Tuesday, August 26, 2008

TEAM USA



SILVER MEDALIST!!!!!
We came away with a silver medal after going down to the netherlands 4-0 in first three minutes of game..we fought back but the netherlands beat us 9-8..our hats off to them..
I just wanted to thank all of you who have posted, sent emails and watched us live from your computers..we have never felt as much love and support as we have this time around..You have truly made Beijing and the memories of Beijing a little sweeter with your warm thoughts..Thank you.....GO USA!!!!
WE ENDED WITH 110 MEDALS THE MOST BY ANY COUNTRY...WE ARE THE BEST!!!!!

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Happy Birthday to you Patty!!!

We beat the Australia 9-8, today in our semifinal game..what a game it was..I cant really remember much but what I do remember is going up by 3 to end the 3th quarter and after we missed a 5meter we fell a part for a little bit and gave up our 3 goal lead..But then we cracked down on defense and made some 5on6 saves and scored a crucial 6on5 with a minute left in the game..then we did what we do best and played some great defense the last possesion to the game...We will face the Netherlands on thursday..the beat Hungary 8-7...cant wait...

Scoring:USA: 9 (2,2,4,1) B. Villa 3, B. Hayes 2, K. Craig 1, A. Gregorka 1, J. Steffens 1, N. Golda 1AUS: 8 (2,2,1,3) K. Gynther 3, R. Rippon 2, G. Beadsworth 1, B. Knox 1, M. Santoromito 1
Saves - USA - B. Armstrong 8 AUS - A. McCormack 156x5 - USA 4/7 - AUS 2/8

Friday, August 15, 2008

TEAM USA


USA VS Russia

We beat the Russians 12-7...
After day 2 of competition we found out that the Russians were eliminated from advancing with their loss to China and our tie with Italy..We didnt know what Russian team we would find on Day 3 of competition..What we did know is that regardless of how the Russians were going to treat their game, we needed to come out and make a statement..We needed to win to still give us a shot at advancing first in our bracket..However, with the tie we also needed to wait and see the end result of the Italy/China game..I tip my hat off to the Chinese they are playing really well and taking advantage of every opportunity they get..They lost to the Italian 10-9...which helped us win our bracket..We needed China to win, tie or not lose by more than one goal and not have a higer score than our game...to determine the tie breaker between Italy and US...I guess you could say luck was in our favor and all those things happened last night..So now we wait and train to play against the winner of the quarterfinal between Australia/china...

Scorers:
USA: 12 (5,3,2,2) N. Golda 3, B. Villa 2, A. Gregorka 2, B. Hayes 1, P. Cardenas 1, J. Steffens 1, E. Windes 1, M. van Norman 1RUS: 7 (0,2,4,1) O. Turova 2, S. Konukh 2, E. Prokofyeva 1, E. Pantyulina 1, E. Soboleva 1Saves - USA - B. Armstrong 10, J. Hipp 1 - RUS - V. Vorontsova 16x5 - USA - 4/6 (2/2 penalties) RUS - 2/6

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

USA vs ITALY

Ends in a tie 9-9...
The Italians go up on us 2-0 but that did not stop us from taking shots and going right after them..We were very unfortunate with our shooting in the first quarter hitting lots of post but we were shooting with confidence...
In the second quarter we finally got one in the goal with a little commerce connection..We draw an exclusion at center and I passed the ball to patty and she buried in the goal.. The Italians scored again and that put that back ahead 3-1..We were still going after them trying to get into an offensive flow..Hayes put away another power play to give us our second goal..But the Italians would regain their two goal lead but we were not done before the half was over. Leave it to our youngest to power one into the goal from the center position from a great entry pass from Hayes..Hayes would then score her second goal of the night with a perfect lob that was out of reach of the Italian goalkeeper...We went into half with tied 4-4..
The Italians scored first coming out of the half time break..But that lead would be short lived as Villa (me) scored on a power play...Minutes went by and Jessica Steffens scores a natural goal that was a beautiful perfect corner that went bar in..This would be the first time US takes the lead..With the third quarter coming to an end the Italians would even up the score once again..
Coming out of the gates for the final quarter saw a lot of back and forth action both teams pushing the counter attack and transition to get something started, the US was finally able to convert on a counter attack, Villa scores a goal that trickles in very slowly...We will take it (they don't all have to be pretty)...The US would keep the lead and extend the lead with from Stanford alum Alison Gregorka, another beautiful natural goal..Our two goal lead would be cut to one by an outside shot and with a minute left in the game the Italians drew an exclusion and called a timeout..they converted the 60n5 and the game was tied with :22 seconds left in the game..We called a time out, ran a play and got an entry pass into the center position, Craig tried to get a shot off but the italian defender clamped down and the game ended in a tie...

***** In the last match of the game we saw China defeat Russia 13-11..which means that the russians do not have a chance of advancing to the quarterfinal rounds..We must beat Russia friday and await the outcome of the China/Italy game which is played later that day to determine which position we will end up in our bracket...

scorers:
USA - 9 (0,4,2,3) B. Hayes 2, B. Villa 2, H. Petri 1, P. Cardenas 1, J. Steffens 1, A. Gregorka 1, K. Craig 1ITA - 9 (2,2,2,3) M. Miceli 2, T. di Mario 2, E. Casanova 1, S. Bosurgi 1, E. Valkai 1, M. Zanchi 1, C. Ragusa
Armstrong 10 saves

Monday, August 11, 2008

Olympic Debut: American beat Chinese

OH Yeah!!! Hard fought game but we got the win..WE beat the Chinese 12-11...It was definitely a nail bitter for those in the stands..I think most of us in the water were more calm and knew that we would get it done...We played pretty good 5on6 defense and great 6on5 offense...Betsey blocked a 5 meter and Natalie scored 4 goals..It was a very weird game..But most Olympic openers are with both team going 100 miles an hour and the referees always given some sort of instruction like call lots of kick outs to keep the game clean...

The Chinese jumped on us to get an early lead 2-0..After we didn't convert on our first 6on5..They had some "hot" shooters who kept hitting the corner in our zone..We tighten up our defense a little bit and were able to get our counter and offense going...At half we were up 8-7..We held a two goal lead for just a bit in the third and couldn't hold on to it..In the fourth quarter we went down by a goal early and then we cracked down on our defense...They would remain scoreless the rest of the quarter and we scored a natural from the center position and we scored our last 6on5 to put us up by 1..

Some may be doubting us at this point..But we beat a good team that may fly under the radar...One down....Next up Italy on Wednesday Aug 13......this is the fun part...Go TEAM USA!

scorers:
Hayes 2, Villa 1, Wenger 1, Golda 4, VanNorman 1, Craig 3
Armstrong 7 saves,
USA 4/6- 6on5 , 4/9- 5on6
China 1/2 penalties

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Getting Ready to play!!!


Tonight I will watch some olympic magic in our apartment from the 24 hour feed we get here in the village..I will be inspired by other athletes competing and doing well..Last night, three fencers swept the women sabre competition..It is so sweet to see your flag being raised and having not only one flag but three american flags being raised..oh yeah!!!!! The men just beat the Chinese 8-4...we got next!!!!
Go Team USA!!!!

Friday, August 8, 2008

Opening Ceremonies!!!

Great Job China!!!!
Last night was incredible and a great way to get the games started..As a special treat to the American athletes we were taken to a special venue in order to hear for ourselves a good luck from our President...He was so excited to be there and wished us all good luck and gave a direct order of winning gold medals...we took that to heart...If you look at the link below you can see our team picture with the President....
http://www.nbcolympics.com/photos/galleryid=184069.html

Ralph Lauren dressed us up really well but the china humidity made it very difficult to stay dry and beautiful..By the end of the night, I was soaked through my wonderful attire but still trying to look good and represent our country in a good way...I finally got my picture with Laker super star Kobe and he was very nice and gracious..I was also able to show off my Italian skills with him and have a conversation with him in Italian...That was awesome....
The lighting of the torch was unbelievable...a Chinese gymnast was walking on air to light the torch..hope you all caught that on TV..someone just emailed me teammate Petie and said they say us on TV....I will try to post pictures later...
Today we scrimmaged the Australians..we are back to work and getting ready for our showdown with China on 08/11...LET THE GAMES BEGIN!!!!

Thursday, August 7, 2008

The Olympic Village Life!!

I meant to add some pictures to give you some sort of idea of the make up of the village but there are so many rules and restrictions on what we can blog about so I decided to just tell you some of my adventures and maybe put up some pictures at a later time...
When we arrived at the Olympic Village a couple days ago we arrived in style sporting some new gear provided by Nike, that day we were known as the team in black..Coincidently, the USOC staff here in the village also was wearing black as their color of the day so we were on top of it..We were assigned our apartments when we arrived so the first thing we did, or I did was scope it out and see which rooms were best...Betsey and I were fortunate enough to get a room with a bathroom, kind of like a master suite...nice, huh...There are three rooms per aparment and a common area..China did a good job with the apartments..After settling in and decorating our apartments with some patriotic decorations we headed to the dining hall because we were starving...After our dining hall extravaganza (the food has been great, no complaints) we ventured around the village, acted like tourist by taking a million pictures..At one of our picture moments, the Village daily photographer thought we were a lively bunch so she took pictures of us and we were in the paper the other day..Im sure most of the teams are jealous that us the American water polo team was in the Village Daily,looking fly with our gear on.. That day we ran into so high profiled athletes like Rafael Nadal and Pau Gasol, Im not going to lie we did go up to them and asked them to take pictures with our team..Im sure they are now afraid of the that water polo team dressed in black..but they were very pleasant and put up with are many request of individual photos....So after our first afternoon in the village, we called it a night and were lucky enough to sleep in and enjoy our day off the next day...
The rest day consisted of finding the post office to get some post cards and stamps and making a pit stop at the venue store to buy some cool beijing momentos...After running around the previous day we took it easy and were getting ready for the next day which meant back to business as usual with two practices awaiting us..
Since then we have been training and having an occasional tourist moment only when the dream team walked into the dining hall last night..Lebron, Kidd, Boozer, Anthony and Wade were very gracious to the american water polo team that travels in a pack and asks for various photos...
Today we were able to practice and scrimmage in the Venue pool against Australia..We had a slow start but ended in a tie 9-9..Today gave us a reminder of what we are doing here..we are here to play good water polo and handle our business in the pool....
Go team USA!!!!

Sorry!!

I have not been doing a good job on keeping you, my readers, informed on the activities of the village life..I promise to post later today some of the adventures we have been on since arriving here in the Olympic Village..Ill leave you with this thought, the chinese are doing an exceptional job...cant wait to get this show on the road...

Sunday, August 3, 2008

OLYMPIC VILLAGE!!

Today we head to the olympic village, we will call that home till aug 25..I hope the beds are comfortable. We are so excited to get there...I decided we should look like a team, not such any team, but a very dominant looking team..we will post pictures later of our team outfit as we head into the olympic village where over 10,000 athletes will be housed and fed till closing ceremonies....
I will tell you all about the village later today or tomorrow..
On another note, we played the netherlands in two "official games" and dominated the first one, the second one saw, a less dominant game by us but still a good game..Im not sure what the final score ended from the second game but we definitely won the first game..Today is a gloomy day in China but we are hoping we can see some rays of light as we head to the village later...
oh and if you dont read my teammates Petie's blog...you should..post a comment and she will send you a postcard from the olympic village....go here.
go team USA!!!