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No team has been more dominant at the Olympics over the past 20 years then the U.S. womens basketball team, winning five straight gold medals.Theyll try and keep that streak going in Rio.Training time is always our biggest challenge, said three-time gold medalist Sue Bird. When you get to the medal rounds its one and done, but we have a lot of experience in those games and look to continue our recent success.The Americans have won 41 consecutive Olympic contests dating back to the bronze medal game in 1992, winning by an average of nearly 30 points a game. With nine players, including Bird, Diana Taurasi and Tamika Catchings, returning from the London Games, the U.S. is a heavy favorite to win another gold medal.Olympic newcomers Elena Delle Donne, Brittney Griner and Breanna Stewart will add a dynamic mix to the veteran core.The only potential thorn for the U.S. is lack of training time. While most other countries get to spend months together preparing, the U.S. has about two weeks before its first game. Although a lot of that time has been spent crisscrossing the country.Im hoping that they remember some of the stuff that we did last year at the World Championship and a couple years ago at the Olympics and maybe February at that little training camp that we had, U.S. coach Geno Auriemma said. Fortunately, theyre a lot of the same players that played. So we havent changed a whole lot. But theres not much time and theres not much that you can do to get ready. You just have to trust that theyre ... They never let you down. They always seem to respond when you need them to.The U.S. is in a difficult group with Serbia, China, Canada, Spain and Senegal.Obviously were in a tough group, Auriemma added. Because anytime you have the European champions like Serbia already in the group and Canada, the Americas champion, those are two really good teams. And then you add in China and Spain.Here are a few other things to watch for in womens basketball at the Olympics:A LITTLE REVENGEThe U.S. is also out for a little bit of revenge. The last time they played in Brazil at the 2006 World Championship, they lost to Russia in the semifinals. It was their only defeat in either the Olympics or worlds since 1992.I hadnt thought about that until you brought it up, Bird said laughing. The fans down there definitely know their basketball and like rooting against us. As the deficit against Russia grew, the cheers started getting louder for them.MEDAL CONTENDERSWhile the gold medal is most likely a foregone conclusion, the other two spots on the podium are up for grabs. France was the silver medalists in 2012 and Australia has won either a silver or bronze at every Olympics since 1996. Other candidates for a medal could be Serbia, which won the European championship, and Canada.SCHEDULE CHANGEThis year there will be a change in the competition structure. With the men and women playing in different arenas until the quarterfinal rounds, teams can play on consecutive days. The U.S. doesnt begin play until Sunday, Aug. 7 against Senegal. The Americans then play the next day against Spain. There will only be three or four games per day now instead of the six there used to be. Its the first time this format is being used since the 1984 Olympic in Los Angeles.GOLDEN GIRLSIf the U.S. does win another gold, Taurasi, Bird and Catchings will join Teresa Edwards and Lisa Leslie as the only basketball players to win four gold medals.SLAM DUNKAustralia center Liz Cambage became the first woman to dunk in the Olympics in London. Will the 6-foot-8 star have an encore in Brazil? Keep an eye on Brittney Griner, the odds are the 6-8 American will add her name to the list.IMPRESSIVE STREAKSOnly two other traditional team sports have longer consecutive gold medal streaks than the U.S. womens team. The American mens basketball team won seven consecutive golds from 1936-68. The India mens field hockey team won six in a row from 1928-56. Ecco Outlet España . Westbrook has missed 27 games since having a procedure on Dec. 27 to deal with swelling in his injured right knee — the third operation on the knee in nine months. Tienda De Zapatos Ecco . Jim Rutherford, President and General Manager of the Carolina Hurricanes, announced Wednesday that the team would assign Swedish forward Elias Lindholm to his nations team for the upcoming tournament. http://www.eccobaratas.es/ . 1 position. The Mustangs (6-0), who beat Queens 50-31 last weekend, earned 17 first-place votes and 287 points in voting by the Football Reporters of Canada. Western was last ranked first in the country in October 2011. Ecco España Baratas . A forerunning sled crashed into the worker Thursday at the Sanki Sliding Center. The unidentified worker broke both legs and was airlifted to a nearby hospital. Comprar Zapatos Ecco Online . PETERSBURG, Fla. A successful Esports Championship Series Season 1 saw a finals with a prize pool of $765,000, with $250,000 of that going to the champions, G2 Esports. Today FACEIT announced Season 2, which will house a substantial $1.75 million dollar amount that will go towards the prize pool and supportive funds. The new season starts on Oct. 7, and the finals kick off on Dec. 8. Additionally, there will be open qualifiers from Aug. 5-27, with the top two teams from the qualifiers taking on the bottom two teams from ECS last season in both the North American and European regions.We asked Michele Attisani, chief business officer and co-founder of FACEIT, to tell us more about the upcoming season.We are fascinated by the fact that the winner of the qualifiers gets co-ownership in the league and a chance to select representation at the leagues governing committee. How did the players respond to that idea during Season 1? Is this a selling point to bring in some of the best CS:GO teams?This is a slow burner for us. Its an important step and both ourselves and the teams are still getting used to how it will work on a more macro level. Teams have varying interest in the concept but they are all happy for the step forward in professionalism. As with mainstream sports, moving away from heaping all of the money onto prize pool and more into structural funding for teams especially leads to a much more stable infrastructure and giving teams and their players a voice in the league allows us to have global sign off on any changes. As a selling point, it is definitely a factor, but the strongest selling point is our good relationship and trust with all of the players.How did the fans respond to Season 1? I have to imagine you were able to see a ton of fan interaction with the event at Wembley.The event at The SSE Arena, Wembley, exceeded our expectations. We are so proud of everyone who put in the effort to make it happen and the overwhelming positive reaction from the fans, community, teams, players and talent was the greatest reward we could ask for.Esports is clearly growing at an amazing, almost alarming, rate. ECSs stance towards building an esports community is impressive, yet something many groups aspire to. Please elaborate on how ECS is indeed helping the esports community.Community is everything to us, it is our core ethos and something we intend to keep at the forefront of our decision-making. We aim to provide the community with great experiences every season and alongside that we focus on creating interactive content around the season, from ECS ladders on FACEIT, to the addition of open qualifiers that give anyone the chance of reaching the top. We even go the extra step to do a few extra special things for members of the community that come to our attention around our finals like giving away VIP tickets to our most loyal members or exclusive backstage tours, meeting the players and signing sessions.How can your event help bring stability to the CS:GO scene that has been rocked by a few issues as of late?The scene is definitely undergoing growing pains right now, but we aim to be a rock that anchors the industry, encourages best practices and constantly pushes professionalism. One core thing that we are working on with all of the other large organizers is stabilization of the yearly calendar to make sure players are not overworked and do have some down time to rest. For this reason we are releasing our schedule for Season 2 over three months in advance, as well as all schedules for 2017.Clearly the Turner Sports broadcasting of CS:GO ELeague is helping expand esports in the USA, yet Turners traditional media approach is certainly different than what ECS / FACEIT / Twitch deliver. How do you view Turners participation in esports?Turner has shown us that productioon levels can be so much more than they had been in the past, helping to push esports studio broadcasts to a new level, accessing a wider audience and encouraging new brands to invest.dddddddddddd We had the privilege to advise and help Turner and in turn they push us to produce better quality productions. For example, ECS is broadcast from the IMG studios in London, the countrys leading television studio complex. We have also created a team of industry veterans in both gaming and television.CS:GOs popularity in the U.S. and Europe is impressive. How important is it for CS:GO competition to be more globally, versus EU/American, focused?It is true that up until now Europe has been the powerhouse of the CS:GO scene and the general viewer base is very European and American focused, so obviously these two regions have the biggest sway when it comes to decision-making for production. That being said, China and South America are some real hot spots right now and with the ECS Season 1 finals being broadcast on television in over 35 countries globally, we have very high hopes for growth in these regions.For teams aspiring to qualify for the ECS esports league, what general advice do you have for them? Clearly, qualification is not easy.Obviously the level of skill in CS:GO at this moment is off the chart, but new talent is rising through the ranks every month. For Season 2 of the ECS we will be holding open qualifiers on FACEIT, which we recently announced, [the full media release for Season 2 can be found here: http://www.csgoleague.com ]. This is something we intended for Season One, but due to time constraints we couldnt provide. The FACEIT platform gives us a unique opportunity to be able to open up these qualifiers to anyone that wants to try for the top. Alternatively, there are ladders every week for new aspiring teams to get in a level of practice, and the FACEIT Pro League (FPL) is available to help aspiring players transition to professionals.CS:GO has been dominated by a few particularly strong teams. Are there any up-and-coming teams you think could pull off some upsets?Some are saying that our finals were G2s break out event, so we are excited to see what Season 2 brings. Brazilian teams are all looking very strong right now and there is a good chance we will see a few more of those breaking through in Season 2.What will you be doing this year to provide more fan interaction with the players?Production for the finals was something we feel created a great viewer experience, we handpicked top broadcasting talent from television (i.e., director of MTV EMA) to create the most immersive show possible. Fan signing sessions and the VIP experience at our finals had an amazing reaction from the fans and players, we want to do more things like this that can bring access to the players and fans so we have some interesting secret ideas for this in the next event.What talent do you plan on bringing in to cast the matches? And who is remaining from ECS past broadcasts?We have a very good relationship with talent across the board and the level of talent in CS:GO is incredible so we often feel spoiled for choice. We were really happy with the lineup for Season 1 and we think they all worked very well together. But of course, as always, we will listen to the community before making our choices for Season 2.Will you be adding any new features to the broadcast portion from Season 1? More statistics, more replays, etc.?In this industry, if you are not evolving every single show, then you are going to fail. Other than some exciting new statistics coming from the FACEIT platform, you will have to wait and see as to what we have planned. ' ' '