Griffith added to roster
Yolanda Griffith was added to the U.S. women’s basketball team Saturday.
Griffith, a center-forward for the WNBA’s Sacramento Monarchs, was a member of the gold medal-winning 2000 Olympics team. Her addition completes the 12-member team that will compete at the Summer Games in Athens beginning Aug. 13.
“I did it in 2000 and I want to get back and get the gold medal,” Griffith said. “Other countries are trying to take the gold medal from us and we’re going to have to defend what we did in 2000.”
The other members of the Olympic team are: Sue Bird, Swin Cash, Tamika Catchings, Shannon Johnson, Lisa Leslie, DeLisha Milton-Jones, Katie Smith, Dawn Staley, Sheryl Swoopes, Diana Taurasi and Tina Thompson.
Through nine games in the WNBA season, Griffith is averaging 15.7 points, 8.4 rebounds and 2.67 steals. In the U.S. team’s 8-0 run in the 2000 Olympics, she was its top rebounder (8.8) and No. 3 scorer (11.5).
Road cycling berths decided
Kristin Armstrong’s hope was to make the 2004 Olympics in the triathlon. Osteoarthritis in her hips ended that plan two years ago.
And Jason McCartney once was so discouraged and burned out by cycling, he simply quit and stayed away for two years.
Now, they’re Olympic-bound national champions.
Armstrong, of Boise, won the women’s national cycling road race championship Saturday at Redlands, Calif., earning an automatic berth on the Olympic team that will compete in Athens. She edged time trial national champion Christine Thorburn by about half a bike length, finishing the 73-mile course in 3 hours, 26 minutes, 12 seconds.
“The Olympics, man, I’ve been dreaming about that since I was a kid and it definitely tops it all,” Armstrong said. “It hasn’t hit me quite yet.”
McCartney, who battled mechanical problems early in the 118-mile men’s selection race and leg cramps in its latter stages, won by 61 seconds over David Zabriskie, finishing in 5 hours, 9 minutes, 57 seconds.
U.S. Olympic archery team set
A 34-year-old wildlife refuge manager who didn’t compete in his first Olympic-style archery tournament until last year secured a spot on the U.S. team Saturday.
John Magera earned the third and final spot as six days of U.S. Olympic trials finished at Mason, Ohio.
Vic Wunderle and Richard “Buster” Johnson got the two other spots on the team.
Jennifer Nichols finished first in the women’s trials, followed by Stephanie Arnold and two-time Olympian Janet Dykman from El Monte, Calif.
The Olympic archery competition starts Aug. 15 in Athens.
Magera, from Carterville, Ill., is a longtime shooting enthusiast who started participating in the Olympic-style event only two years ago and didn’t enter a tournament until last year.
His goal was to finish among the top 16.
Wunderle, from Mason City, Ill., defended the title he won in 2000, when he went on to earn the individual silver medal for the U.S. team that finished third.