With a swing from Logan Tom's powerful right arm, the volleyball sailed over the net, past the wall of blockers and way beyond the end line, giving Brazil the victory.
    Her head bowed and her shoulders slumped, and she knew it was all over: the gold medal match, her third Olympics and these wonderful, awful two weeks for herself and her USA teammates, all hitting her in one moment as the Brazilians danced on the other side of the net Saturday.
    "You have no idea," Tom said later, asked to describe the emotions she experienced in Beijing.
    Actually, we all do. Anybody who watched her play with her fist-pumping style, or who was around the former Highland High star even for a minute or two as she paused in the interview area after matches, sensed what she was feeling. There were smiles, there were tears, there was that familiar, puzzled look as she tried to interpret the question.
    In the end, there was satisfaction.
    While talking at one point, she suddenly reached down and took the silver medal in her hands. She smiled. "It's pretty, isn't it?" she said.
    Just not golden enough to make this story perfect. This stuff never quite seems to write itself, but this sure was one time you wished it would. It was all coming together for Tom and her teammates. They were overcoming the disappointing performance of four years ago in Athens, dealing
Advertisement

with the shocking death in Beijing of a former teammate's father, celebrating the homecoming of their legendary Chinese coach and positioning themselves to complete a remarkable run in these Games.
    And then they ran into the Great Wall of Brazil. The Brazilians had not even lost a set in this tournament, with powerful hitting and blocking and equally adept digging and passing. They were supposed to win their first gold medal, although there was a moment after the Americans won the second set, and another when they were battling to the end of the fourth set, when it was reasonable to picture an upset.
    It did not happen. Tom had played brilliantly right until the final sequence when the Brazilians blocked her from the left side on consecutive points, then let her last hit go long and completed a 25-15, 18-25, 25-13, 25-21 victory. They proceeded to wear flags like capes as they ran around the gym and later dog-piled on the court after the medal ceremony.
    The Americans just hugged and cried - "tears of happiness," Tom said, convincingly.
    "It's just such an accomplishment for this team and the USA and these girls," she said. "There's no disappointment. If we would have come out today and not fought, I'd maybe have a different answer to that."
    It was a much better ending than 2004's, when Tom surprisingly was benched during a five-game loss to Brazil in the quarterfinals. That team underachieved; this team went beyond expectations during a difficult, draining two weeks that began with the stabbing death of the father of '04 player Elisabeth Bachman, the wife of U.S. men's volleyball coach Hugh McCutcheon.
    If it has became an emotional Games for McCutcheon's team, which itself won gold after it defeated Brazil in four sets Sunday (Saturday night MDT), it was all of that if not more so for the women, who knew Todd Bachman well. They steadied themselves after some initial inconsistency, won a series of tough matches and did something the program had not done since 1984 by earning the silver medal.
    "I can't explain to you where our team was several months ago, and where we are now - from inside out, how we've grown, how we've played for each other," libero Nicole Davis said. "As the tournament went on, the more I believed in us and where we could go and what we could do. That's a tribute to all the girls."
    * KURT KRAGTHORPE can be reached at kkragthorpe@sltrib.com. To write a letter about this or any sports topic, send an e-mail to sportseditor@sltrib.com.