Sporting Madness

Photo: Natasha Kai celebrates her game-winning goal against Canada with teammate Amy Rodriguez (left). [Photo from the New York Daily News ]. I've already posted a more thorough recap of this morning's Canada-U.S. Olympic soccer match over at Out of Left Field , but I figured I'd do a quick GBU breakdown here. The Score: United States 2, Canada 1 in extra time. How I Saw It: On the tube. The Good: -Karina LeBlanc: LeBlanc has been the backup keeper to Erin McLeod for quite some time now, but she showed no rust when called upon after McLeod was injured early on. LeBlanc made several tremendous saves for Canada, including at least two on breakaways and one diving one-handed stop right in front of the goal line. Given the amount of quality chances the Americans had, LeBlanc was a huge reason that the Canadians were even able to take the game to extra time. She only allowed one goal, which came on a six-yard Natasha Kai header that was unstoppable by any mortal keeper...

Breaking down the Olympic soccer opener... The Score: Canada 2, Argentina 1 How I Saw It: On the tube. The Good: - Kara Lang scoring Canada's second goal off of a free kick awarded to Canada only moments earlier when she was viciously tackled by Argentina's Maria Quinones, who earned a yellow card for her trouble. Brilliant way to get vengeance without getting booked in the process. - Jodi-Ann Robinson , turning an impressive performance as a 19-year-old sub despite only being called up to the team earlier this week to fill in for the injured Amber Allen. The highlight of Robinson's play was the brilliant Hackey Sack move she performed to fool a defender, holding the ball between her legs while on the ground, flipping over and getting to her feet on the opposite side of her marker. Who ever said fooling around gets you nowhere? - Melissa Tancredi 's hockey-style screening of Argentine goalie Vanina Correa on Canada's first goal. I've always wanted to see tha...

A quick note that I'll be staying up to live-blog the opening game of the Canadian women's soccer team's quest for Olympic gold (yes, they start before Friday's opening ceremonies). Kick-off is at 4:45 ET (1:45 PT) this coming morning, and the game can be seen live on CBC. I'll also have notes from the Brazil-Germany match, which will be streaming live on CBCsports.ca. For background on the team and the competition, check out this excellent Ed Willes piece in the Vancouver Province , striker Kara Lang's blog on the Province's website, Gary Ahuja's excellent piece on defender Randee Hermus in the Langley Times or Duane's preview over at Out of Left Field . Hope to see you in the live-blog comment thread!