Sports Then and Now

The USA women's archery team will be heading to London for the 2012 Olympics after surviving the recent qualifier.

The USA Archery Team will aiming to defy the betting odds and win a medal at London 2012, after the women’s team successfully qualified by beating Mexico at the recent Archery World Cup competition at the Golden Spikes Event Centre in Ogden.

It was a close call as to who would eventually be on the plane to London, as both teams had regulation scores of 213, and then in the shoot-off, they each posted identical scores of 127.

Up stepped Jennifer Nichols, whose arrow went closest to the dead-center of the bull’s-eye to knock the Mexicans out and ensure that the USA women’s team would return to the Olympic Games, having missed out in Beijing.

For Nichols herself, it will be a third visit to the Games, and she will be joined by the exciting 19-year-old Miranda Leek who is already ranked number one in the USA and 9th in the world. Read the rest of this entry →

Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol will be playing on different teams during the London Olympics.

Since basketball was first included as an Olympic Games event at Berlin, in 1936, the United States has been very much the dominant force. They won every gold medal up to 1972, when the Soviet Union finally beat them in Munich.

However, since then, it has been mostly a case of ‘normal service resumed’, with just two instances of bronze (Seoul 1988 and Athens 2004) tarnishing the otherwise brilliant glow emitted from the gold cabinet.

None of this comes as a surprise, when you consider that the NBA is the strongest basketball association in the world. Indeed, in the 1990’s, the USA were able to call on the services of none other than the legendary Michael Jordan, to help secure their rightful place at the top of the tree.

They can be beaten, as Argentina proved at Athens 2004, but there was no chance of a repeat shock, four years ago, when LA Lakers player, Kobe Bryant, led the USA to gold in Beijing. He is now in his thirties though, and that will give hope to the other 11 teams in the competition, notably, Spain, who have become a real force in world basketball of late. They have their own talisman in Pau Gasol. Read the rest of this entry →