More Miscellaneous 2016 Olympics Musings

The U.S. women's soccer team lost to Sweden at the Olympics and so was eliminated from medal contention.  The gave up the game to the Swedes in penalty kicks to break a tie.  Oh, well, you can't win 'em all.  And the men can't win at all.

This would be no big deal if not for post-game comments from American goalkeeper Hope Solo, who stalled for time before Swedish player Lisa Dahlkvist scored the winning goal and thus fired the shot heard 'round the world, hadn't offered this sour quote after the game:  "We lost to a bunch of cowards. The better team did not win."  Asked to expand on that, she said, "Sweden dropped off. They didn't want to open play. They didn't want to pass the ball. They didn't want to play great soccer."

And with that, Solo wins the Nancy Kerrigan Award for Bad Sportsmanship.  But then, at least Nancy Kerrigan could argue that she should have won the women's figure skating gold medal in 1994 because figure skating is a subjective sport.  Soccer is very objective - the team with the most goals wins the game.  The Swedish ladies didn't have to play great; they just had to win.  And they did.

Meanwhile . . . how about Maya Dirado?  She upset Hungary's Katinka Hosszú by six one-hundredths of a second in the women's 200-meter backstroke race.  I turned away from the telly thinking Hosszú was going to win, then I looked back barely in time to see Dirado touch the wall first!  Even when I saw the replay, I couldn't believe it. I'm sure Dirado couldn't believe it either.

And now that Hosszú has to settle for silver, is her husband responsible for her loss of the gold?  Well, he should be held responsible.

Also, Michael Phelps went into the water with the hope of winning the 100-meter butterfly. He ended up losing to Singaporean swimmer Joseph Schooling - whom Phelps once met when Schooling was a kid back in 2008 - and sharing the silver with South Africa's Chad LeClos and Lazslo Cseh of the Czech Republic. Yes, three-way ties happen.  Did fifth-place finisher Li Zhuhao of China get a bronze medal? No, but he should have. Why waste a bronze medal by not handing it out?

Oh, yeah, Schooling set a new Olympic record in the 100 fly.

Also, congrats to American swimmers Anthony Ervin and Nathan Adrian for winning gold and bronze, respectively, in the men's "splash and dash" 50-meter freestyle.  Although, I would have preferred to see Ervin show more modesty, in the style of Tom Dolan, when he won.

And while you weren't paying attention, brothers Gary and Paul O'Donovan of Ireland won the silver medal for in the lightweight men's doubles rowing competition - Ireland's first medal in these Games and its first Olympic rowing medal in history.  Ethnic pride here!

Whoever said "You don't win silver, you lose gold" obviously never won a silver . . . and obviously wasn't Irish. :-)