Olympics

12:00 AM ET Associated Press TOKYO — U.S. men’s water polo captain Jesse Smith will skip the opening ceremony for the Tokyo Olympics on Friday after the USOPC limited how many players from his team could participate in the festivities. Olympic water polo rosters consist of 13 players, and 12 are designated as available for

2:21 PM ET Associated Press CONAKRY, Guinea — The West African country of Guinea has reversed an earlier decision to pull out of the Olympics and will send a delegation of five athletes to the Tokyo Games. Minister of Sports Sanoussy Bantama Sow made the announcement Thursday after national and international outcries that followed an

3:06 AM ET Associated Press TOKYO — After images of Olympic soccer players taking a knee were excluded from official highlight reels and social media channels, the International Olympic Committee said Thursday they will be shown in the future. Players from five women’s soccer teams kneeled in support of racial justice Wednesday, the first day

8:00 AM ET The Olympic Games have always marked points of entry and reentry for the Japanese people. A closed society until 1868, with martial arts the only activity resembling sports as we now define them, Japan looked to its participation in the 1912 Olympics Games in Stockholm as a way of introducing itself to

6:58 AM ET Associated Press TOKYO — Stina Blackstenius scored a pair of goals and Sweden once again stunned the United States at the Olympics with a 3-0 victory Wednesday in the women’s soccer tournament. The Americans, ranked No. 1 in the world and the favorites to win gold in Tokyo, were riding a 44-match

12:36 PM ET Connor O’Halloran Team GB Paralympian Olivia Breen has said she was left “disgusted” after an England Athletics official told her that her sprint uniform was “inappropriate” and “too revealing” at the England Championships on Sunday. Double world-champion Breen, who has cerebral palsy, is set to compete in the T38 long jump at

8:36 AM ET TOKYO — The chief of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee on Tuesday did not rule out a last-minute cancellation of the Olympics, as more athletes tested positive for COVID-19 and major sponsors ditched plans to attend Friday’s opening ceremony. Asked at a news conference whether the global sporting showpiece might still be

5:30 PM ET Tory BarronESPN Editor Close Tory Barron is a Bristol-based writer and editor for ESPN.com. After retiring from playing lacrosse at UConn, the DC native decided to try her hand at writing about people playing sports. You would think that world-class athletes would command world-class accommodations. But depending on who you ask, that’s

7:37 AM ET After an unprecedented pandemic delay, the opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics will finally begin on Friday. And while there are many superstars competing (Simone Biles, Katie Ledecky and Allyson Felix, to name three), there also are other names you might not know yet — but should. Here, 25 of the most

11:09 PM ET LAS VEGAS — Team USA built some needed momentum for the Olympics with a quality win over current world champion Spain, 83-76, Sunday night in their final exhibition game before heading to Tokyo. After falling behind by as many as nine points in the first half, Team USA showed off his shooting

3:19 PM ET Tennis star Coco Gauff will not represent the United States at the Tokyo Olympics after testing positive for COVID-19. Gauff announced her diagnosis Sunday on Twitter, saying she is “so disappointed” and she hopes “there will be many more chances” to play in the Olympics in the future. 🙏🏾❤️🤍💙 pic.twitter.com/lT0LoEV3eO — Coco

3:43 AM ET Maya Yoshida has called for Tokyo 2020 organisers to reconsider its ban on spectators. Koji Watanabe/Getty Images Japan men’s captain Maya Yoshida has questioned the decision to hold the Olympic Games behind closed doors, calling on authorities to reconsider the spectator ban before the football tournaments begin on Wednesday. Yoshida led Japan to

1:39 PM ET Britain’s 5,000 metres runner Andrew Butchart will compete in the Tokyo Olympics after UK Athletics handed him a suspended ban for saying he had changed the date on a COVID-19 test result to return to Britain from a meet before clarifying his remarks. In a now-deleted episode of The Sunday Plodcast, Butchart

1:01 PM ET Associated Press SAINT-EMILION, France — Tadej Pogacar is all but guaranteed to win a second straight Tour de France after completing the penultimate stage unscathed on Saturday. With the final day of the race usually uneventful until the final sprint on the Champs-Elysees, the Stage 20 time trial marked the last serious

9:56 PM ET Mechelle VoepelESPN.com Close Mechelle Voepel covers the WNBA, women’s college basketball, and other college sports for espnW. Voepel began covering women’s basketball in 1984, and has been with ESPN since 1996. LAS VEGAS — Coach Dawn Staley spoke calmly after the U.S. women’s basketball team lost 70-67 to Australia on Friday, but

11:00 AM ET Cleveland Cavaliers forward Kevin Love is withdrawing from Team USA and will not travel to Tokyo for the Olympics, his agent, Jeff Schwartz, told ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski on Friday. Love spent 10 days with Team USA in Las Vegas preparing for the Games but is still returning to full form from a

6:26 AM ET Associated Press HIROSHIMA, Japan — IOC president Thomas Bach got a mixed reception in his visit on Friday to Hiroshima to mark the first day of the so-called Olympic Truce. Such a one-day visit by a dignitary would ordinarily be routine, but the Olympics are set to open next week with Tokyo

7:54 PM ET Nneka Ogwumike, Chiney Ogwumike and Elizabeth Williams have sent a letter to the secretary general of FIBA, challenging the organization’s rulings on their application to play for the Nigerian national team at the upcoming Tokyo Olympics, sources told ESPN. If FIBA doesn’t grant their appeal, all three plan to appeal to the