Kent Steffes

Last updated

Kent Steffes
Personal information
NationalityAmerican
BornJune 23, 1968 (1968-06-23) (age 55)
Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S.
Height6 ft 4 in (193 cm)
College / UniversityStanford University, UCLA
Medal record
Men's beach volleyball
Representing the Flag of the United States.svg  United States
Olympic Games
Gold medal icon (G initial).svg 1996 Atlanta Beach
World Championships
Gold medal icon (G initial).svg 1993 Rio de Janeiro Beach
Bronze medal icon (B initial).svg 1997 Los Angeles Beach

Kent Steffes (born June 23, 1968, in Ann Arbor, Michigan) is an American former professional beach volleyball player. [1]

Contents

Steffes received his AAA beach rating while still attending Palisades High School. [1] He was named the 1986 National High School Player of the Year. [2] He enrolled at Stanford University and played for one season before transferring to UCLA, where he graduated with a degree in economics. [3] While a Bruin he joined the AVP Tour full-time in 1988. [1]

Steffes earned the AVP No. 1 ranking at age 22, the youngest player to do so in the history of the sport. [1] Steffes and his partner Karch Kiraly won the inaugural beach volleyball gold medal at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. [4] That same year, he was selected as the MVP of the AVP. [1]

In his career, Steffes teamed with numerous partners to win 110 events, [5] and has the highest winning percentage in the history of the sport (48.6%). [6] By the time Steffes retired in 1999, he had won over $2,500,000 in prizes. [1]

In 2004, Steffes was inducted into the California Beach Volleyball Hall of Fame. [1] In 2020, Steffes was inducted into the USA Volleyball Hall of Fame as an All-Time Great Male Beach Player. [7] [5]

Personal life

Steffes became a member of the AVP Board of Directors, and also served as secretary. In 2000, he enrolled in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford, where he graduated in 2002. He has two children and lives in Los Angeles, where he writes and works in the financial industry. [4]

Book

Steffes is the co-author of the book Kings of Summer: The Rise of Beach Volleyball. [8] Together with his co-author Travis Mewhirter, it chronicles the rise of beach volleyball from a 1970s rebel culture to inclusion in the 1996 Summer Olympics, and offers an in-depth look at the dramatic quarterfinal match between Steffes and his partner Karch Kiraly against Sinjin Smith and Carl Henkel. [8] [9]

Awards and honors

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Misty May-Treanor</span> American beach volleyball player (born 1977)

Misty Elizabeth May-Treanor is a retired American professional beach volleyball player. She is a three-time Olympic gold medalist, and as of August 2012, was the most successful female beach volleyball player having won 112 tournaments in domestic and international competition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Karch Kiraly</span> American volleyball player and coach

Charles Frederick "Karch" Kiraly is an American volleyball player, coach, and broadcast announcer. He was a central part of the U.S National Team that won gold medals at the 1984 and 1988 Olympic Games. He went on to win the gold medal again at the 1996 Olympic Games, the first Olympic competition to feature beach volleyball. He is the only player to have won Olympic medals of any color in both the indoor and beach volleyball categories. He played college volleyball for the UCLA Bruins, where his teams won three national championships under head coach Al Scates.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elaine Youngs</span> American beach volleyball player

Elaine Youngs is an American former professional volleyball player who competed both indoors and on the beach.

Christopher St. John "Sinjin" Smith is an American former professional beach volleyball player. He was the first player to win 100 career tournaments, and won numerous Manhattan Open titles with Karch Kiraly and Randy Stoklos as partners.

Randy Stoklos is a retired American beach volleyball player. He is the first player to earn $1 million playing competitive beach volleyball. He is a five-time winner of the prestigious Manhattan Open.

Eric Fonoimoana is an American former beach volleyball player of Samoan descent who paired with Dain Blanton to win the gold medal in beach volleyball at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. He played professionally for more than 16 years and has entered over 200 tournaments. Fonoimoana won at least one tournament for seven straight years between 1998 and 2004. He is a former AVP Most Valuable Player and is in the top 10 in terms of all-time tournaments played. He has earned over 1 million dollars playing beach volleyball.

Jeff Wayne Nygaard is an American former volleyball player. He was a member of the United States national indoor team in the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta and the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia. He was a middle blocker. He also played beach volleyball at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece with partner Dain Blanton.

Steve Dennis Timmons is an American former volleyball player who represented the United States at three consecutive Summer Olympics, winning a gold medal in 1984 and 1988, and a bronze medal in 1992. He was named the MVP of the 1984 Olympics by the International Volleyball Federation. He was a pioneer of back row hitting.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Todd Rogers</span> American beach volleyball player

Todd Jonathan Rogers is an American professional beach volleyball player who is an Olympic and FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship gold medalist. He and his former partner, Phil Dalhausser, were the 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011 AVP Tour champions.

José Geraldo Loiola is a former beach volleyball player from Brazil. He won the gold medal at the 1999 Beach Volleyball World Championships in Marseille, France, partnering with Emanuel Rego.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Hyden</span> American volleyball player

John Hyden is an American volleyball and beach volleyball player. Raised in San Diego, California, where he attended Mt. Carmel High School, Hyden was a member of the United States men's national volleyball team that finished in ninth place at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. At the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, he finished in 11th place with the national team.

Michael Allen Lambert is an American former volleyball player who is a two-time Olympian with the United States national volleyball team. His team finished ninth place at the 1996 Summer Olympics and eleventh at the 2000 Summer Olympics.

Ricci Judson Luyties is a former American volleyball player. As a member of the United States national volleyball team, he won a gold medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea. Luyties later became a successful professional beach volleyball player and won seven titles. He is now the head women's volleyball coach at the University of California, San Diego.

Troy Richard Tanner is a former volleyball player and Olympic gold medalist. He was a member of the United States men's national volleyball team that won the gold medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea.

Rita Louise Crockett is an American former competitive volleyball player. Crockett was a silver medalist at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

Gregory Scott Lee was an American professional basketball and volleyball player. He played college basketball for the UCLA Bruins, winning back-to-back national championships as their starting point guard in 1972 and 1973. He had short stints in the original American Basketball Association (ABA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA) before playing four seasons in West Germany. As a volleyball player, Lee teamed with Jim Menges to set a record with 13 consecutive professional beach volleyball titles. He was inducted into the California Beach Volleyball Association's (CBVA) hall of fame.

Eugene Bleecher Selznick was an American Hall of Fame former volleyball player, and volleyball coach. He played on world championship and Pan American Games championship teams. He was also inducted into the Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame and the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.

George Roumain is an American former volleyball player. Roumain played volleyball for Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, and was considered the nation's top recruit. He played college volleyball for Pepperdine University, where he was a three-time All-American and was named National Player of the Year in 1998 and 1999.

James Menges is an American former volleyball player, coach, and Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) tournament director. He played college volleyball for the UCLA Bruins under head coach Al Scates. His college teams won national championships in 1972 and 1974. He is best known for beach volleyball, where he was the game's most dominant player from the mid 1970s through the early 1980s.

Adam Johnson is an American former professional beach volleyball player. In total, he won 44 beach volleyball tournaments, and won about $1,700,000 in prizes in his career. 16 of his tournament wins were with volleyball legend Karch Kiraly as his partner.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "Kent Steffes". Beach Volleyball Database . Archived from the original on May 18, 2023. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  2. ↑ Lidz, Franz (June 22, 1992). "Banker of the Beach". Sports Illustrated . New York City. Archived from the original on January 27, 2022. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  3. ↑ Garcia, Irene (August 26, 1994). "A Winning Prototype : Beach Volleyball Star Kent Steffes Dominates Along With Kiraly, and His Harder, Smarter Approach Is Catching On". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved July 24, 2023.(subscription required)
  4. 1 2 "Kent Steffes". Olympedia. Archived from the original on September 17, 2021. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  5. 1 2 3 4 "Kent Steffes". USAVolleyball. Archived from the original on June 9, 2023. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  6. ↑ Smith, Kim; Strauss, Doug (May 17, 2022). "Phil Dalhausser's AVP Dominance Over the Years". Association of Volleyball Professionals . Archived from the original on December 4, 2022. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  7. ↑ Kaufmann, Bill (February 3, 2020). "Scott, McPeak Headline USAV Hall of Fame Class". North Country Region Volleyball. Archived from the original on July 24, 2023. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  8. 1 2 "Kings of Summer: Rise of Beach Volleyball". Amazon.com . Archived from the original on January 12, 2023. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  9. ↑ "Going for the Kill Karch Kiraly and Kent Steffes of the U.S. Beat Down One of Their Primary Obstacles to a Gold". Sports Illustrated. New York City. July 27, 1996. Archived from the original on May 26, 2022. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.