RIO DE JANEIRO Italy’s women’s water polo team advanced to the Olympic final with a victory over Russian Federation on Wednesday, where it will compete for gold against either the United States or Hungary.
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“We really did change the game by playing really fast and intelligent”, Johnson said.
“It was hitting me pretty hard at the end of the game”.
Johnson, 21, who won four state titles at Ransom Everglades School, is the only non-Californian on the team and the first black woman to play for the Olympic team. Arianna Garibotti pumped in five goals and Roberta Bianconi scored twice as Italy improved to a ideal 5-0 in Rio de Janeiro. “We’re going to have our hands full, no doubt”. The opposition scored 10 or more goals exactly three times all season against the USA, while the Americans scored at least 10 goals on 36 occasions.
Hungary scored right away in the third quarter, on a Keszthelyi shot, to pull within 2 points of the USA, but it was the closest they would get. This will be the second meeting between the USA and Italy in Rio, with Italy winning the first match during pool play.
After Bujka scored to get Hungary within one at the beginning of the second half, the United States responded with four of the next five goals.
Hungary made another charge in the fourth, but Steffens and Kiley Neushul responded with a pair of goals to help put it away.
US men and women have won gold medals in nine different sports so far during the Rio Games, but in no other sport has their performance been so dominating.
There they were, still wearing their water polo caps, swinging hips to the drumbeat with dancers in huge green and yellow feathered headdresses as the crowd chanted “U-S-A, U-S-A!”
Italy’s women’s water polo team finished sixth in the 2008 Olympics, and seventh in 2012. The reigning world champions were never headed in a final that brought together the only two teams who had gone undefeated in all five of their previous games at Rio 2016. When the final seconds ticked off, Krikorian walked over to congratulate Italy coach Fabio Conti, and then was tackled into the pool by a couple of his jubilant players. “I want to get a goal or a stop for her because she has our backs”.
KK Clark celebrates after the United States defeated Italy in Friday’s women’s water polo championship in Rio de Janeiro. “To just all be in that circle and share that circle with one another, it was fun for me to just look around and look everybody in the eyes and say, ‘We dreamed of this and we did it'”.
Gabriel Jesus added two goals in the first half at the packed Maracana Stadium and Marquinhos and Luan scored a goal each in the second.
Ivanova and Olga Gorbunova scored the first two goals of the game, but Italy gradually took over.
Attacker Rachel Fattal of Seal Beach scored the only second period goal for the US, which led 5-3 at halftime. Teammate Roberta Bianconi added two goals, both on penalty shots.
Garibotti scored seven times in Italy’s first four games.
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Breaking his silence Friday, Lochte said he was sorry for his behavior surrounding an early-morning incident at a gas station that in many ways has become the defining moment in Rio.
