USC’s national championship comes a tad early

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The Women of Troy won the 2009 Collegiate Beach Volleyball Championship this past weekend.

The NCAA will start awarding national championships in the sport during the 2010-11 academic year.

While the title won’t count toward USC’s NCAA totals, it’s still a big accomplishment for the program, which finished ahead of a number of fellow hard-court powerhouses. Nebraska was runner-up, followed by Texas, Hawaii, San Diego, North Carolina, Utah and UC Riverside.

When introduced at the Division-I level (it was already approved for Division II), the sport will officially be called sand volleyball, reportedly to appeal to landlocked schools. Semantics haven’t seemed like much of a problem before -- the tournament just won by USC was held in Riverside, which certainly isn’t ocean side. The 2009 AVP tour is visiting such tropical locals as Houston; Atlanta; Brooklyn; Las Vegas; Mason, Ohio; Muskegon, Mich.; and Glendale, Ariz.

The Trojans were led by the duos of Jessica Gysin/Alex Jupiter and Zoe Garrett/Geena Urango, who won their respective divisions. CBS Sports will air a one-hour program about the event on May 16 at 11 a.m. PDT.

-- Adam Rose