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Connecticut Olympians aim for gold

MICHAEL FORNABAIO

Article Last Updated: 08/03/2008 12:45:34 AM EDT

Click photo to enlarge

EMILY CARUSO 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Member in Women s Air Rifle Date of Birth: 6/4/1977 Birthplace: Stamford, Conn. Hometown: Fairfield, Conn. Resides: Colorado Springs, Colo. (U.S. Olympic Training Center) Shooting - Rifle 2004 U.S. Olympian Performance Short List 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Trials, 1st place in 10m Air Rifle, qualifying for a spot on the 2008 U.S. Olympic Team 2002, 2005, 2006 and 2007 USA Shooting Air Rifle National Champion 2006 Spring Selection Match Champion 2004 U.S. Olympic Team, air rifle, ninth Personal Emily first began shooting at the age of 11 as part of the Police Athletic League (PAL). She is a graduate from Norwich University in Vermont where she earned her degree in psychology. Emily is currently among a short list of shooting athletes living and training at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo. Contributed photo

The 2008 Summer Olympics begin with opening ceremonies Friday night in Beijing.

Bright and early the next morning, which will still be Friday night here in Connecticut, Emily Caruso will be shooting for gold. If everything goes as scheduled, her Olympics will be over in two and a half hours.

But Caruso, who grew up in Fairfield, will be just the vanguard for the state's contingent in China.

No fewer than nine members of the U.S. delegation have called Connecticut home. That includes tennis star James Blake, who also grew up in Fairfield, and Woodstock archer Butch Johnson, one of three Americans competing in a fifth Olympics this summer.

At least 10 other Olympic athletes from around the world attended college

James Blake, of the United States, hits a forehand on his way to defeating Dmitry Tursunov, of Russia, during the Rogers Cup tennis tournament in Toronto on Thursday, July 24, 2008. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Frank Gunn)

here, including three from UConn women's basketball powerhouse program, plus one of the sharpest fencers. Three softball players were Brakettes.

Eight Olympic baseball players have spent time with one of the state's Class AA teams. It all begins with Caruso in the first event of the games, the women's 10-meter air rifle. She made the trip from Colorado, where she has trained for eight years, to California to Korea to Beijing earlier this week.

Caruso tied for ninth four years ago in Athens, missing the final round on a tiebreaker. "She has pretty much dedicated herself to the sport," said Eugene Caruso, her father, on the phone from Florida. "We're just proud of her, her hard work and dedication. There's not a whole lot of glory in this sport. It's not like basketball or even swimming or track and field."

The 10-meter air rifle competition begins at 8:30 a.m. Saturday. Beijing is 12 hours ahead of Eastern Daylight Time, so here, that's Friday at 8:30 p.m. The final is scheduled to begin two hours later and take 20 minutes.

The 25-hour trip was too much, so Eugene and Trish Caruso plan a party at home for Friday night. They plan to pull up the streaming video on the Internet and watch as their daughter

US Rowing: Dan Walsh of Norwalk was an alternate for the 2004 Olympic Rowing team. Four years later Walsh is Beijing bound as a member of the men's heavywieght 8 boat representing the United States in the 2008 Olympics. Paul Desmarais/ Staff photographer

takes 40 shots to try to qualify for the final.

The top competitors take 10 more shots, and like that, the event will be over.

The Carusos hope it will end with a medal, but they are already thrilled with what has happened to Emily Caruso in the 20 years since Richard Hoinacki taught gun safety to her and her sister, Jaimee, at the Fairfield Police Athletic League.

"She's worked at the sport since she was 11 years old," Eugene Caruso said. "She's just worked to be the very best she can be at this and compete at every level along the way."

In addition to Caruso's competition, rowing, women's basketball, fencing, archery and sailing will all begin Saturday and are likely to involve athletes with Connecticut ties.

'Always

Phoenix Mercury forward Diana Taurasi, left, shoots over Seattle Storm forward Shyra Ely in the third quarter of a basketball game Friday, July 25, 2008, in Phoenix. The Mercury defeated the Storm 94-80. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

an honor'

Fairfield has another stake in Beijing, though James Blake has received a little more attention over the years. The eighth-ranked tennis player in the world will compete in his first Olympics. Competition begins next Sunday, and the 64-man draw won't be held until Thursday.

Blake, 28, didn't go to the Olympics in 2004, a season in which he broke his neck and began a long rehabilitation. He has competed in the Davis Cup, though, and won two matches in the final last year as the United States won for the first time since 1995.

"It's going to be a thrill," Blake said in the Miami Herald earlier this summer. "I've never been there. Never been part of the team. Being part of the Davis Cup team is always an honor. But the Olympic team, it's a little different.

"I'm excited to interact with all the other athletes. Because for them, it's the biggest thing in their careers, and to see how hard they've trained and just talk to them about how much they've sacrificed to get to that point is going to be a lot of fun.

Hopefully, I can meet a lot of new people."

If he spent enough time with the American rowers, he'd run into quite a few from Connecticut. There's Norwalk's Dan Walsh, 29, who was an alternate four years ago but made it this year on the men's eight team.

The United States is the defending champion, and three rowers return to the squad. There are the Winklevoss twins, Cameron and Tyler, who will compete together in the men's pairs. "We probably have the most experience in the eight boat, but we have done well in the pair and fared well for our squad," Cameron Winklevoss told the Greenwich Time.

"The pair is a beautiful event that requires a lot of synchronicity between two people." Until this, the twins, 26, were probably best known for a recently settled lawsuit, which alleged that a Harvard classmate had stolen the idea for Facebook from them.

Arriving in Beijing with less notoriety are Ken Jurkowski, 26, of New Fairfield, and Michelle Guerette, 27, of Bristol. They will each compete on their own in single sculls, each the lone U.S. representative in their event.

Four years ago in Athens, Guerette was on the women's quadruple sculls team that finished fifth. Another rower, Patrick Todd, was born in Danbury but lives in Cincinnati. Preliminaries are set to begin Saturday.

The finals in the singles and pairs are set for Aug. 16, and the men's eight final is scheduled for the next day. Women's basketball runs the length of the games, from Saturday through the gold-medal game Aug. 23.

Two former UConn stars, Diana Taurasi and Sue Bird, will be part of the United States team, winners at five of the past Olympics. Another Husky legend, Svetlana Abrosimova, is playing for Russia. Connecticut Sun head coach Mike Thibault is an assistant coach for the United States; one of his Sun players, Erin Phillips, will play for Australia.

Medal collector In archery, Johnson, 52, will be trying for his third medal in his fifth Olympics. He won a team gold in Atlanta in 1996, then a team bronze in Sydney in 2000. This year's event runs from Saturday to Aug. 15.

At the other extreme is Courtney King, 30, who lives in New Milford and will compete in the equestrian dressage event. King just made it into the Olympics, finishing third at the Olympic Selection Trials in June.

But she almost made it twice: She finished third in the rankings on Harmony's Mythilus, a gelding, and fourth on Idocus, a stallion. That qualified her and "Myth," as he's called on her Web site, to compete in Hong Kong. "Idy" is a reserve horse.

The team dressage competition is Aug. 13-14 in Hong Kong. The individual competition includes preliminaries Aug. 16 and finals Aug. 19. Six Yale students or alumni are competing, led by a returning medalist: Fencer Sada Jacobson won bronze four years ago in sabre, one of the three weapons competitions.

The Bulldogs also have a pair of sailors competing. Thomas Barrows, who'll be a junior in the fall, is competing for the United States Virgin Islands, while Stu McNay of Boston is a skipper in the 470 class.

Three former Elis rowers may compete for three different countries. Rachel Jeffers is an alternate on the United States team. Ashley Brzozowicz is on the Canadian women's eight crew, while Josh West is on Britain's men's eight.

Fairfield's and Sacred Heart's athletic departments weren't aware of any Olympians with ties to the school. Sacred Heart track standout Arman Dixon reached the quarterfinals in the 400 meters at the Olympic Trials but was eliminated there with the 19th-best time.

The Brakettes had alumnae on the first three U.S. Olympic softball teams, all gold medalists. Three made it this time, including pitcher Cat Osterman for a second time. Outfielder Kelly Kretschman makes her Olympic debut, as does third baseman Andrea Duran, who only made a cameo appearance in Stratford two years ago before joining the national team.

Several baseball Olympians came through the state during their minor-league careers, including two who played with the defunct New Haven Ravens. First baseman John Gall and pitcher Jeremy Cummings will play for the United States, six years after they called Yale Field home.

"When I started the season, I told people this was my last year unless something special happened," Cummings, 31, told the (Charlestown, W.Va.) Daily Mail. "A lot has happened, but I'm still looking at it like that."

Three former New Britain Rock Cats players are going to Beijing: left-handed pitcher Brian Duensing, third baseman Terry Tiffee, and Canadian outfielder Ryan Radmanovich.

Canada also has a pair of players, Chris Begg and Brooks McNiven, who have been with Norwich's Connecticut Defenders in the past year; American outfielder Nate Schierholtz played there two years ago.

Wilton's Kristine Lilly might have been the women's soccer team captain this month, but she had a baby girl July 22. We could keep going. The point is, Connecticut fans can find a rooting interest in at least 10 sports this month.

Following the locals

(Dates are in China, which is 12 hours later than Eastern Daylight Time.
An event that begins in the morning in China will actually begin the night before our time.)

ARCHERY - Saturday-Aug. 15. Butch Johnson's bullseye would be a second gold medal.
BASKETBALL - Saturday-Aug. 23. Sue Bird, Diana Taurasi and the United States try to win gold. So do Russia's Svetlana Abrosimova and Australia's Erin Phillips.
ROWING - Saturday-Aug. 17. The U.S. men's eight includes Norwalk's Dan Walsh. They begin Sunday, aiming for an Aug. 17 final; Yale's Josh West will battle for Great Britain. Greenwich twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss compete together in pairs. New Fairfield's Ken Jurkowski and Bristol's Michelle Guerette are in singles. They are trying to reach finals set for Aug. 16. Ashley Brzozowicz of Yale competes in the women's eight for Canada.
EQUESTRIAN, DRESSAGE (HONG KONG) - Team, Aug. 13-14; individual, Aug. 16, 19. New Milford's Courtney King is one of three Americans qualified.
SHOOTING - 10-meter air rifle, Saturday. Fairfield's Emily Caruso competes in 10-meter air rifle the very first morning.
TENNIS - Aug. 10-17 (women's final, Aug. 16). James Blake is six matches away from gold.
SAILING (Qingdao) - 470, Saturday- Aug. 18; laser, Aug. 10-19. The 470 includes Yale graduate Stu McNay. Thomas Barrows, a current Bulldog, competes in the laser class for the U.S. Virgin Islands.
FENCING, WOMEN'S SABRE - Individual, Saturday; team, Aug. 14 Former Yalie Sada Jacobson won bronze in Athens and returns.
BASEBALL - Aug. 13-23. The United States and Canada both have players who have competed for one of the state's minor-league teams.
SOFTBALL - Aug. 12-21. Former Brakettes Kelly Kretschman, Cat Osterman and Andrea Duran will help the United States defend its gold.