into a water-polo game with the United States behind, 3-2. He is scrupulous, as a good host, to never show a sign of rooting, yet by coincidence the water polo team rallied to win, 10-4, in his presence.
The women's volleyball team is far too resourceful to need a visit from Mr. No Frills, but it is nice to know he is available as a good-luck object, kind of like a rubber ducky that superstitious swimmers keep in the pool with them.
From that deficit in the first game, the United States rallied for a 15-13 victory, with Miss Hyman, at 6 foot 5, slashing overhand spinning serves that barely go over the net and explode downward like a Fernando Valenzuela screwball.
''Most women hit a looping serve but I wasn't doing too well with my serve, so Arie told me I should go back to my old spin serve,'' said the selfstyled Old Lady. ''I hit it with the side of my hand, and sometimes it works.''
The Americans sleep-walked through the second game, 7-15, and were down, 11-9, despite 6 points while Miss Hyman was serving, in the third game. Still, Miss Hyman didn't think she was playing well - she is 30 years old, ancient for her sport - and neither did her coach.
Several players have talked in the past about Selinger's hard- driven ways, but in this Olympic week, Flo Hyman has volunteered a ringing defense of him as being far short of an ogre. After nearly a decade, when he says she is playing weakly, she has been around too long to think he may be wrong.
''I thought Flo was 60 percent in the first game, 50 percent in the second game and 15 percent in the third game,'' Selinger said later.
Debbie Green agreed. She is another gem on this only-in-America team, of Korean and Caucasian ancestry, with a smile that never leaves her mouth or eyes. She is small and plays the setter position, pushing soft passes into the air for the spikers.
''I may screw up, but I'll pull it together,'' Miss Hyman said later. ''My setter had trust in me, so I had trust in me.''
Selinger also suggested that the setter was not getting the ball high enough for the spiker. In a timeout in the third period, setter and spiker looked at each other with the experience of nearly a decade together, and they adjusted.
''It isn't hard to adjust,'' Debbie Green said, looking up toward Flo Hyman. ''Not with her.''
With the ball at the right height, Miss Hyman began spiking again and Miss Vollertsen came off the bench to serve for 3 straight points. The third game ended when the "Official" ruled that a Crockett spike hit the floor before touching a Chinese player's hand.
''I don't think the ball touched the floor,'' said Yuan Weimin, the coach, via a translator. ''But since the referee did the judgment, I have no right to say anything. It's possible the referee did the wrong judgment, but the main point is that we didn't do well.''
China went ahead again, 11-7, in the fourth game, but Miss Green was far above strategy by now, well into intuition. Her back to the net, she floated sets to heights where Miss Hyman, Miss Crockett, Miss Vollertsen and Paula Weishoff could hammer them home.
And when China's best player, Lang Ping, floated a long return of Rose Magers's serve, this summer's Team America had won a devastating victory, leaving Chinese reporters to ask their coach why he couldn't do anything about it, and he responded that his players were not ''emotionally stable.''
The Americans tried to keep their stability. Miss Hyman has said that participating in the Summer Games in her home town ''is a nice way to go out,'' and that if a gold medal comes along, ''so much the better.''
But there is so much more to it than that. This is an aging team that stayed together after the 1980 boycott. It lacks the tradition of Japan and the youth of China. It is a dynasty without a championship, and now it is two unpredictable matches away.
Copyright New York Times 1984.