Sporting Madness

Photo: Karina LeBlanc makes a save while training with the Canadian women's team in 2007 [Photo from CTV.ca]. In what may perhaps be a big step forward for women's soccer in the United States, a Canadian played a key role. Karina LeBlanc , the long-serving Canadian international (69 caps at the senior level according to the CSA site ), made several impressive saves [ The Canadian Press ] to preserve a 2-0 victory for the Los Angeles Sol over the Washington Freedom in the first-ever game in the new Women's Professional Soccer league. It's been a long road to this point for LeBlanc. According to her bio page , she was born in Atlanta but moved to Maple Ridge, B.C. with her family at a young age. She went to Maple Ridge Secondary, where she didn't play high school soccer (as they didn't have a team at that point) but starred in basketball, track and field hockey. She then spent four very successful years playing soccer at the University of Nebraska, finishing wi...

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...