The United States women's team celebrate their victory over Brazil for the Gold medal in 2008 Olympic Games. The Olympic team included Hope Solo, Heather Mitts, Christie Rampone, Lindsay Tarpley, Shannon Boxx, Amy Rodriguez, Heather O'Reilly, Carli Loyd, Kate Margraf, Angela Hucles, and Lori Chalupny. Click to continue reading...

I'm getting up to watch the 6 a.m. U.S.-Brazil Olympic women's football final.

So briefly:
*The U.S. continued its domination of Guatemala Wednesday with a 1-0 win in the first game of the semifinal round of World Cup qualifying.

*Sven Wins For Mexico.

*CONCACAF WCQ Scores.

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The USWNT and Brazil both won in convincing fashion and will face off on Thursday morning (9AM ET) in the gold medal match. Germany and Japan (maybe it's me ... but doesn't that sound awfully World War Twoish?) will square off in the Bronze medal match-up (6AM ET). Kudos to Japan for making [...]SHARETHIS. Click to continue reading...

Here we go, here we go.

USA: 1-Hope Solo; 17-Lori Chalupny, 15-Kate Markgraf, 2-Heather Mitts, 3-Christie Rampone-Capt.; 7-Shannon Boxx, 11-Carli Lloyd, 9-Heather O'Reilly, 5-Lindsay Tarpley; 16-Angela Hucles, 8-Amy Rodriguez

Japan: 1-Miho Fukumoto; 2-Yukari Kinga, 3-Hiromi Ikeda, 4-Azusa Iwashimizu, 7-Kozue Ando; 14-Kyoko Yano, 8-Aya Miyama, 10-Homare Sawa, 15-Mizuho Sakaguchi, 11-Shinobu Ohno, 17-Yuki Nagasato. Click to continue reading...

First (from The Writer's Almanac), a wonderful poem by Marge Piercy to start your day with something introspective - before diving into the usual sports-centric deluge! This poem runs along the thought-path I was pursuing last night just before sleep. Guess it may be time to get reacquainted with myself . Click to continue reading...

A diving header from Natasha Kai gave the U.S. a 2-1 win earlier today over Canada and sent the women to an Olympics semifinal game Monday against Japan.

Game story.

The U.S. lineup: 1-Hope Solo; 17-Lori Chalupny, 15-Kate Markgraf, 2-Heather Mitts, 3-Christie Rampone; 7-Shannon Boxx, 11-Carli Lloyd, 9-Heather O'Reilly (6-Natasha Kai, 91), 5-Lindsay Tarpley (13-Tobin Heath, 82); 16-Angela Hucles, 8-Amy Rodriguez (12-Lauren Cheney, 109).

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Here we go, the U.S. versus the Canadians in the quarterfinals.

Canada:
Erin McLeod, Emily Zurrer, Candace Chapman, Martina Franko, Clare Rustad, Sophie Schmidt, Rhian Wilkinson, Diana Matheson, Christine Sinclair, Melissa Tancredi, Kara Lang

U.S.
Hope Solo, Heather Mitts, Christie Rampone, Kate Markgraf, Lori Chalupny, Lindsay Tarpley, Shannon Boxx, Heather O'Reilly, Carli Lloyd, Amy Rodriguez, Angela Hucles. Click to continue reading...

Tomorrow at 6AM we'll start the next leg of the Olympic tournament journey. There's not a lot in the way of soccer news in the interim. The WNT Blog is a good place to track the USWNT's travels and preparation for tomorrow's showdown with Canada. An upbeat and determined Canadian squad is [...]SHARETHIS. Click to continue reading...

Heather O'Reilly scored just 40 seconds into the game, USC striker Amy Rodriguez also scored and Torrance's Shannon Boxx was named player of the game as the U.S. crushed New Zealand (much much) earlier today 4-0 to win its group.

The U.S. needed a big win and a large Norway loss against Japan to take the group.

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The U.S. women play New Zealand at 4:45 a.m. Tuesday on MSNBC with a quarterfinal berth on the line.

A win will clinch the second spot in the group behind Norway for the U.S., although a tie will be enough if Norway beats Japan.

The last time the two nations met, just before the 2007 Women's World Cup, the U.

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Landon Donovan always did have an impeccable sense of timing.

And he's candid and honest, too - someone ask him about his locker room bust-up (well, that's what the English tabloids would call it) with Ruud, will ya?

Me? I'll be listening to the considerably less quotable Cobi Jones and Preki at the press conference held at the same time previewing Thursday's SuperClasico.

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An important match versus Japan looms. Predictions?

USA: 18-Hope Solo; 2-Heather Mitts, 15-Kate Markgraf, 3-Christie Rampone - Capt., 14-Stephanie Cox, 15; 9-Heather O'Reilly, 7-Shannon Boxx, 11-Carli Lloyd, 5-Lindsay Tarpley; 16-Angela Hucles, 8-Amy Rodriguez.

JPN: 1-Miho Fukumoto; 2-Yukari Kinga, 3-Hiromi Ikeda, 4-Azusa Iwashimizu, 7-Kozue Ando; 5-Miyuki Yanagita, 8-Aya Miyama, 10-Homare Sawa, 15-Mizuho Sakaguchi; 17-Yuki Nagasato, 11-Shinobu Ohno. Click to continue reading...

The U.S. Men's Olympic Team apparently walked in the Olympic opening ceremonies Friday (although I didn't see them and it just ended), but the women were otherwise engaged with their second group game against Japan in about two hours (live at 2 a.m. on USA).

Said Torrance Olympian Shannon Boxx after watching the ceremonies on TV (like we did):

"I thought the beginning was amazing.

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Galaxy beat writer Scott Wolf gave a few tidbits of today's story in blog posts Friday and here we learn just how happy Coach Ruud Gullit is to punt Abel Xavier. So are we, Ruud, so are we.

A massive crowd is expected in New York for David Beckham, sorry, today's game (3:30 p.m. live on Fox Soccer Channel).

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CHICAGO -- Goalkeeper Hope Solo is among 18 players picked for the U.S. Olympic women's soccer roster, nine months after she was kicked off the team at the World Cup.

Briana Scurry, who took over from Solo for last year's World Cup semifinal loss to Brazil, was left off the roster by coach Pia Sundhage, who replaced Greg Ryan following the World Cup debacle.

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Hope Solo is returning to China while Briana Scurry is staying home.

Less then a year after coach Greg Ryan set off a goalkeeper firestorm by benching Solo ahead of their World Cup semifinal match against Brazil in favor of Scurry, Hope will finally get her chance to win a big tournament in China. Click to continue reading...

U.S. Coach Pia Sundhage announced today her 18-player roster for the Olympics (with college, caps and goals in parentheses):

goalkeepers: Nicole Barnhart (Stanford, 9), Hope Solo (Washington, 64); defenders Rachel Buehler (Stanford, 11/0), Lori Chalupny (North Carolina, 70/6), Stephanie Cox (Portland, 42/0), Kate Markgraf (Notre Dame, 181/0), Heather Mitts (Florida, 78/2), Christie Rampone (Monmouth, 193/4); midfielders Shannon Boxx (Notre Dame, 92/18), Tobin Heath (North Carolina, 12/2), Angela Hucles (Virginia, 84/7), Carli Lloyd (Rutgers, 62/15), Heather O'Reilly (North Carolina, 90/19), Lindsay Tarpley (North Carolina, 96/26), Aly Wagner (Santa Clara, 121/21); forwards Natasha Kai (Hawaii, 48/19), Amy Rodriguez (USC, 19/4), Abby Wambach (Florida, 123/98).

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June 10, 2008 - Get Ready! On June 14, 2008 South Korea will host the second annual Peace Queen Cup. The Peace Queen Cup is a women's soccer tournament  created after the success of the Men's Peace Cup. The goal of the Peace Cup is "to harness the splendor and energy of football, the most popular [. Click to continue reading...