orangeman

I looked him up a few days ago in anticipation of this competition. Canada usually does well in new sports at the Olympics, until other countries catch up. Hoping he can continue his success in Paris, but I feel like new sports with ambiguous scoring usually have "interesting" winners at the Olympics, often to attract certain big market countries (look at the USA in snowboard slopestyle in 2014).

Got it, thanks!

The top 5 ranked teams not already qualified will do so through rankings, correct? Canada is now #5 on the yet to be qualified teams, but it also has to included teams from all continents. Africa and Oceania do not have qualified teams, so do they automatically get spots (Kenya and Australia)?

Just looking at Canada, it's pretty crazy you can go 5-2 in the qualifying tournament and be (potentially) ranked in the top 10 in the world and still not make the Olympics.

Great upset, but the road is still tough to qualify. All they can do now is win.

I personally never had any doubt. Unrelated, how does one go back to delete comments?

Just pointing out I never agreed to this. I was just jinxing them. I never had a doubt they'd come up with bronze.

My obsession with FOURTH is really just a running joke. All I really cared about this tournament was securing an Olympic berth and maybe getting experience for some of the younger guys. The Olympics will be a different beast with the NBAers there, and if Canada can field its best team of pros we should be a favourite for the podium. Which means we'll finish fourth.

We're Number Four! Bronze, Silver, Gold Those Get So Old! Just Out the Door, It's Canada at Number Four! Not Third, Not Second, Not First But Certainly Not the Worst! Who Would Ever Want More Than Comfortable Number Four? Why Can't the Other Nations See We Don't Even Want Top Three Deep In Our National Core Is a Maple Syrup Drenched Number Four!

They'll be playing the USA for bronze. Like I said...

I think this will be the case. NBAers have traditionally not played for Canada at qualifiers, but I think they'll show up at the Olympics. Everyone wants to be the Dream Team.

And unless Oleksiak comes back strong, the sprint freestyle has suddenly dried up, too. Still think they'll compete for a medal in the women's medley in Paris, and maybe even the mixed medley if they decide to go for it. The latter is much harder, though. Putting Angus/LePage on the breaststroke will improve the team, but replacing McNeil with Liendo won't really move the dial. Not sure if it'd be enough. The other good news is, reviewing the times from Fukuoka, Gaziev did great in the relays on the freestyle. After two strong finishes in the men's freestyle relays in Tokyo and Fukuoka, they're just lacking one more 47-second guy to really challenge for a medal.

Well, Canada settling in for a comfortable 4th place finish. At least they locked up that Olympic berth first.

Between this and Sophie Angus, Canada might have finally filled their breaststroke role in the relays. Unfortunately it comes at a time where they are falling behind in the other strokes.

Canada just setting up for their usual 4th place finish, as expected. At least they got their Olympic quota....where they will finish 4th.

They previously always finished 4th for Olympic qualifying at this tournament.

Canada off to the semis!

They get it done!

Here we go!

Canada and Serbia tied at the half. Not exactly where I thought it would be right now. Will this be a Brazil situation where they collapse in the 2nd half, or a Spain situation where they dominate?

They are very excited about it. Basketball is pretty big in Canada and we have some big NBA stars, but it's been 23 years since we qualified a men's team. https://www.cbc.ca/sports/olympics/summer/basketball/world-cup-basketball-men-canada-paris-sidebar-1.6956119 https://www.cbc.ca/sports/olympics/summer/basketball/world-cup-basketball-men-roundup-canada-spain-1.6956074

Wow, perfect series of events! Eastern Europe well represented in the quarterfinals. Canada in the harder bracket on paper, but at least on opposite side of USA. Hopefully all Canadian NBAers will show up in Paris.

Canada loses to Brazil, will need to beat defending champs Spain this weekend in order to move to the quarters. But hey, Latvia beat Spain today, and Canada beat Latvia. So, logically, it should be a "slam dunk", right? RIGHT? Bad collapse in the 4th, scoring only 60 points for the game after averaging over 110 previously (the most in the tournament). Not great. Outscored 24-13 in the 4th quarter. Yikes.

If finishing 4th resulted in Canadians getting medals their next time out, we'd be on top of the medal table all the time.

Gotta wonder if Sage Watson was there if she could have pushed them over the top. But then again, everyone was lucky that the Americans weren't in the final.