Week 4 of the Athletes Unlimited volleyball season is here, and with it comes the end of an era.

Sheilla Castro says goodbye

Sheilla Castro will play in the final game of her career on Saturday, which comes nearly six years after she first announced her retirement from the Brazilian national team.

Castro joined the AU roster for the league’s second season with the goal of improving upon her performance from last year, and she quickly delivered on that promise. For the first time in her AU career, Castro earned a captain’s spot in Week 3 and didn’t look back.

On Friday, she posted a career-high 23 kills, adding 11 digs and three blocks against Team Lowe in what was the highest scoring match in league history with 164 combined points. The third set of that match also set a league record for points, with Team Castro coming out on top 39-37 for a combined 76 points.

With 2,142 points through the end of Week 3, Castro will most certainly pass her points total from last year (2,350) in the final three games of her career. The two-time Olympic gold medalist with Brazil is currently in third place on the AU leaderboard, 147 points behind Bethania De La Cruz in second.

While the reason for Castro’s early departure is unknown, her impact on the leaderboard will still be felt at the end of the season.

Battle for the best

Dani Drews retook the spot atop the leaderboard last week with 2,374 points, out-gaining De La Cruz by 451 points. She’ll need to keep up the pace to stave off De La Cruz, the title favorite who sits just 85 points behind Drews with 2,289 total.

Natalia Valentin-Anderson also surged back into the top four and a captain’s spot with 2,017 points. A total of 357 points separates the four captains heading into the second-to-last week.

Among the top 10, Morgan Hentz was the biggest climber after gaining 851 points in Week 3. She’s now in sixth place and will play for Team Drews this week.

Cassidy Lichtman also entered the top 10 for the first time last week, moving up four spots from 11th.

The leaderboard is competitive entering the final two weeks of AU competition. De La Cruz looks to avenge her second-place finish from last season, while Drews aims to cap what has already been a stellar rookie campaign with a championship trophy.

Emma Hruby is an associate editor at Just Women’s Sports.

Two weeks into Athletes Unlimited’s Volleyball season, the action is delivering on its promise. Week 3 begins Wednesday night amid continued shifts atop the leaderboard.

Bethania De La Cruz moved into first place with 1,779 total points, while last week’s leader, Dani Drews, fell to third wth 1,413 points. In between them is Karsta Lowe, who finished fifth last season, with 1,455 points. Sheilla Castro has moved into fourth with 1,319 points.

The competition remains tight atop the leaderboard, albeit a little less so than in Week 2. A few new faces have moved into the top 10, and others have simply shifted or remained in place. While De La Cruz holds a firm lead of 324 points, a mere 212 points separates fifth and 10th place.

Just Women’s Sports has a few storylines to follow as the competition resumes Wednesday.

Bethania De La Cruz secures the top spot

Bethania De La Cruz took command of the leaderboard in Week 2, though her lead is by no means safe.

De La Cruz showcased her draft savvy in Week 2, as her team helped her set the single-match kills record during their loss Friday to Team Stivrins. With 27 kills in that game, De La Cruz is now third in the league with 87 through the first two weeks of the season. Karsta Lowe is first with 94. The outside hitter also has 66 digs on the season.

Can anyone catch De La Cruz in Week 3? While it seems unlikely that she would surrender her lead given how dominant she’s looked through two weeks of play, a bad game or two could put any one of the league’s top players right back in the mix.

De La Cruz also has extra motivation on her side, looking to take care of unfinished business after finishing as runner-up to AU champion Jordan Larson last season.

The Sheilla Castro show

For the first time in her Athletes Unlimited career, Sheilla Castro is a captain.

Through just two weeks, Castro has made major improvements over last season. On Saturday, the opposite hitter posted a career-high 17 kills against Team Drews for a season-high 329 points in a single game. She added to her 654 total points in Week 1 with 653 more in Week 2.

Castro’s surge should not come as a surprise. A member of the Brazilian national team, she is a two-time Olympic gold medalist and has won eight championships while playing overseas in Brazil, Turkey and Italy.

Castro is on pace to improve upon last season’s performance by nearly 1,000 points, and if she keeps it up, she could accomplish even more than that.

Into the top 10

Two of the biggest stars in Week 2, Leah Edmond and Nomaris Vélez Agosto also entered the top 10.

Edmond recorded 200-plus points in the final two games of the week. Her best performance came Saturday, when she posted a career-high 19 kills against Team Valentin-Anderson. As she steadily climbs, Edmond already has amassed nearly half of her point total from last year. The outside hitter currently sits in eighth place, 25 points behind seventh place and fewer than 200 points behind fourth-place captain Sheilla Castro.

Vélez Agosto, the 2021 Defensive Player of the Year, has also shown improvements from last season. On Wednesday against Team Valentin-Anderson, she recorded a career-high 18 digs for Team De La Cruz.

Vélez Agosto began last season on a tear and tapered off toward the end. Her consistency will be an X-factor in the last three weeks of this AU season.

Emma Hruby is an associate editor at Just Women’s Sports.