Sunday was another strong day for the US with US coming close to gold in both fencing and shotgun before picking up medals. Cycling teased the country with a US rider not even a quarter kilometer from gold, and then swimming brought the house down in the evening with four pairs of swimmers reaching tomorrow night’s finals and, two gold medals, and three other medal. The weather was not great in Rio affecting several events and cancelling the rowing entirely for the day. Catch up on it all and preview Monday in our daily update.
August 7th Recap:
Basketball
The US women opened their Olympics with a dominant thumping of Senegal 121-56. Diana Taurasi, Sylvia Fowles, and Breanna Stewart each had 15 points in the win, all of Taurasi’s on threes. Sue Bird played distributor well with eight assists. The US goes top of their group and will play again Monday at 11 AM when they take on Spain, also 1-0 after beating Serbia.
Beach Volleyball
The first loss by a US beach volleyball team came on Sunday as Lauren Fendrick and Brooke Sweat lost their opening pool match against Monika Brzostek and Kinga Kolosinska in three sets 21-14, 13-21, 7-15. The Americans next face pool leaders Talita Antunes and Larissa Franca Tuesday at 3:30 PM. On the men’s side Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena beat Mohamed Arafet Naceur and Choaib Belhaj Salah fairly easily 21-7, 21-13 to take the lead in their pool. Up next is Lombardo Ontiveros and Juan Virgen on Tuesday at 10 AM in a matchup of the top two in the pool.
Canoe
Both Americans competing in the men’s slalom events on Sunday advanced to the semifinals. Casey Eichfeld didn’t post a great time in either run of the C1 but they were good enough to place him 12th as he made it to the semifinals by just under five seconds. Michal Smolen posted a top ten time on his second run in the K1 as he was three seconds clear in advancing to the semifinals. Both Eichfeld on Thursday and Smolen on Wednesday will need to be better if they want to advance to their respective finals.
Cycling
The women’s road race delivered one of the most exciting events of Rio so far. The field stayed together for the most part for most of the race though at times various riders pulled out to leads and at one point Kristin Armstrong did some hard work in pulling the field back up to those leaders. It was a sacrifice she made for her teammates and dropped out of the race before the final climb. Teammates Megan Guarnier and Evelyn Stevens tried to move towards the front in the final climb but eventually they just didn’t have the attack in them and they finished 11th and 12th. The one that stole the show for the US was Mara Abbott. After leading the attack up the climb Abbott was passed and was second as they began their treacherous descent. As the leader pulled away from her Abbott chose to manage the descent with some caution as there are a number of tricky turns. As it turned out the leader would suffer a horrific fall that left her with three spinal fractures (she’s expected to recover) and Abbott surged to the lead. Over the final 20km she clung to a one minute lead as it slowly dissipated. She was still up seven seconds with 500m left but she didn’t have a sprint left in her legs and the three riders chasing her all flew by and left her alone in fourth. It was an incredible effort and race from Abbott but she was left without a medal in the end.
Equestrian
The final two eventing riders for the US competed in the dressage portion on Sunday. Lauren Kieffer posted a 47.30 that has her 33rd while Phillip Dutton posted the top US score of 43.60 and is 15th overall. The combined US score of 137.50 has them in sixth place after the first day of competition.
Fencing
We knew going into Sunday that two Americans were stuck in the same 1/16th of the bracket and only one of those two could advance to the quarterfinals. We learned quickly it wouldn’t be Miles Chamley-Watson as he was eliminated by Artur Akhmatkhuzin 15-13 in the round of 32. Akhmatkhuzin wouldn’t last long as he would be the second opponent for Alexander Massialas after he had defeated Mohamed Essam 15-7 to open. Massialas got revenge for his fellow countrymen 15-9 and then advanced to the semifinals with a 15-14 epic comeback win over Giorgio Avola. Gerek Meinhardt had a blowout win in the round of 32 15-4 over Maximillien van Haaster but needed every last point in a 15-14 win over Erwann Le Pechoux to reach the quarterfinals. Meinhardt’s quest for a medal came to an end in a 15-13 loss to Richard Kruse. Massialas again avenged his countrymen defeating Kruse in the semifinals 15-9 but dropped the gold medal match 15-11 to Daniele Garozzo and had to settle for silver.
Gymnastics
We knew the US would reach the women’s team final and they did cruise to that with far and away the best score. The real question on Sunday was which of the women would reach the all-around final. Simone Biles did post the top score in qualifying by over a point and a half and the duel for the second American spot (only two per country are allowed) was between Aly Raisman and Gabby Douglas. In the end Raisman finished a little under a half a point ahead of Douglas to grab the all-around final spot. Douglas had the third highest all-around qualifying score so she would have been a likely medalists had she made the final.
The US also qualified seven for the individual finals. Biles was the top qualifier on the floor, on the vault, and on the balance beam. Leading the way as the top qualifier on the uneven bars as Madison Kocian. Douglas made the uneven bars final in third, Raisman made the floor final in second,and Laurie Hernandez made the balance beam final in second.
Judo
Judo got underway Sunday for the US as Angelica Delgado lost to Adiyasambuu Tsolomon in the women’s 52kg round of 32 despite a strong effort. Tsolomon scored a waza-ari to open the scoring forcing Delgado to try and play catchup. Scoring chances came often for Delgado as she notched three yukos, but nothing serious enough to match Tsolomon’s waza-ari. Late in the match Tsolomon was warned twice for stalling but she managed to escape with the win.
Rowing
Rowing was completely scratched on Sunday as conditions in Rio were so windy that the events could not be held. The result of the cancellation of Sunday’s races is a revamped schedule for the rest of the week that changed the timing of some of the events. For an idea of how that affected Monday’s schedule see below.
Rugby Sevens
The US knew their medal hopes depending on pulling an upset on Sunday. Having lost to Fiji in their group opener the US would need to beat Australia in the final group match to avoid facing New Zealand in the semifinals. Australia opened with a score in the first half of the matchup with the US but the American rallied through scores by Jessica Javelet two minutes apart to take a 12-5 lead with three minutes left. The Americans almost made it to the finish line in front but a late Australia score was converted and the match finished a 12-12 draw.
A draw wasn’t enough to avoid New Zealand so the US medal hopes came down to a matchup with the Kiwis. The US played tough throughout the match and had a major opportunity in the second half as New Zealand was yellow carded giving the US a one-woman advantage for two minutes. Starting in the offensive third the US was unable to turn the advantage into points and would end up losing the match 5-0 to end their medal hopes. The US is now into the 5th-8th place bracket and faces Fiji today at 1 PM.
Shooting
The first event that took place on Sunday was the women’s 10m air pistol qualification round. Lydia Paterson was very consistent during the event but scores of 94 and 95 through her four rounds were only enough to place 29th with a 378 total. Paterson was six short of the 96 average needed to qualify for the finals. Finishing a bit further back in 40th was Enkelejda Shehu who averaged 93 in four rounds between 92 and 94 for a total of 372.
The other event on Sunday was the women’s trap. Corey Cogdell was consistent throughout the three qualifying rounds going 22-23-22 to finish fifth with a 68 total. One less hit target and Cogdell would have been forced to take part in a shoot-off for a spot in the final. In the semifinal Cogdell would manage to get into a tie for second making 13/15 targets but missed her first shot in the shoot-off and was knocked into the bronze medal final. Cogdell remained consistent hitting 13/15 in that final which was enough to force a shoot-off. This time it was Cogdell’s opponent with the opening miss and Cogdell secured her second Olympic bronze after taking one eight years ago in Beijing.
Swimming
A great day in the pool saw the US take home two golds, three bronze medals, and advance eight swimmers to finals that will happen on Monday night. The first gold belonged to Katie Ledecky who won the women’s 400m freestyle in world record time (nearly two seconds better than her old mark). Ledecky was joined on the medal stand in the event by Leah Smith who took home the bronze despite finishing over five seconds behind Ledecky’s record pace. The other gold for the US came in the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay. Caeleb Dressel, Michael Phelps, Ryan Held, and Nathan Adrian did the work in the final as the US won by over half a second. Anthony Ervin, Jimmy Feigen, and Blake Pieroni all swam in the heat for the US.
In events with semifinals on Sunday night Kathleen Baker had the top time in the women’s 100m backstroke semifinals while Olivia Smoliga qualified for the last spot in the final, Monday night at 9:30 PM. Conor Dwyer was third with Townley Haas sixth in the men’s 200m freestyle as both reached the 9:21 PM Monday final. In the 100m breaststroke Lilly King took the top spot from the semifinals with Katie Meili advancing in sixth to Monday’s 9:54 PM final. Finally in the men’s 100m backstroke Ryan Murphy and David Plummer went 1-2 in the semifinals and now there’s a fascinating inner two lanes with both Americans gold medal threats in Monday’s 9:38 PM final.
Tennis
Overall it was a good day for the US because they won four of their five matches, but the shocking first round exit of potential women’s doubles gold medalists Serena Williams and Venus Williams put a real damper on the day. The Williams sisters lost 3-6, 4-6 to Lucie Safarova and Barbora Strycova, their first ever Olympic doubles loss, and the Olympic career of Venus may be over. The US isn’t out though in women’s doubles as Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Coco Vandeweghe are medal contenders and cruised past Anabel Medina Garrigues and Arantxa Parra-Santonja in a 6-1, 6-1 win. Their round of 16 match against Timea Bacsinszky and Martina Hingis will be on Monday.
In men’s doubles it was two wins in two tries for the Americans as Steve Johnson and Jack Sock quickly took out Julio Peralta and Hans Podlipnik-Castillo 6-2, 6-2 while Brian Baker and Rajeev Ram had a surprisingly strong 6-1, 6-4 win over Gael Monfils and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. Both have round of 16 matches today with Johnson and Sock taking on Juan-Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah while Baker and Ram take on Oliver Marach and Alexander Peya.
The final match on Sunday for the US was Serena Williams against Daria Gavrilova in the women’s round of 64. Williams got the win 6-3, 6-3 and now faces Alize Cornet on Monday as she tries to keep her dreams alive of a singles gold in Rio.
Volleyball
The US men didn’t open their Olympics the way they had hoped to as they were swept by rivals to the north Canada 23-25, 17-25, 23-25. The loss was a real surprise for the US but shouldn’t be problematic long term in Rio as long as they start taking care of business. Their next match is with 1-0 group leaders Italy and will certainly be a tough one for the Americans. That’ll come on Tuesday at 2 PM.
August 7th Preview:
All times ET!! All events should be available online via NBC’s Olympic website and apps (assuming a cable package that gives you access). What is live in ET/CT is often tape delayed in MT/PT. Yell at NBC for their ridiculous decision to tape delay an Olympics happening one hour east of ET, it’s insane. Schedules of competition and of course TV coverage subject to change, especially if the US competitors unexpectedly advance in a competition.
Archery
The very first archer to take part in the individual events will be Mackenzie Brown as she starts the women’s round of 64 on Monday at 8:26 AM against Claudia Mandia. If Brown is able to win the match she’ll move into the round of 32 which starts less than an hour later at 9:05 AM. Two wins on the day will move her into the round of 16 on Thursday.
Archery will be covered on tape delay on NBCSN in their coverage from 1-3 PM and from 3-6 PM.
Basketball
The US women will play for the second straight day as they take on Spain at 11 AM in their second group game. Both teams are 1-0 though Spain’s six point margin over Serbia was just slightly smaller than the 65 point win by the US against Senegal. The US men also play on Monday as they take on Venezuela at 6 PM. These teams met in a pre-Olympics warmup and the US won comfortably despite not shooting well. Venezuela dropped their opener to Serbia by 24.
NBCSN will have coverage of both the men’s and women’s games LIVE.
Beach Volleyball
On Monday in beach volleyball Jake Gibb and Casey Patterson take on Alexander Huber and Robin Seidl as they look to open pool play with a couple of wins. The men will take to the beach volleyball court at 3:30 PM. Wrapping up the day on the beach will be April Ross and Kerri Walsh Jennings against Wang Fan and Yue Yuan at 11 PM. These two teams both won their opening pool match so the winner will be in great shape to top the group.
NBC plans to carry both matches LIVE.
Boxing
The only boxing match on Monday for the US is Nico Hernandez going in the round of 16 of the light flyweight division against Vasilii Egorov. The American-Russian matchup will be a tough one as the Russian is one of the best in the world in the division.
The bout is at 4:45 PM ET and NBCSN will have tape delayed coverage between 9:30 PM and 12 AM.
Canoe
Casey Eichfeld and Devin McEwan will compete in the C2 slalom competition on Monday in the heats. They’ll need one of the 15 best times between the two runs to advance to the semifinals on Thursday. They will take run one at 11:32 AM and run two at 1:32 PM.
NBC should have some live coverage between 10 AM and 2 PM that should pick up both runs. They will also cover the sport live between 3:45 and 5 PM.
Diving
The very first diving event of Rio for the US is on Monday with David Boudia and Steele Johnson competing in the men’s synchronized 10m platform. They’ll have six dives in the event with the top total scores winning.
You’ll see the diving delayed in the evening on NBC between 8 PM and 12 AM.
Equestrian
After the first part of the eventing competition the US sits in sixth as a team with Phillip Dutton the top individual in 15th while Clark Montgomery in 24th. The competition moves into the cross-country phase on Monday as all the riders will go during the day. Boyd Martin will be first off at 9:45 AM while Montgomery goes at 11:02 AM. Lauren Kieffer goes third at 12:27 PM while Dutton ends the day at 1:44 PM.
Equestrian will be covered in part LIVE on USA between 9 AM and 2:30 PM so we very well may see all four riders go live in the US.
Fencing
The US women will take the pistes for the women’s sabre individual competition on Monday. Mariel Zagunis starts things off at 9 AM with a round of 32 match against an opponent yet to be determined. Dagmara Wozniak is up next against Vassiliki Vougiouka at 9:40 AM while Ibtihaj Muhammad goes at 10 AM against Olena Kravatsa. Muhammad and Wozniak would face round of 16 matches at 11 AM if they win while Zagunis would go at 10:35 AM. All four quarterfinals are at 11:40 AM and Zagunis and Wozniak are in the same quarter of the bracket. They would be in the 3:30 PM semifinal while Muhammad would be in the 3 PM semifinal. If anyone reaches the semifinals they would be in either the bronze match at 4:15 PM or the gold match at 4:45 PM.
NBCSN will be picking up some LIVE fencing in their coverage between 9 and 11 AM but USA should have the round of 16 matches for the Americans LIVE and then again on tape delay between 12 and 2:30 PM. The final is scheduled to be LIVE on NBCSN as well.
Field Hockey
After a massive 2-1 win over Argentina to open the Olympics the US faces Australia at 9 AM in their second group match. With the top four of six advancing the win over Argentina has the US on the doorstep and an upset today could make them likely to advance. Australia lost their opener 1-0 to Great Britain so they’ll be ready to bounce back today.
NBCSN will have LIVE coverage of the match.
Gymnastics
With the qualifying rounds out of the way gymnastics will turn to the men’s team event on Monday. The US qualified in second place behind China and they will be paired up to make their rotations together with the countries trading off who goes first on each apparatus. The US will start on floor with Alex Naddour, Sam Mikulak, and Jake Dalton going. All three scores count so avoiding bad routines is crucial. On the pommel horse the US will have Danell Leyva, Mikulak, and Naddour. On the rings Chris Brooks will have his first routine followed by Dalton and Naddour. The US will go with Mikulak, Dalton, and Naddour on the vault before using the same lineup for both parallel bars and the horizontal bar, Mikulak, Brooks, and Leyva.
The event starts at 3 PM but you won’t see it on TV until NBC’s tape delayed coverage between 8 PM and 12 AM.
Judo
Two more judoka will have their Olympic competition for the US on Monday. Times are difficult to project in judo as the schedule is a “followed by” system with no guaranteed start times but Nick Delpopolo will probably have his round of 32 match in the 73kg division against Ahmed Goumar no earlier than 10 AM. Not much later on the same mat Marti Malloy will have a round of 16 57kg match against a yet to be determined opponent. Likely no earlier than 10:15 AM. The morning session will have any rounds up to the quarterfinals while the repechage (for quarterfinal losers) and semifinals will be in the evening session beginning at 2:30 PM.
The women’s quartefinals are to be covered on tape delay on NBCSN between 1 and 3 PM with today’s finals LIVE on MSNBC.
Rowing
Things will start off for the US with Tracy Eisser, Megan Kalmoe, Grace Latz, and Adrienne Martelli competeing in the women’s quadruple sculls at 7:40 AM. In a race of five the US crew need only a top four finish to advance to the final. Ten minutes later at 7:50 AM in the women’s eight Amanda Elmore, Tessa Gobbo, Eleanor Logan, Meghan Musnicki, Amanda Polk, Emily Regan, Lauren Schmetterling, Kerry Simmonds, and Katelin Snyder will compete in the first of two heats. The top crew in the heat will go straight to the final while the rest of the boats face a repechage. The women’s eight will be followd by the men’s eight at 8:20 AM in the second of two heats. Mike DiSanto, Sam Dommer, Austin Hack, Alex Karwoski, Stephen Kasprzyk, Rob Munn, Glenn Ochal, Hans Struzyna, and Sam Ojserkis will need to win the heat to move into the final directly without stopping first in the repechage.
Repechage action will pick back up in the men’s pair at 9:30 AM with Nareg Guregian and Anders Weiss needing to finish in the top three of four to move on into the semifinals. They’ll be followed by the repechage of the women’s double sculls where Meghan O’Leary and Ellen Tomek need the same top three result to advance to the semifinals themselves in the 9:40 AM race.
Just starting on Monday at 10:10 AM will be the women’s lightweight double sculls crew of Kate Bertko and Devery Karz in the first of four heats. The top two of five in their heat will advance to the semifinals while the remaining three boats will head to the repechages. Then later in the morning at 11 AM the men’s lightweight double sculls boat of Andrew Campbell and Joshua Konieczny will be in the second heat of that event’s as it begins. The top two of the five in the heat wil head to the semifinals while the other three will have to fight through the repechages.
Beginning their competition in the third heat of the women’s pair Grace Luczak and Felice Mueller will open their Olympics at 11:50 AM. As long as the US crew is in the top three they’ll go to the semifinals. If they finish in the bottom two it’ll be the repechage. Twenty minutes later at 12:10 PM the final race of the day for the US is the first of the Olympics for Charlie Cole, Henrik Rummel, Matt Miller, and Seth Weil. The men’s four crew will be racing in the second of three heats and only need to finish above last in the four boat heat to reach the semifinals. If they do happen to finish last they still have the repechage to save their Olympics.
NBC will pick up rowing coverage LIVE during their coverage from 10 AM-2 PM while tape delayed coverage will be part of NBCSN’s coverage from 3-6 PM.
Rugby Sevens
After losing in the quarterfinals to New Zealand on Sunday the US is out of medal contention but will still be trying to end Rio on a positive note with their last two games on Monday. They will start with Fiji at 1 PM in the 5th-8th semifinals. Win or lose the US will play again against either France or Spain depending on who got the same result. It’s a chance to avenge their Olympic opening loss to Fiji that cost the US a realistic shot at a medal.
NBCSN should have LIVE coverage of the first match while the second will be LIVE on CNBC at 5 PM if the US gets a win against Fiji.
Sailing
Sailing events begin on Monday at the Olympics with multiple races taking place in four different events. At 12:05 PM two men’s races are scheduled to begin, Charlie Buckingham in the Men’s Laser and Pedro Pascual in the men’s RS:X. Ten minutes later at 12:15 PM The women’s laser radial race with Paige Railey and the women’s RS:X with Marion Lepert kick off. The two RS:X events will have three races on Monday while the laser and laser radial events have two races on Monday.
MSNBC will have some sailing coverage on delay in their coverage from 3-5 PM.
Shooting
The only event featuring the US shooters on Monday will be the men’s 10m air rifle. Qualifications are at 8 AM where Lucas Kozeniesky and Daniel Lowe will be taking part. There will be six rounds of 10 shots in qualifying with the top eight moving into the final later in the day at 11 AM.
The qualifying will not have any video available, even online, and the final has no scheduled TV coverage.
Swimming
Seven events will be contested on Monday, one less than Sunday as there is no relay race today. In the afternoon session there will be three events starting with heats leading into semifinals in the evening. In all of these races the top 16 advance to the semifinals where only the top eight move on to finals on Tuesday. Missy Franklin at 12:17 and then at 12:22 PM Katie Ledecky will be competing in the women’s 200m freestyle with the semifinals later in the evening at 9:03 and 9:12 PM. After the women’s race Tom Shields at 12:39 PM and Michael Phelps at 12:44 PM will be competing in the men’s 200m butterfly. The semifinals for that event are at 10:10 and 10:19 PM on Monday evening. The final event starting is the women’s 200m individual medley where Maya DiRado at 1:06 PM and Mel Margalis at 1:11 PM will be trying to get into the semifinals at 10:36/10:45 PM in the evening.
Four finals will be contested in the evening starting with Townley Haas and Conor Dwyer in the men’s 200m freestyle at 9:21 PM. Nine minutes later at 9:30 PM it will be the women’s turn as the 100m backstroke final takes off with Olivia Smoliga and Kathleen Baker in the field. The US has the top two seeds in the final of the men’s 100m backstroke at 9:38 PM in Ryan Murphy and David Plummer. The final race for gold on Monday night will be in the women’s 100m breaststroke where Katie Meili and Lilly King will be swimming to try and top the world.
NBC will have full LIVE coverage of the swimming both during the day session and during the evening session.
Table Tennis
The only individual still alive in the singles competitions will get her third round match underway quickly on Monday. Lily Zhang is first up to start the day at 9 AM when she takes on Hyowon Suh. If Zhang should advance to the round of 16 she’ll play again later in the day at 7:30 PM. Two wins for Zhang on Monday will move her into the quarterfinals on Tuesday.
USA will carry Zhang’s morning match LIVE while more tape delayed coverage of table tennis comes on USA between 12 and 2:30 PM. More tape delayed coverage in CNBC’s 5-8 PM coverage window.
Tennis
Some of these matchups were mentioned in the recap above as four of the five Americans on court Monday advanced on Sunday as well. Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Coco Vandeweghe have a round of 16 doubles match against Timea Bacsinszky and Martina Hingis that will lead off at 10 AM as will Madison Keys in her round of 32 singles match against Kristina Mladenovic. We also have a decent guess on time for Serena Williams against Alize Cornet in the singles round of 32. That match will begin no earlier than 5:45 PM and has a good chance of starting right then.
It’ll be a real guessing game as to when the two men’s doubles matches happen. Steve Johnson and Jack Sock take on Juan-Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah in a match that may be as early as 2:30 PM while it probably won’t be any earlier than 4 PM for Brian Baker and Rajeev Ram against Oliver Marach and Alexander Peya. Both men’s doubles matches are in the round of 16.
Bravo has full LIVE coverage on TV for tennis while streams of individual matches are available online.
Volleyball
Coming off a three set sweep of Puerto Rico on Saturday the US women return to the court to take on the Netherlands. Both teams are 1-0 and a win here puts the US in great position in the group stage with three more games to come.
2 PM ET start time for this one and NBC will carry it LIVE.
Water Polo
The US men opened with a 7-5 loss to defending gold medalists Croatia and should still be just fine in their quest to a top four finish and a spot in the quarterfinals. That said getting a win over Spain today would be a good way to make sure things don’t start to get a bit nervy.
The US takes on also 0-1 Spain at 10:40 AM and you’ll see it LIVE on NBC.
