Chicago Olympians: Day 8

By Marcus Gilmer on Aug 16, 2008 4:10PM

We've hit the half-way point for the Olympics but there's still plenty of excitement, including Michael Phelps heart-stopping gold medal race. At this point, we suspect he may just be toying with our emotions just to keep us interested. But our Chicago-area Olympians, including Christine Loukas and Dwyane Wade, are providing some fireworks of their own and keeping us glued to our televisions. Which is a good thing, right? Screw it. Go Team Chicago!

Women's 3m Springboard Diving - Christine Loukas finished seventh in the semifinals with a final score of 329.00, but that was still enough to qualify her for the finals, being held tomorrow.

Men's Basketball - Team USA (I refuse to any longer use the lame nickname "The Redeem Team") continued their impressive showing in pool play, dropping Spain 119-82. Dwyane Wade had 16 pts, 6 reb, and 1 ast in the game. Team USA is still undefeated in pool play, which they complete Monday against Germany. The victory also clinched them the number one seed from Pool B. Playing for Argentina, Chicago Bull Andres Nocioni had 7 pts, 5 reb, and 1 ast in their 97-82 victory over Iran.

Men's Rowing - Jamie Schroeder and the U.S. men's quadruple sculls team finished second in their semifinal heat to advance to Sunday's final.

Softball - The Chicago Bandits' Jennie Finch is slipping: she gave up two hits today in the U.S.'s 7-0 shutout of Chinese Taipei.

Men's Indoor Volleyball - Tom Hoff, Sean Rooney, and the U.S. team made short work of the Chinese, taking barely over an hour to win 3-0 (25-22, 25-12, 25-18). Team USA also welcomed back coach Hugh McCutcheon, who has been absent following the horrific stabbing death of his father-in-law last week as the games started.