|
 |   |
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Multimedia Central Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities Work in Sports
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE |  |
High hopes Personable men's team looks for medal in Sydney
BOSTON (AP) -- With an old war horse, a tattooed tough guy and a pair of freckle-faced twins from Wisconsin, the U.S. men's Olympic team is sure to capture the hearts of Americans. More importantly, the gymnasts feel they can win a medal at the Sydney Olympics. Each of the six members selected for the team has a good story to tell. There are Paul and Morgan Hamm, fraternal twins from Waukesha, Wis., who will celebrate their 18th birthdays in Sydney. There's John Roethlisberger, a 30-year-old veteran who somehow survived, in his father's words, "the worst 24 scores he's ever put together in his career," to make his third Olympic team. And of course, there's Blaine Wilson, who has game to go along with the attitude -- and a new fiancee, as well. He proposed to Makare Desilets, a volleyball player from Fiji, after he won the Olympic trials Saturday night. Yet, for all the great sidelights, the thing that makes coach Peter Kormann happiest is that he finally feels he has a team that can compete for a spot among the top three at the Olympics. The performances Saturday buoyed that feeling, to the point that Kormann was making guarantees. "This is the best men's team since 1984, when they won the gold medal," Kormann said, recalling the Los Angeles games skipped by the Soviet Union and most of the Eastern Bloc. "When this team wins a medal at this Olympics, this will be the first men's team medal in a non-boycotted year. And that's going to happen this summer." After several slips and wobbles during U.S. nationals and in the first round of trials, there was no margin for error in the finals. Everyone was hitting routines, which is exactly what this team must have when it goes against China, Russia and the other world powerhouses. Instead of creating doubt, the trials built confidence the team will take to San Diego for its final training camp before the 14-hour flight across the Pacific to the Olympics. "In 1996, when Peter walked out and said we can win a medal, we were saying, 'Whatever,'" Wilson said. "Now it's different. When he walks out there and says we can win a medal, it's like, 'Yeah.' We all believe it and we all think it's going to happen." The selection process was seemingly built to create controversy. As expected, Kormann fielded his share of questions for the selection committee's decision to use its two wild-card selections to take sixth-place finisher Morgan Hamm and seventh-place Roethlisberger, a native of Fort Atkinson, Wis., over fifth-place finisher Jamie Nataile. But Natalie, who will go to Sydney as an alternate, took the decision in stride, never taking the bait when asked repeatedly if he felt cheated. He was introduced as part of the team at a small brunch for family members Sunday. "Jamie hit every routine," Kormann said. "If he can somehow find a way to make all the guys on the Olympic team do the same thing he just did, that medal will be a piece of cake." USA Gymnastics officials assured everyone that the selections were made according to the rules, and that pairing the veteran Roethlisberger and the Hamm twins on the team were coincidental byproducts, not a savvy marketing ploy. Still, the possibilities seem endless. "That's just a bonus for the media and for the sport of gymnastics," team director Ron Galimore said. "It just so happens that after all was said and done, we end up with a great story with Roethlisberger and with two high school-aged twins who can do Doublemint commercials for rest of their lives."
| ||||||||||||||||||||
