Our way - FOXSports.com

Updated Aug 1, 2012 9:19 PM ET

LONDON

Volleyball players flash hand signals behind their backs, letting their teammate know where the serve should go or where they should position themselves. But for Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor, the First Couple of beach volleyball, this covert means of communication appears superfluous.

When Walsh zigs, May-Treanor zags.

It is possible, at first glance, to look at them as opposites: the tall, Stanford-educated Walsh with the caffeinated speech who seems capable of resting her elbows atop the net, and May-Treanor, whose sublime passing and serving and easygoing mien do little to mask a childhood spent hanging out with her dad on the Southern California beach circuit.

In truth, though, they are complements, a yin matched with a yang, forming a circle as complete as the way they cover the court.

They continued their pursuit of a third consecutive Olympic gold medal Monday night by fending off the Czech Republic’s Marketa Slukova and Kristyna Kolocova, 21-14 and 21-19, to remain unbeaten in pool play.

They are ranked third in the world, but are clearly still the favorite of the celebrity set and networks. Basketball players Chris Paul and Russell Westbrook, tennis commentator John McEnroe and snowboarder Shaun White were among those who turned up for a match that did not begin, thanks to NBC, until a half hour before midnight.

That the match, which began in 57-degree weather and required players to wear leggings and long sleeves instead of bikinis and sports bras – surprisingly, no fur coats – did not chill their mood may have been because it was May-Treanor’s 35th birthday. She was presented a cupcake afterward.

Or, more likely, it was because they are intent on savoring their last Olympics together, one they did not expect to be playing in London.

May-Treanor had ostensibly retired after she missed a year with a torn Achilles tendon – suffered on 'Dancing with the Stars' of all things – and Walsh had taken time off to have twin boys. But as May-Treanor watched her husband, catcher Matt Treanor, prepare to go to spring training last year, regret began to creep in.

They talked and she decided she wanted one more shot at the Olympics. The decision made, she texted Walsh: They needed to talk.

By that time, Walsh had teamed with Nicole Branagh, who had partnered with May-Treanor while Walsh was taking her pregnancy leave. They were planning on playing in London.

When May-Treanor sat down and told Walsh, she said it was as more of a courtesy than an invitation. She just wanted to let her know.

Walsh was stunned, but quickly came to a conclusion.

“If she was playing, I was in,” Walsh said. “She, for a while, didn’t want to play. She told me flat out – I’m done. Good luck. Have fun. I’m supporting you all the way. So I moved on. Then when she called . . .

“I committed to someone else because there was no chance. When she changed her mind, you have to reassess things. It was an easy decision in so many ways, but it was hard because I had to hurt someone (Branagh) that I really respect.”

May-Treanor, at heart, is an introvert. She is soft-spoken and, in an autobiography published two years ago, she hit on the reason why, detailing how she struggled with her parents’ drinking growing up – and later her own. But her mother’s death from cancer, shortly before winning her first gold medal in Athens in 2004, has both stirred her comeback and ensured that it will be over at the end of these Olympics.

She wants no regrets.

“I didn’t do this for me. I want to finish with her,” May-Treanor said, nodding toward Walsh. “I want to finish with my teammate, my partner, my sister who I love by my side. That’s what it is. I want to finish the way I want to go out. I don’t want to leave with any what if.”

Then it will be on to dreams deferred. She wants to be with her husband more. She wants to have children. She will finish her master’s degree this fall, and would like to begin coaching. She wants to get on with the rest of her life.

“I’m ready,” she said. “I’m ready. It’s hard as elite athletes. We sacrifice a lot of time with our loved ones. We have people die and we’re not home. Babies are born. It’s that time (now). Families understand and people around you understand that you have to sacrifice to get where you are. But it’s time for me to reconnect, to get that balance back. My dad’s getting older. I want to spend time with him because there are things out there for me that are more important.”

When you lay this all out for your teammate, it can be overwhelming – both a powerful inspiration and a heavy weight. Though they are contemporaries, playing against each other since they were teenagers, May-Treanor has always been viewed reverentially, a prodigy who did not disappoint. When May, who was the two-time NCAA Player of the Year after leading Long Beach to an unbeaten season, asked Walsh to join her playing beach volleyball after the 2000 Olympics, she once said that it was like getting an invitation from Michael Jordan.

So when they rejoined last summer and were just merely another contender – they had once won 112 consecutive matches – it was unsettling.

“We were in a funk mentally,” Walsh said. “It wasn’t physical at all. We were just in a weird place. We were just wanting it so bad and trying to be so perfect. ... We just don’t want to let each other down. I don’t want to let Missy down and that was keeping us kind of timid. It wasn’t allowing us to rise to the occasion because we were afraid of letting someone down and we had never done that before.”

Figuring this out came with a helping hand: Mike Gervais, a sports psychologist whom Walsh had been working with since 2009. He sat down with both players.

Like marriage counseling?

“Absolutely,” Walsh said. “Misty and I are married. I have two amazing partners, my husband Casey and Misty. Sometimes you take things for granted. I’ve known her for so long, and I’m close to her but I don’t know everything she’s thinking. And it’s really important to get on the same page and talk about those little things. Nothing’s too little.”

Those little things are making a difference. While May-Treanor and Walsh have never dropped a game at the Olympics, winning 32 in a row, they have been tested here. In three of the four games, they’ve won by 21-18 or closer. They rallied from an 18-15 deficit to beat the Czechs.

“They are strong in the head,” Kolocova said.

Walsh, 33, said they are better than they have ever been, but so is the field. They have one more match in group play, against a plucky, scrambling set of Austrian sisters, Doris and Stefanie Schwaiger. Then it is on to the knockout phase.

The final is just more than a week away, the end a long way off except for those whose sojourn began 12 years ago.

“It’s a real emotional journey that we’ve been on and it’s been so great for so long, but it’s coming to an end and that’s real heavy,” Walsh said. “It’s heavy in a beautiful way. It’s going to be sad and half devastating when we’re done, but we just want to go out on top and then we can cry all we want.”

It would be quite a scene: joy and sadness, the end of one road and the start of another, a path, a partnership and a friendship all coming full circle.

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