Headed To The Semifinals

Group play completed today and both teams have accomplished the first step of winning the Pan Ams, winning group play. The women continued their dominating run dispatching Puerto Rico 19-3 to set up a semifinal match with Brazil on Wednesday at 3:30pm cst. The men's team found themselves in another close match before pulling away against Argentina for the win 13-7. They actually trailed at one point in the game, the first time either USA team has trailed in this tournament. Their victory sets them up with a semifinal match against Cuba on Thursday at 3:30pm cst. All these games are scheduled to be streamed live at the live stream link provided in a previous post. Also you can follow along on twitter @usawp.

The men's game was more interesting than the women's as it was back and forth and almost had a bit of a rumble. Things got physical towards the end of the third quarter. After the Argentina coach was shown the door with a red card the two teams got tangled up in transition leading to both teams meeting near mid tank for some words. Cooler heads prevailed but the result was a 4 minute major penalty for Argentina leaving them a man down. That allowed the USA to take a close game and blow it open with a flurry of goals early in the fourth quarter.

Awesome photo of Tim Hutten from Getty images

So the win or go home type matches start tomorrow as we've gotten to the exciting part of the tournament. In the lead up there have been quite a few articles posted lately, many focusing on women's team captain Brenda Villa with her Mexican ties.

Here is one from TeamUSA.org - http://www.teamusa.org/news/2011/10/24/preparation-and-focus-key-for-women-s-water-polo/45180?ngb_id=3

Here is another on Brenda from the AP - http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/25/2472072/us-water-polo-captain-villa-at.html

Here is another on men's goal Chay Lapin being the latest in the Long Beach pipeline - http://www.presstelegram.com/sports/ci_19180157

As I get more links I'll send them along. In other news I took the wrong bus to the venue today breaking my streak of not getting lost in Mexico. Thankfully I was able to rally a cab after ending up at the volleyball arena and make it to the pool just before the opening sprint. I really should have gotten some Rosetta Stone going on before departing, but live and learn.

Excellent dinner tonight at the hotel, a steak pepito which is like a steak, guacamole, beans, tomato, cheese, and onions on a baguette. Very good. Never heard of it before, I'll probably get it again.

Back tomorrow with more.