DC GAMES '16: The Team Of A Generation

A DCBLOG Sports Special

BY DC CUEVA                     

> @DC408Dxtr / @DC408DxNow

On Wednesday, August 3rd, competition kicked off at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games as the action began - as it always does in the summer games - with the first group stage matches in the women's and men's soccer competitions - two days before the Opening Ceremony officially began the Olympiad. These Games have been anticipated for some time, but after a slew of controversies taking place in the lead-up to this first week of August the attention has turned, as they should be for the next two & a half weeks, on the athletes and the moments they're bringing us from Brazil. So far, the focus has been mainly on them and we've had plenty of great moments with more to come.

   The past three years, American soccer fans have been inundated with the very best "the beautiful game" has to offer as the sport has risen in the world's largest sports market. The 2014 FIFA World Cup attracted record attention here as once again the U.S. followed the fortunes of the Men's National Team in record numbers in Brazil. This year, Copa América Centenario brought top level men's international soccer to these shores for the first time since the '94 World Cup, and overseas there was UEFA EURO 2016 where Christiano Ronaldo and Portugal win the title and capped off a summer that also saw him and Real Madrid capture the Champions League. And as its new season begins, the Premier League has grown in stature in America with NBC's unparalleled commitment to England's pastime and Leicester City winning the EPL title in true underdog fashion.

   But above all else, the biggest story in American soccer, has been the Women's National Team. For one month in June and July of last year, sports fans once again became enthralled in a sport that until the '90s has not thrived in a country grown on a different sports agenda, but this time it was a team that became a pop culture phenomenon. And in a 16-minute span, they went to another level as the United States women won the FIFA Women's World Cup for an unprecedented third time. It would become the defining moment of American soccer in the last 25 years, and quite a ride the women's program has gone through to get to this position as the dominant force in the women's game, despite the ending they had in Rio. In spite of all of this incredible success, it hasn't always been gold for a sport now entrenched as one of the most popular.