Proud to be an American

By Dan Rodgers

The past few days have been rather exciting in the United States of America. On Wednesday June 23, the United States faced a win or go home scenario against Algeria in the World Cup. It wasn't exactly a win-or-go-home scenario until England scored against Slovenia.

Regulation time had expired with the scored still tied at...nil-nil? (0-0 for us in the states) The USA's chances were beginning to look slimmer and slimmer, but Landon Donovan to the rescue! Less than one minute into the injury time, Donovan follows a pass he made up the field and the deflection off of the goalie went straight to him. Donovan put it right into the wide open goal and sprinted and dove on his stomach in ecstasy.

With the goal, the USA won their pool for the first time in over 70 years. They held the tiebreaker over England, who now will play powerhouse Germany in the knockout stage. We (the USA) will play Ghana, who held the tiebreaker over Australia and Serbia.

USA vs. Ghana - June 26 2:30 pm
Germany vs. England - June 27 10:00 am

Even though this was an incredible victory for the USA and it came with almost no time left in the game, I think it was the second most amazing sporting event we were victorious in the past two days. This morning, (23-USA) John Isner finally defeated qualifying Frenchmen Nicolas Mahut in the first round of Wimbledon 2010.

The reason this is so incredible is because these two players took part in the longest match in professional tennis history. The three-day match was postponed Tuesday night after the fourth set due to darkness, and postponed again last night due to darkness when the players were tied at 59-59 in the fifth set. The 11 hour and five minute match concluded when Isner broke Mahut's serve to win 70-68.

The fifth set alone took over eight hours, which is long enough to break the record for the longest match ever. Both players had over 100 aces, breaking the previous record of 78 by a single player in a match.

Both players were also supposed to participate in doubles matches today. Isner missed his because he was still playing Mahut, but Mahut reportedly went to play his doubles match at the conclusion of the record-breaking one. Gosh only knows how he is still breathing, let alone playing another match in the same day.

Props to Isner for winning (go USA) and now he advances to the second round and will play tomorrow (four days in a row). Good luck to him the rest of the way.

Rodgers That