Cal at the Olympics: Abbey Weitzeil First Golden Bear to Get a Medal

She helps USA's 4x100 freestyle relay team take bronze. USA softball clinches berth in gold-medal game. Cal alumni lead USA water polo win.

Abbey Weitzeil became the first athlete with Cal connections to earn a medal in the Tokyo Olympics as she was part of the United States' 4x100 relay team that finished third in the finals on Sunday in Tokyo (Saturday night in the Pacific time zone).

Weitzeil, who was the national swimmer of the year.in 2020 while at Cal, swam the second leg for the Americans in the relay final and posted the fastest time of the four American swimmers, clocking 52.68 seconds for her 100-meter leg.  She put the U.S. in contention for a medal with her swim; however, Simone Manuel, swimming the anchor leg for the Americans, was just edged out for second place by Canada's Penny Oleksiak.

Canada finished just three one-hundredths of second ahead of the United States, which was timed in 3:32.81 compared to Canada's 3:32.78.

The favored Australians finished well ahead of the pack to capture the gold in a time of 3:29.69.

USA Softball Team, featuring Valerie Arioto, Improves to 4-0

Former Cal standout Valerie Arioto was in the starting lineup, batting cleanup, for all four games by the USA softball team, which improved to 4-0 with a pair of victories over the weekend, including a comeback win on Sunday (Saturday in the United States).

Those two wins clinched a berth in the gold-medal game for the Americans. They will face Japan in their final round-robin game on Sunday (Pacific time), and will play Japan again in the gold-medal game since USA and Japan have already clinched the top two spots..

After posting a 2-0 victory over Mexico on Saturday (Friday in the Pacific time zone), the American team rallied for two runs in the bottom of the first extra inning to pull out a 2-1 win over Australia on Sunday (Saturday night in the Pacific time zone).

The USA-Australia game was scoreless after seven innings, forcing extra innings, and the Aussies scored a run in the top of the eighth.

In the bottom of the eighth, Arioto was on-deck when Amanda Chidester belted a two-run single to left to give the Americans the walk-off victory that put them in the gold-medal game, probably against Japan.

Arioto went 0-for-3 against Australia, and she is 2-for-11 for the tournament with two walks.

Valerie Ariota plays first base for the Americans. Photo by Valerie Arioto Kareem Elgazzar-USA TODAY Network

Only six teams are involved in the Olympic softball event, and the gold-medal game will match the two teams atop the standings after each team has played all of the five other teams in a round-robin.

The U.S. has yet to play Japan in what will be a preview of the gold-medal game.

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Ex-Cal standouts help USA men win opening water polo match

Former Cal stars Luca Cupido and Johnny Hooper accounted for the Americans' final three goals in a tense 15-13 victory over Japan in their opening game in Group A men's water-polo action.

Cupido's first goal came with 5:01 left in the fourth quarter and ended a run of five straight goals by the USA team that gave the Americans a 13-10 lead.  After a Japan goal, Cupido scored again at the 4:14 mark to make it a 14-11 game.

However, Japan scored the next two goals to get to within one at 14-13 before Hooper scored his only goal of the game with 26 seconds left to give USA a safe two-goal margin.

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Cover photo of United States' bronze-medal-winning relay team (Abbey Weitzeil second from right) is by Rob Schumacher, USA TODAY Network