Shoji ‘brothers’ bonded by bronze

Although technically not related, Micah Christenson has spent enough time with Kawika and Erik Shoji to blend in with one of volleyball’s most prominent families.

“It’s super funny because a lot of fans and a lot of people think that I’m a Shoji also,” Christenson said with a laugh.

“I don’t even deny it anymore. I just say ‘yes’ if they ask if I’m a Shoji and I tell them I’m an honorary third brother.”

Already tightly knit through their shared upbringing on the court, the trio landed in Honolulu last Tuesday further bonded by Olympic bronze.

The selections of Christenson and the Shoji brothers to the U.S. men’s volleyball team gave Hawaii claim to a quarter of the roster at the Rio Games and they returned home with a hard-earned bronze medal to commemorate their first Olympic experience.

“I don’t think it’s really hit us yet, what we did and how we won that bronze medal,” Kawika Shoji said. “But the overall experience was just really special, from the very beginning at the opening ceremony to the very end when we won 15-13 in the fifth set to win a bronze medal.”

With the Shoji brothers’ parents — University of Hawaii women’s volleyball coach Dave Shoji and his wife Mary — part of the U.S. cheering section at Maracanazinho Arena, their stay in Brazil got off to a stumbling start with losses to Canada and Italy in their first two matches of the Olympic tournament.

Needing a win over host Brazil just to keep its medal hopes alive, the U.S. knocked off the eventual gold medalist in four sets to start a run of four straight victories to advance to the semifinals.

“It was a crazy experience,” said Christenson, who started at setter. “You prepare so long for this tournament and the first two games you kind of lay an egg and … some of those thoughts creep in and you’re thinking, ‘oh man did we just blow our shot at coming out of our pool?’

“But we had to saddle up and realize this is still under our control and we’re good enough to beat any team in the world on any day. I think it was such an amazing response by our team to fight our way out of that hole.”

Aspirations of gold evaporated when Italy rallied from 2-1 down, and trailing 22-19 in the fourth set, to win in five in the semifinals. It appeared the Team USA might be kept off the podium after dropping the first two sets to Russia in the bronze medal match.

But in what all three Hawaii players characterized as a microcosm of the tournament, the team rallied to win the next three sets to earn a place in the medal ceremony.

“It was honestly devastating to lose that semifinal match,” said Erik Shoji, the U.S. libero. “It was tough. It was 24 hours of just emotions pouring out and trying to recover and trying to regroup.

“But the way this team came back, as we did after those first two matches, we knew we could do that after the semifinal match. It took a while in that Russia game, but we kept fighting and really showed our character as a team and came back.”

While an appearance in the Olympics is a feat unto itself, sharing the moment with longtime friends amplified the significance of walking into Maracana Stadium for the opening ceremony for the products of Kamehameha (Christenson), ‘Iolani (Kawika Shoji) and Punahou (Erik Shoji).

“To be able to just experience that energy of the stadium … that’s kind of when you really realize you’re representing the USA, you’re representing Hawaii and it really hit us that we were Olympians at that point,” Kawika Shoji said.

Their Olympic journey ended a week ago with the bronze medal match and the closing ceremonies, and the Shoji brothers both said they were looking forward to a little bit of downtime at home after culminating the four-year Olympic cycle.

Not so much for Christenson, who jumped off the plane on Tuesday and right into helping his fiancee, Brooke Fournier, finish up preparations for their wedding today.

“She’s been unbelievable through all of it,” Christenson said in a rare break in the rush. “She understands the situation I’m in and where my mind had to be at for quite a while. We did as much as we could together, but she’s been absolutely amazing doing 90 percent of all the work to make our day really special.”

Christenson said following up the Olympics with a wedding within the span of a week is an “unbelievable sequence of events and I’m in a wonderful period of my life right now.”

After the wedding, the Christensons will start married life in Italy where Micah will resume his professional career. Kawika Shoji has signed on to play professionally in Russia through the winter while Erik Shoji is currently unsigned and mulling the next step in his career.

While they decompress from the just completed cycle, the journey to Tokyo for the 2020 Games is sure to beckon soon enough … if not already.

“The goal is four more years so I’m not going to stop now and I’m definitely going to get in the gym sooner rather than later,” said Erik Shoji, who turned 27 last Wednesday.

“People always say they get the bug, they get addicted to the Olympics, and I kind of got that a little bit. To be at the closing ceremony where Brazil transitioned it to Japan, that was really cool and everyone got that excitement about Tokyo. I know a bunch of our team’s going to be returning and I hope to be one of those guys in Tokyo.”