Dear Canada, About What Happened...

Well, a week has gone by and it's time for me to update my Olympic coverage. The USA has both teams in the women's beach volleyball final, the men crashed and burned. The women's track team is raking in the medals, the men are struggling. Men's and women's basketball teams are easing into the semifinals. Women's volleyball is also in the semis and the men got upset by Italy in the quarters. Swimming is over and there is not much else to pay attention to or US fans... oh, yeah, that little women's soccer final. That's kind of important.
That semifinal win over Canada was just about as amazing as the win over Brazil in the '11 World Cup. The USWNT (US Women's National Team) seems to have a never-die attitude and is relentless in getting to the goal. They apparently also have a reputation for playing "overly physical." Since being down 0-2 to France in the opening game they hadn't given up a goal until the semifinals. But, they are no longer invincible. They got lucky that France, Sweden, Brazil and Japan were on the opposite side of the bracket... remember how they had trouble with all four teams in '11? Even more luck came their way when Canada beat the UK (who hadn't been scored on at that point) with home-field advantage.
Luck seems to be what won this last game for them. Rapinoe's corner kick goal, the stalling call, the hand-ball call... all lucky breaks, essentially. But an unlucky loss is hard to swallow, just ask the Canadian players that fell that the game was stolen from them. Allow me to drop some classic Shallow Speculations analysis on this game to quiet the complainers from the north without sounding too much like a homer.
First, Canada is a solid team. Are the world-class?? Not quite. Sinclair is an all-time great, and Tancredi is a star, but beyond that they just a solid team. You could argue, depending on the style of soccer you prefer, that the US women would make up 50-60% of any all-world team right now. Canada road some solid coaching and a ton of emotion and momentum into a solid finish. (They need to get their shit together if they want the bronze. They could easy fold under the weight of that tough loss and get drilled by a solid French team tomorrow, but they could also come out with passion and purpose and win the bronze 3-0.)
Second, I wasn't able to confirm this with stats, but a 1-goal lead is NEVER safe in soccer... ask Brazil, or ANYONE. You never know what will happen. If you lose a game when you never lead by more than a single goal, you can only be mad at yourself.
Along those lines, my biggest complaint about soccer, besides the flopping, is the stalling, which is somewhat related. Remember in the US/Brazil game in '11 how that Brazilian player flopped and faked an injury for over 2 minutes? The US got that time back and scored the tying goal... karma. I'm not saying Canadian players were faking injuries, but they were sure stalling. FIFA needs to change the rules... not so much a shot clock, but a limit on the amount of time you can possess the ball in your defensive half. Water polo, lacrosse, and other sports have similar rules. Trust me, it will make the game more exciting and hopefully boost scoring... a major complaint from those who don't like soccer.
Finally, I would like to address the Canadian complaints about officiating. No sports fan can ever say they haven't complained about officiating when their team loses a tough game (legitimately or not), so this may sound hypocritical. First, for the Canadian coach to "call out" the USWNT for being "overly physical" is ridiculous. Soccer is contact sport. If you aren't physical, you aren't winning. Sure, there is a fine line between physical and illegal, but the best way to combat an "overly physical" team is to match their physicality. Second, Rapinoe's corner-kick goal was essentially an own goal. Why was no Canadian player covering the near post? Why, when the ball was played extremely close to the far post, were the Canadian defenders attacking the ball in the direction of their goal? They were asking for it to deflect off of them and into the goal. Third, the penalty on the goalie for stalling is, in fact, silly. It's never called. That doesn't change the fact that it is a violation of the rules. Just like Brazil getting karma for faking injuries in '11, Canada was karmacally punished for their stalling. Finally, the hand-ball. A hand-ball is a hand-ball. Forget the discussion of intent. I'll buy "accidental" when the ball hits your arm while your arm is at your side, like you're standing there like a poll. It's not an accident when it hits your arm when it's up in the air, especially when it's shielding your face. It's soccer, if the ball comes to your face, you should head it down, or jump up and chest it down. Any time a shot hits a defenders arm when they are between the shooter and the goal, you have to assume they were doing their job and preventing a goal... thus, a penalty. You cannot expect the official to determine intent in the heat of the moment... the NFL is trying to, with their hard hitting crack-down, but still.
It all comes down to the fact that Canada was never up by more than 1 goal, they could have applied more offensive pressure when they were ahead late (instead of stalling), they could have stopped the penalty kick without a handball, and their goalie could have stopped Wombach's penalty as well... (plus, they could have not let Morgan score the winner with like 20 seconds to go) any one of those things would have won the game for them. Instead, they are left to complain like sports are supposed to be fair or something.

Olympic Ring Toss

Wouldn't ring toss be a fun Olympic event to watch??
I thought I would be remiss if I didn't discuss the Olympics with you all. Every four years, the world's greatest athletes (and some folks who excel at games) gather in a large city for shiny pieces of metal and the adoration (or shame of their country.
I've made my opinions of the Olympics obvious before. I really enjoy the country versus country aspect... maybe because Team USA is the one team I cheer for that isn't terrible or stuck in mediocrity. I don't remember any Olympics prior to Barcelona '92, so I didn't experience much of the "us vs. them" drama during the Cold War with the USSR (and even at that point Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia were splitting up). I still want the USA to win everything they possibly can. I want to see all the US athletes compete, especially when there is medal at stake. Also, there are a few sports (basketball, track, soccer, volleyball) that I really want to follow closely. That being said, here are my thoughts on London 2012 so far:

- London??? Really? Ok, I can come to terms with the time difference... and at least our athletes are in a country that doesn't hate us (thank God the Olympics will probably never be in Tehran). But I am seriously looking forward to Rio '16... no more tape delays.
- The Olympics always have several storylines that end up being no big deal, and several storylines come out of nowhere. The Phelps/Lochte rivalry is nothing to write about, but the success of the Chinese female swimmers is a surprise.
- I started out being REALLY mad at NBC for their coverage and the lack of excitement because of athletes and reporters Tweeting/Facebooking results in real-time, ruining the surprise and drama on TV. Now, I've begun to forgive them. I'm the one following people on Twitter and checking status updates like a hawk; NBC is just trying to have something to run in prime time so their coverage can sell ads. They've moved the time consuming team sports to NBC Sports and MSNBC, which sucks if you don't have NBC Sports (I haven't seen a second of men's basketball or women's soccer). At least it's not terrible coverage, and they have quality broadcasters (Al Michaels to Dan Patrick to Brian Williams to Bob Costas is a solid line up).
- Let's talk Phelps vs. Lochte... it seems like heading into this Olympics, most people were fed up with Phelps and really excited about the results Lochte was producing. Phelps had turned into the "villian" and Lochte was the likeable hero. So far, while Phelps has not been up to his standard (or our ridiculously high expectations), he was not the one that got passed on the final lap of the 400 Free relay, giving France revenge for the US upset in '08. Ease up on Phelps... and Lochte for that matter. They are on the same team and appear to be great friends. We can't win EVERY medal.
- Speaking of "disappointments"... our gymnastics teams were both expected to win several medals (and favorites to get gold), and we had the defending individual all-around World Champion Jordyn Weiber. Well, a funny thing happened during qualifying... Weiber had too many mistakes and missed out on the individual all-around because, even though she had the 4th-best score, you can only have 2 athletes per country. Then the men seemed to have the same issues and finished 5th in the team competition (at least Danel Leyva made up for it last night with that great come back and the women won team gold). Gymnasts rarely make two Olympics, unless they are VERY young in the first one or stay really good into their 20s. We need to give these kids a break... they are KIDS remember. Poor Jordyn Weiber couldn't even talk to the press after she missed out on the all-around because of a technicality. Some of the deductions the judges are taking off can't even be seen by a normal person. If they haven't been in the Olympics before, there is no way to train for the pressure they will feel while throwing and contorting their body around the gym.

Some US surprises so far...
- Men's archery beat South Korea in the semi-finals... they lost the gold-medal match, but they ousted the top ranked team to get silver.
- We have 4 good beach volleyball teams. How awesome would it be to win 2 golds AND 2 silvers.
- John Isner made the quarterfinals of the men's tennis tournament.
- The women's soccer team has played stellar defense since giving up two goals in the first twenty minutes to France. Also, the three teams that can beat them (Brazil, Japan and Sweden) are on the other side of the bracket (but watch out for UK, they beat Brazil).
- Gabby Douglas filled in nicely for Jordyn Weiber in the all-around winning gold.
- Missy Elliott and Allison Schmidt... nuff said.

Some US "concerns"...
- The Women's basketball team has seemed sluggish to start games off. The second team of Whalen, McCoughtry, Augustus, Moore, and Cash has been playing better defense and with more energy.
- There is no men's soccer team... let that sink in for a little.
- China maintains the medal count lead into today... it's time to kick it in high gear.

I'll post some final thoughts when the events are completed... hopefully a comprehensive review of how the USA dominated down the stretch.