LEXINGTON, Ky.  – The American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) announced its 2026 AVCA Top Flight Award winners with the University of Hawai'i No. 1 pair of Julia Lawrenz and Izadora Stedile making the list.

This year marks the eighth class of the award which started in 2018 and is designed to recognize excellence in beach volleyball from all over the country and across all flights. In order for a pair to be eligible for the award, the two athletes must compete in at least 15 matches together at a specific flight number and win 75 percent of their matches at that flight.

The Brazilian pair of Lawrenz and Stedile went 21-7 (.750) at the top of the order for UH facing the top pairs from nearly a dozen nationally-ranked teams. Overall the duo went 23-8 and were the only UH tandem to appear in every match together. The award caps a monumental week for the pair who in the previous day earned AVCA All-America second team and  all-Big West first team honors.

UH now has 16 Top Flight citations since its inception and has had at least one pair recognized in seven of the eight years of the award.