World Dominance

Perhaps because of Title IX as well as the American emphasis on team sports in general, the U. S. has dominated women's team sports for the past couple of decades.

The 1996 Olympics in Atlanta provided the perfect stage.  The U.S. women captured the gold in basketball, soccer, and softball, the first Olympic "hat-trick" in those sports.

And the beat goes on. The soccer team won the 1999 World Cup at home over China 1-0 in a shootout in front of more than 90,000 fans, an American television audience estimated at 40 million, and a worldwide television audience of one billion.

They made household names out of Kristine Lilly, Mia Hamm, Michelle Akers, and the eventually shirtless heroine Brandi Chastain. The U. S. softball team has added two more Olympic golds to its resume (2000 and 2004).

The undefeated '04 team was so good, outscoring the opposition 51-1 for the tournament, that the IOC has, at least for the time being, dropped softball as an Olympic sport beginning in 2012.

Pitchers Cat Osterman, Jennie Finch, Lisa Fernandez, and Lori Harrigan gave up one run and 18 hits in 56 innings as the U. S. went 9-0. Similarly, the women's basketball team zipped through the '04 Olympics undefeated (9-0).

Except for a four-point win over Russia in the semi-finals, every victory was achieved with a double-digit margin.

It's doubtful whether the grande dames of the sport (Lisa Leslie, Dawn Staley, and Sheryl Swoopes) will return in '08 in Beijing, but the re-loaded American team will be favored again.