Taylor Sander

Taylor Sander
Personal information
Nickname	The Sandman
Nationality	American
Born	(1992-03-17) March 17, 1992 Huntington Beach, California, United States
Height	1.96 m (6 ft 5 in)
Weight	80 kg (180 lb)
Spike	345 cm (136 in)
Block	320 cm (130 in)
College(s)	Brigham Young University
Volleyball information
Position	Outside hitter
Current team	BAIC Group
Number	15
Career
Years Teams 2011–2014 2014–2016 2016– BYU Cougars BluVolley Verona BAIC Group
National team
2012– United States
Honours Olympic Games 2016 Rio de Janeiro Team World Cup 2015 Japan World League 2014 Florence 2015 Rio de Janeiro
Last updated: 21 August 2016

Taylor Sander (born March 17, 1992) is an American volleyball player, a member of United States men's national volleyball team and China club BAIC Group, gold medalist of the 2014 World League and 2015 World Cup and bronze medal in Rio 2016.

Personal life

Sander is the son of Steven and Kera Sander. He has an older sister, Britney Wardle, and a younger brother, Brenden, who also plays volleyball and is a current member of the BYU men's volleyball team. He graduated from Norco High School in Norco, California. At BYU Taylor majored in Global Studies.^[1][2] His parents are LDS, and he grew up LDS (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints—also known by the nickname Mormons).^[3] In July 2015, he married Rachel McQuivey, who represented the BYU Track & Field team as a long jumper and hurdler.^[4]

Career

College

He was recruited by USC, Long Beach State, UC Irvine, and BYU.^[5] At Brigham Young University Sander was a four-time AVCA All-American (three first-team citations, one second-team citation), the 2014 AVCA Player of the Year,^[6] 2013 and 2014 MPSF Player of the Year, 2013 and 2014 MPSF Tournament MVP, and four-time All-MPSF First Team. He holds the BYU all-time single-match record for service aces (nine) and career service aces (182). In the rally-scoring era, is No. 1 at BYU in career kills (1,743), career attempts (3,464), career service aces (182), season attempts (1,021 in 2014), season service aces (55 in 2014) and aces in a match (nine).^[7]

Regarding his decision to attend BYU he said in January 2012, "Growing up in Huntington Beach (Calif.) I've always been a big BYU fan. I grew up LDS and with my parents being LDS, that was the school we always cheered for and I've always wanted to go to BYU since I was a kid." ^[3]

Clubs

Sander signed a contract with Blu Volley Verona, an Italian Serie A1 team (top level), on June 10, 2014.^[8]

National Team 2014

Sander competed with Team USA in the 2014 FIVB World League. 4th ranked USA upset 1st ranked Brazil to win the tournament, and Sander was named "best outside spiker" and tournament MVP (which included a $30,000 prize award).^[9]

He was on the USA men's roster for the 2014 FIVB World Championships in Poland, August 30 – September 21, 2014.^[10]

He was selected as USA Volleyball's Men's Team Rookie of the Year.^[11]

National Team 2015

He was a member of the U.S. team that competed in the 2015 NORCECA Champions Cup in Detroit, Michigan, USA, May 21–23, 2015.^[12] Against Mexico May 21, 2015, Sander had 7 points on 6 spikes and 1 block. The U.S. defeated Mexico 25-15, 25-12, 25-17.^[13] The following day Team USA defeated Cuba in four sets, 20-25, 25-17, 25-10, 25-14, guaranteeing a top two finish and a spot in the 2015 FIVB World Cup to be held September 8–23, 2015 in Japan. Sander totaled 15 points on 10 spikes, 3 blocks, and 2 aces.^[14] In the championship match, May 23, 2015, the U.S. lost to Canada in five sets, 22-25, 25-19, 25-21, 21-25, 15-17. He again totaled 15 points, this time on 12 spikes and 3 aces.^[15]

He is on the U.S. Preliminary Roster for the 2015 FIVB World League.^[16] He played in the first World League match against Iran, May 30, 2015, in Los Angeles. He led all scorers with 19 points on 16 kills, two blocks and one ace.^[17] During the U.S. broadcast of this match on the NBC Sports Network May 31, 2015,^[18] Sander appeared to injure his ankle late in the 3rd set after colliding with a teammate on a block attempt and landing awkwardly. Thomas Jaeschke came in soon afterwards and finished out the set, but Sander returned to play all of the 4th set.

He did not play in the second match against Iran and was not on the roster for the next two matches against Russia.^[19][20][21] He also was not on the roster for the matches against Poland June 12 and 13, 2015, in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, due to an ankle injury, but did travel and practice with the team.^[22] Coach John Speraw mentioned during the press conference following the 2nd match against Poland that he was not sure when Sander would be ready to play again.^[23]

He traveled with the team to Iran^[24] and was back on the roster for the June 19 and 21 matches played/to be played in Tehran, Iran at the Azadi Stadium.^[25] He played the entire 3rd set of the 0-3 (19-25, 27-29, 20-25) loss to Iran June 19, 2015. He scored 5 points on 5 kills from 9 attempts. He also had 1 dig and 4 excellent receptions out of 5 attempts.^[26][27][28]

He has a stress fracture in his lower shin, not an ankle injury as first thought. This was reported by Blair Lambert June 19, 2015 on his volleyball blog From The Pins after speaking with a family member earlier in the week.^[29]

References

External links

• BYU Athlete Profile
• Taylor Sander on Twitter
  
• Taylor Sander on Facebook

United States – 2015 FIVB World Cup – Gold Medal
1 Anderson 2 Russell 3 Sander 4 Lee 6 Lotman 7 Shoji K. 9 Christenson 11 Holmes 12 Jablonsky 16 Troy 17 Holt 20 Smith 21 Shoji E. 22 Watten Coach: Speraw

United States squad – 2016 Summer Olympics – Bronze medal
1 Anderson 2 Russell 3 Sander 4 Lee 7 Shoji K. 8 Priddy 9 Troy 10 Jaeschke 11 Christenson 17 Holt 20 Smith 21 Shoji E. Coach: Speraw

Awards
Preceded by Ivan Zaytsev Ricardo Lucarelli	Best Outside Spiker of FIVB World League 2014 ex aequo Ricardo Lucarelli	Succeeded by Michał Kubiak Earvin N'Gapeth
Preceded by Nikolay Pavlov	Most Valuable Player of FIVB World League 2014	Succeeded by Earvin N'Gapeth