Back in the U.S., Shmoop and the rest of the girls talk about how clever he was in the afternoon match. They also talk about Nerissa's absence from the team, and how the other girls think she's a bad influence on the other players. They wonder if they can figure out what's going on behind the scenes with the girls, since they haven't heard anything from the girls since they left. They're also curious about what the girls think of the match, since the girls don't seem to care about the match at all, and they're starting to hate the guy who beat them so badly. They want to know what the players think of him, too, since he's such a good player. They ask him if he'll help them out, and he says he'd do so if he had to. He's not sure if Nerissa is in on the match yet, because she hasn't joined the team yet, but he hopes she'll be soon. He also says that the girls are going nuts over him, and that they've been trying to get back at him since he beat them. He doesn't know what to do now, because he hasn1t been able to play the new ball, and the girls aren1t playing until the spring tournament. He tells them to check out his new team, which is practicing with Momozono. He says that a player got hurt, so he asked Nao to come in and play in his place, and now he doesn1t know why they haven1t told him about it yet. He thinks it's because they didn1t want to get involved in the whole thing. He asks if she can still play, and she says she can, but she can't get a good block out of her, so she won1t be able to get it done. He wonders if he should have told them