Turin, Italy, October 2, 2018 - After three weeks and 94 matches of thrilling volleyball, culminating in Poland's exceptional performance in the final against Brazil to claim the title at the 2018 FIVB Volleyball Men's World Championship, the stars of the show can count the numbers that made them shine.
A total of 162 and 26 minutes of pure volleyball was played in cities across Italy and Bulgaria, for 535 sets and 15,522 rallies.
The longest match of the tournament was 2:29, which is what it took Finland to hold off Puerto Rico's attempt at a comeback and prevail 3-2 (25-19, 25-23, 27-29, 21-25, 15-10) in Round 1 in Varna.
This ties the all-time World Championship duration record since the introduction of the Rally Scoring System. In 2014 Iran beat USA five sets, also in 2:29.
Poland's Bartosz Kurek beats the block of USA's Taylor Sander in the semifinals of the 2018 FIVB World Championship to score an amazing point - one of his 171 throughout the tournament.
Top scorer overall at the 2018 World Championship was MVP of the tournament Bartosz Kurek, who led Poland to a thundering win over Brazil in the final for their second consecutive and third overall title.
Kurek scored 171 points (133 kills, 22 stuffs, 16 aces) for an average of just over 14 per match. He was followed in second place of the scorers' list by USA's Matt Anderson at 163 points and Brazil's Wallace De Souza (157).
Kurek's tally in 12 matches is the lowest for a top scorer since the introduction of the Rally Scoring System. The all-time record remains 271 points (in 11 matches) by Puerto Rico's Hector Soto).
Top scorers by World Championship edition:
• 2002 Argentina: Marcos Milinkovic (ARG) - 193 points
• 2006 Japan: Hector Soto (PUR) - 271 points
• 2010 Italy: Ian Perez (ESP) - 173 points
• 2014 Poland: Mariusz Wlazly (POL) - 233 points
• 2018 Italy/Bulgaria: Bartosz Kurek (POL) - 171 points
In total there were nine new entries this year in the list of players to have scored 30 points or more in a single World Championship match.
Serbia's Aleksandar Atanasijevic tied the all-time high of 38 points in his team's win 3-2 win over France in Round 2. Puerto Rico's Hector Soto had scored 38 points against Argentina in 2006.
In attacking, Japan's Yuki Ishikawa had 55 kills from 95 swings for an efficiency of 57.89%. Of the teams in the Final Six (but in an overall tournament count), Douglas Souza of Brazil registered an 56.58% efficiency (129/228), just ever so slightly above Anderson, who finished at 56.56% (138/244).
Simon Van De Voorde of Belgium was the most prolific of blockers on average, registering .80 stuffs per set and 24 in absolute numbers. Of the teams in the Final Six only Russia's Ilyas Kurkaev, with 20 blocks in total over the whole tournament and .54 per set, made the top 10 of the 2018 World Championship.
The all-time blocking record remains 1.06 per set by Cuba's Robertlandy Simon in 2010.
Simon Van De Voorde of Belgium emerged the most efficient blocker of the 2018 FIVB World Championship with .80 stuffs per set played.
At the 2018 World Championship Cuba's Miguel Angel Lopez served .57 aces per set (11 in total) to top the Best Servers list, though in absolute numbers Russia's Maxim Mikhaylov was way ahead on 19 aces (.51 per set), closely followed by Italy's Ivan Zaytsev on 17 (.46).
Clayton Stanley of USA still holds the all-time record of .70 aces per set, from the 2010 World Championship.
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