2024 Paris Olympics: Sha’Carri Richardson and 4x100 relay team win gold; Team USA women in basketball final

The United States won three gold medals — including the women’s relay in which Sha’Carri Richardson was able to glance at the competition on her way to victory — bringing its total to 33.

China has caught up when it comes to just gold medals and also had 33 at the end of Day 14 of competition at the Paris Games. Australia is next with 18.

Overall, the U.S. has 111 medals: 33 gold, 39 silver and 39 bronze. It continues to lead all other nations and groups in the overall medal count.

Alison Palaia and Eric Quinlan grew up not far from New York City in the 1980s, just when breaking was becoming a thing in the Bronx.

“I remember kids in my school throwing down cardboard boxes on the floor and doing all of these moves,” said Quinlan, 50, now a software engineer who lives in Norwalk, Conn. “And so to see it at the Olympics all these decades later is just amazing.”

The married couple have become quite the breaking fans since buying their tickets.

“We’ve watched a lot of breaking over the past year, and that final was everything we hoped for,” said Palaia, 48, who works as an artist. “I love the way the athletes get in each others’ faces in a theatrical way, but then after they finished they were hugging and laughing. You can tell they all know each other.”

Like others leaving the final, they are dismayed the sport won’t be at L.A. 2028.

“We’re pretty bummed out about it, especially because breaking was invented in the U.S, in New York City,” she added. “I just hope they bring it back for the next one.”

PARIS — Friday night was a “powerful moment for hip hop” and a “powerful moment for dance,” as one of the first-ever Olympic breaking hosts put it after Japan’s Ami was crowned the winner of an arduous day of dance battles.

She faced off against Lithuania’s Nicka in the final, proving her worth and her standing entering the arena as a two-time breaking, or breakdancing, world champion.

Today, Ami added another medal to that list.

Read the full story here.

Paris itself soared to Olympic heights during the two weeks of the Olympic Games. A look at the starring roles of the athletes and the city itself.

Rai Benjamin's winning streak for 2024 continues.

With gold in the 400m hurdles in Paris, his undefeated streak lives on. He's won all nine of his races at any distance so far this year.

He bested Karsten Warholm of Norway to grab his first global gold medal in the event today.

It was a familiar scene for Team USA in the men’s 4x100-meter relay, as their formidable speed was halted once again by a botched baton pass.

In their quest to win their first Olympic gold medal in the event in 24 years and end a 20-year Olympic medal drought, they not only finished off the podium but were disqualified after they flubbed the first exchange.

American track legend Carl Lewis, who has long been calling for a coaching overhaul on the men’s side, condemned the program’s repeated failure to meet the moment.

“It is time to blow up the system. This continues to be completely unacceptable,” Lewis wrote on X. “It is clear that EVERYONE at USAFT [USA Track & Field] is more concerned with relationships than winning. No athlete should step on the track and run another relay until this program is changed from top to bottom.”

Read the full story here.

After the U.S. team of Christian Coleman, Kenneth Bednarek, Kyree King and Fred Kerley suffered a baton bungle in the 4x100 relay and were disqualified, King said they gave it their all.

“We came out here and we had the mind-set of no risk, no reward, so we went out there and went big. It didn’t happen,” King said.

The baton handoff problem was between Coleman and Bednarek.

The history of sports is littered with legendary curses — the Chicago Cubs’ 108-year World Series hoodoo, only broken in 2016, is one particularly famous example. When the Team USA men’s 4x100-meter relay team advanced to tonight's final there was hope they could break a decades-long streak of bad luck.

Since taking silver in Athens back in 2004, Team USA has failed to win a single Olympic medal in this event, and in the last 20 years, the team has been its own worst enemy, with a litany of mistakes and a doping scandal putting pay to its chances of an Olympic medal.

In 2008, the baton was dropped during the exchange between Doc Patton and Tyson Gay in the heats. A silver medal for the team in London in 2012 was retracted after Gay returned a positive drug test after the Games. Another botched baton exchange in Rio in 2016 — this time the baton passed outside of the legal area — again saw Team USA disqualified. And it was more of the same in Tokyo, with a bungled exchange between Fred Kerley and Ronnie Baker seeing the team failing to progress to the final.

But the team, without individual 100-meter champion Noah Lyles, couldn't break through. Christian Coleman's pass to Kenny Bednarek set the team back, with Coleman appearing to run into Bednarek, and Team USA could not catch up.

The U.S. finished in seventh, far behind winner Canada, but the fumbled baton pass meant they were disqualified.

There was trust on both sides of a crucial baton handoff as the U.S. women powered to a gold medal in the 4x100 relay in Paris.

It happened between Gabby Thomas and Sha’Carri Richardson in the final handoff of the race, and each had faith in the other, they said.

“I just remember trusting Gabby and knowing that she’s gonna put this stick in my hand no matter what, and to leave my best on the track,” said Richardson, who blew past her competitors to finish the race.

Thomas expressed a similar faith in her teammate.

“Obviously, passing the baton to Sha’Carri is a very special and unique thing. She is so fast,” Thomas said. “We know we’re in good hands as soon as she gets her hands on the baton. I felt very proud.”