Some of the world’s best beach volleyball athletes are coming to Long Beach and this weekend’s AVP League stop is about much more than another event on the professional tour.
For two days, Alamitos Beach will become the center of the beach volleyball world as the AVP returns to downtown Long Beach for League Week 5 on Saturday and Sunday. The event will be staged on the same stretch of sand that will host beach volleyball during the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, giving athletes and fans an early glimpse of one of the games’ signature venues.
For Long Beach State legend and former Olympian Paul Lotman, the stop feels like a homecoming.
“When the schedule came out, I was really hoping for this one,” Lotman said. “I wanted Long Beach so I could come home and play at a venue that’s also going to be the Olympic venue. It’s awesome. I’m going to have a lot of friends and family there supporting me.”
The timing couldn’t be more fitting.
Just months after Long Beach State retired Lotman’s No. 2 jersey inside LBS Financial Credit Union Pyramid, the 2012 U.S. Olympian returns to Long Beach looking to build momentum alongside partner Miles Partain, one of the country’s young beach volleyball stars and the 2024 AVP MVP. The pair won an AVP title together in 2022 before reuniting this season for the Dallas Dream.
Lotman believes Long Beach was the obvious choice to host Olympic beach volleyball.
“When the LA Olympics announced that Long Beach would host beach volleyball, I thought it was a great choice,” he said. “Just being able to compete there, feel the atmosphere and have the support of the community, friends and family is going to be amazing.”
The weekend will feature no shortage of star power.
Partain is one part of a field loaded with Olympians, AVP champions and some of the biggest names in the sport. Chase Budinger, former NBA player and 2024 Olympian, is scheduled to compete for the San Diego Smash alongside fellow Paris Olympian Miles Evans. The women’s side features reigning AVP MVP Geena Urango, Olympians Taryn Brasher and Kristen Nuss Cruz, two-time Olympian Sara Hughes, world champion Kelly Cheng and six-time AVP champion Betsi Flint among many others.
Cheng and her partner Megan Kraft are coming off a silver medal at last weekend’s Gstaad Elite beach volleyball tournament in Switzerland.
There is also a distinctly Long Beach connection in the men’s bracket.
Lotman’s opening match is expected to pit the Dallas Dream against fellow Long Beach State standout Taylor Crabb and partner Andy Benesh. Crabb, one of the most decorated defensive players in AVP history, has long been one of the city’s premier volleyball ambassadors after starring for the Beach before launching his professional career.
“I love competing against Taylor,” Lotman said. “He was a great player during his time at Long Beach and has had an accomplished career on the beach. I’m really looking forward to that matchup.”
Beyond the competition, this weekend offers a preview of what’s to come in 2028.
The temporary stadium that will eventually rise on Alamitos Beach for the Olympics is still a couple of years away, but the backdrop will be familiar: the Long Beach skyline, the Queen Mary and the Pacific Ocean framing one of the sport’s most iconic settings.
