About The times. (Gainesville, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 9, 2018)
SPORTS The Times, Gainesville, Georgia | gainesvilletimes.com Sunday, December 9, 2018 3B INTERNATIONAL SOCCER ARMANDO FRANCA I Associated Press United States forward Alex Morgan attempts a shot at goal during the friendly women’s soccer match between Portugal and the United States on Thursday, Nov. 8, in Estoril, outside Lisbon, U.S. women’s team grouped with Sweden once again BY JEROME PUGMIRE AND ANNE M. PETERSON Associated Press PARIS — The defending champion United States is grouped with Sweden again for the Women’s World Cup next summer in France. The draw, which determined the group stage for the 24 teams set to play in soccer’s premier tournament, was held Saturday at a gala event in Paris amid a backdrop of unrest in the country. Host France will open the World Cup on June 7 with a match against South Korea in Paris. The Americans defeated Japan 5-2 — highlighted by Carli Lloyd’s hat trick — in Canada in 2015. The U.S. has played in every World Cup since the com petition started in 1991, winning the inaugural event and also in 1999. The No. l-ranked U.S. team landed in the same group with Sweden for the fifth straight World Cup and the sixth time overall. Also in Group F are Thailand and Chile, which is making its World Cup debut. The United States will open the tournament against Thai land in Reims on June 11. Sweden, ranked No. 9 in the world in the latest FIFA rank ings, will face its American foes on June 20 in Le Havre. It will be the final group match for both teams. “This is the first time for me (against the U.S.) but I know about the history, tough games during many years. We feel that we have a chance and that’s the most important thing,” said coach Peter Gerhardsson, who took over the team after Pia Sundhage’s retirement in 2017. The game will be a rematch of the Olympic quarterfinal in Brazil, where Sweden advanced on penalties after a 1-1 draw. Afterward, U.S. goalkeeper Hope Solo famously called the Swedes “cowards” for bunker ing on defense. “It’s a good draw for us, it pits against a couple of teams we’re not that familiar with, which I like and then obviously Sweden. I like having Sweden in the third game because it allows us to settle into the tournament,” said U.S. coach Jill Ellis, who was in Paris for the draw. The pots for the draw were based on the world ranking, except that No. 3 France, as host, was atop the first pot, fol lowed by the top-ranked U.S., Germany, England, Canada and Australia. The updated FIFA rankings were released on Friday. France has gone 7-1-2 this year, with the loss coming against England in the SheBe- lieves Cup in the United States. This will be the fourth World Cup for Les Bleues. Didier Deschamps, who coached the French men to victory in that side’s World Cup in Russia five months ago, got a huge roar Saturday as he walked onto stage. He said he’s confident in Les Bleues under coach Corinne Diacre. “I don’t have advice to give to Corinne, she knows women’s football far better than me. We’ve spoken several times, she knows that I’m at her disposal,” he said. “Obviously there’s a lot of expectation from the fans and media. Corinne and her staff know what awaits, but that shouldn’t be a negative thing.” England, ranked No. 4 in the world, drew a difficult group that includes No. 8 Japan and Scotland. England was the sur prise third-place finisher in Canada and has been on the rise in the past several years. The squad is coached by Phil Neville, a former Manchester United and England defender who played in three European Championships. The Lionesses have gone 7-2-3 under Neville this year. Also drawing a tough group was No. 6 Australia, which is joined by No. 10 Brazil and superstar Marta, who will be playing in her fifth World Cup. Australia defeated Brazil 1-0 in the Round of 16 in Canada. It will be the seventh World Cup for the Matildas, who went 7-4-6 this year. “The first immediate instinct is: It wouldn’t be a major foot ball tournament for the Matildas unless we had to play Brazil — 2007, 2011, 2015 and now 2019, and the Olympics we’ve crossed with Brazil,” coach Allen Stajcic said. “So very exciting to be playing them again, with and we’ve beaten each other so many times over the past few tournaments so it’s just exciting to be playing them again.” The United States went unde feated in play this year, finish ing 18-0-2, including a 2-0 victory over Canada in the final of the CONCACAF qualifying tourna ment. The team’s over all unbeaten streak is at 28 games, dating to a 1-0 loss to Australia in the 2017 Tournament of Nations. Lloyd, who attended the draw event, was asked if she was confi dent the United States can defend its title. “Pretty confident, I must say,” she said. “This squad is as talented as can be, we’ve got the depth and a great coach ing staff in place.” The draw took place inside La Seine Musicale, a dome shaped concert hall perched over the river Seine on the out skirts of Paris — and far enough away from the center not to be affected by the vehement anti government demonstrations taking place in the country. Ellis NBA Approaching a milestone Miami Heat guard Dwyane Wade shoots in front of Phoenix Suns forward Mikal Bridges (25) during the first half of a game on Friday, Dec. 7, in Phoenix. Dwyane Wade on the cusp of 1,000th career game played Associated Press LOS ANGELES — Dwyane Wade never thought he would play 1,000 games. And he’s unsure what the mile stone will mean. Wade is in line to become the 15th active player to appear in 1,000 reg ular-season games, the milestone he’ll hit assuming he plays Saturday night when the Miami Heat visit the Los Angeles Clippers. “I don’t even know the signifi cance of 1,000 games,” Wade said. “I don’t know if it’s a big deal. I think it’s just another number.” The Heat might disagree with that. Heat coach Erik Spoelstra didn’t know Wade was nearing the mile stone until earlier this week, and got wide-eyed when told that Wade had appeared in so many games. “That’s crazy to think about,” Spoelstra said. Nobody has played in 1,000 reg ular-season games for the Heat — Wade has played the most, 893 after Friday’s game in Phoenix. But he’ll be the fourth person to play career game No. 1,000 while wearing a Miami uniform, joining Rashard Lewis in 2013, Shaquille O’Neal in 2007 and Danny Schayes in 1996. “He’s showed an incredible amount of perseverance and resil iency,” Spoelstra said. “That might be one of the main things that I’ll preach and teach to young players, to be able to show the grit it takes. The second thing, which is just as important about Dwyane, is he rein vented himself and committed so much off the court so that he could perform and be healthy and play how he wanted to play. ” The 1,000th game is just one part of a most significant trip to Los Angeles for Wade. His newborn daughter, Kaavia James Union Wade, is there with his wife Gabrielle Union, so the trip to L.A. is a chance for Wade to see them for the first time in a couple of weeks. And on Monday, Wade and LeBron James — both members of the 2003 draft class, longtime friends, then teammates in Miami and Cleveland — could share a court for the final time when the Heat visit the Los Angeles Lakers. Wade and James will exchange jerseys after that game Monday. Wade has exchanged several with opponents already this season, but doing so with James will be particu larly poignant. “To be able to have that last matchup, I think for both me and LeBron, it’ll be cool,” Wade said. “We’ll have a moment at the end of the game to exchange jerseys and talk. When I decided that the jersey exchange was something I wanted to do, LeBron, Chris Paul and Carmelo Anthony were origi nally going to be the only guys I did it with. Then it took on a life of its own, but doing it with LeBron, it will be special.” Wade owns most of the Heat career records, is No. 30 on the NBA’s all-time scoring list and has a legacy that was secured long ago. The only stat he’s still chasing is blocks — he’s No. 2 on the all-time blocks list by a guard, looking up at only Michael Jordan and the 893 blocks he had in his legendary career. And in his 16th and final season before retirement, Wade — who has 857 — still has enough time to catch Jordan. “I just want to see if I can get the block record,” Wade said. “Everything else, I’m good. I’ve got Heat records. I got to 20,000 points and all these things. Things like 1,000 games are so cool when they happen, but I don’t really focus on things like that. I’ve just been blessed enough to be talented enough, long enough, to do this.” WINTER SPORTS WORLD CUP Shiffrin wins gold at World Cup super-G Associated Press ST. MORITZ, Switzerland — Mikaela Shiffrin won a World Cup super-G on Saturday, confirming the sla lom great’s arrival as a pure speed racer and all-round threat. Shiffrin, who got her first career super-G win last weekend, was 0.28 seconds faster than Lara Gut-Behrami and 0.42 clear of third-placed Tina Weirather on the sun-soaked Engiadina course in St. Moritz. Saturday’s race was just Shiffrin’s 10th super- G start in her nine seasons on the World Cup circuit, and the win days ago at Lake Louise, Canada, had been her first podium finish in the discipline. “I did not expect to win today,” Shiffrin said, acknowledging the confidence boost she brought from Canada to Switzerland. “Something is working right now and I’m enjoying it. Coming into this race I thought, ‘Yeah, now I have no excuses.’” Victory was a 47th on the World Cup tour for the 23-year-old American. Her fourth victory in eight races this season already gives her a runaway lead in defense of her overall World Cup title. With a maximum 200 points from the two super-G races this season, Shiffrin can afford to avoid some speed races. Shiffrin plans to skip the next World Cup stop — rescheduled downhill and super-G races on Dec. 18-19 at Val Gardena, Italy — to focus on preparing for her specialist technical events of slalom and giant slalom. “Pick and choose which races seem to be appropri ate,” she said, targeting her favored races on Dec. 21-22 at Courchevel, France. Shiffrin pointed to a little luck of the draw Saturday, getting start bib No. 12, which let her see tricky gates set by a Norway team coach that caught out earlier racers, including Olympic silver medalist Anna Veith. “If you were off balance, (you had) no chance,” Shif frin said. “My coaches did a great job to say exactly where I needed to be smart and where I could just go like a crazy woman.” Shiffrin’s run denied Gut-Behrami a repeat of her first career win in this race 10 years ago as a 17-year-old breakout star. Weirather is a two-time winner of the St. Moritz super-G and the Olympic bronze medalist. Olympic champion Ester Ledecka extended her run of disappointing World Cup super- G results, finishing 2.64 back in 29th place. Ledecka, whose only top-15 result in super- G was her gold medal run at Pyeongchang, seemed in discomfort after the race. The St. Moritz meeting includes a parallel giant sla lom event Sunday in the head-to-head racing format. Hirscher takes first on giant slalom VAL D’lSERE, France — Marcel Hirscher domi nated yet again in the World Cup on Saturday, winning a giant slalom by a huge 1.18-second margin. The seven-time defending overall champion pro tected his first-run lead in steady falling snow to leave Henrik Kristoffersen runner-up yet again. Kristoffersen has finished second to Hirscher in seven giant slaloms, including at the Pyeongchang Olympics, since last December. Matts Olsson placed third, trailing by 1.31 on the Face de Bellevarde slope. Shiffrin SWIMMING Olympic swimmers file suit against FINA BY GRAHAM DUNBAR Associated Press Three Olympic and world champion swimmers have filed an antitrust suit in California challenging governing body FINA’s control of organizing competitions. The legal challenge is the lat est faced by Olympic bodies from athletes seeking greater prize money and more say in running their sport. It was filed Friday on behalf of Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu and the United States’ Tom Shields and Michael Andrew and follows Switzerland-based FINA shutting down an independent meet in Italy with threats to ban competi tors. The planned event in Turin this month involved organiz ers of a proposed International Swimming League (ISL), which aims to operate outside FINA’s control and pay higher prize money. “ISL takes swimmers seri ously, not like FINA,” Hosszu, a three-time gold medalist at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olym pics, said in a statement. “My passion has always been to push swimming in the direction where swimmers are partners of the governing body, not just Muppets.” Lawyers in San Francisco for the swimmers said they “believe a professional league that will compensate its best athletes and better reward them for a life time’s worth of hard training and sacrifice is long overdue.” ISL organizers filed a separate and simultaneous suit against FINA for anticompetitive conduct, the lawyers said.Both suits are pending in the U.S. Dis trict Court for the Northern Dis trict of California. FINA did not immedi ately respond to a request for comment. In a similar case last year, Dutch speed skaters won a European Commission ruling in Brussels against the Swiss-based International Skating Union. They had wanted to compete in a South Korean-organized event in Dubai but were threatened with bans. KOJI SASAHARA I Associated Press U.S. swimmer Michael Andrew celebrates on the podium after winning the men’s 50m freestyle final during the Pan Pacific swimming championships in Tokyo, on Aug. 12.
