Pan Am Gold Rush

The 2015 Pan Am games were coming to TO!
Most people weren't sure whether to embrace it or flee from it.  From the traffic and empty restaurants in our area, many fled.  But we managed to see a few events.  The tickets weren't cheap, but in talking with Tom Ng, he said these things don't come around too often.  So I bought tickets to 100m and 200m swimming medals event and a semi-finals basketball event.

The medal games are twice as much as the pre-lims, but they were exciting! And we got lucky.  Canadian athletes were on the podium for every single event.  And no DSQs!
We sat near the Brazilian contingency so we got to be on TV a few times.  Although you'd have to be watching the online version at http://panam.cbc.com the TV telecast only shows the medal finals and selected heats.  But on their website you'll see almost everything.  And you can rewind if you want.  It's so cool.  Very fwd thinking from the Crown Television station.  Kinda surprising.

The parents of one of the gold medal Brazilian swimmers was sitting right behind us and were they ever overjoyed when their son won the 200m butterfly event.  He was the defending Pan Am champion in this event.  But the Canadian snuck in to get the bronze!  Making the podium is such an achievement, he and the crowd were going crazy!
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Kieran had hinted he wanted to watch archery.  Since he had tried it once when he was at Annette CRC Camp.  I didn't think it was going to be a sell out so I didn't buy tix right away.  One nice thing about having tix is that the TTC is free.  During the games CIBC which was a major sponsor was offering a discount on tix.  So that's when I bought em.

And I got to try out my transit app that tells you when the next bus is expected to arrive.  Works pretty well.

It was a beautiful day for archery.  Almost no wind.
Kind of hard to see the arrows, but there were Canadians in the mix.  So it was cool.

We even got an autograph from one of the Canadian archers in the competition.  I took a photograph of my ticket he signed since, I'll probably recycle it.


We had been to Varsity stadium for the HMS track meet.  What a great outdoor venue.  Although there weren't any place to get any real food.  And there's no in-and-out privileges.  So we were kind of hungry.
General admission so you can sit anywhere and move around if you like.  It was pretty good.  Although a little slow.




I didn't realize Kieran was in the scene when I video recorded the crowd doing the wave at the Archery Event.

I bought the basketball tickets way back in December, same with the swimming.  I just got lucky on this one too, because it was Canada vs USA in the Semi-Finals.  Winner will move on to the Gold Medal Game and the loser will go on to the Bronze Medal game.

There were only 2 NBA players on Team Canada.  It wasn't Steve Nash, he's retired. But it wasn't Andrew Wiggins.  It was his teammate Anthony Bennett (who seemed to have shed a lot of his bench fat) from the Minnesota Timberwolves and Andrew Nicholson from the Orlando Magic.  And Jay Triano was head coach. I didn't recognize anyone else.  I didn't recognize any NBA players on the USA team.  But they did have Bobby Brown.  Every time he scored I was expecting him to break out and sing "Every Little Step I Take".  And I saw Mike Brown, former Cleveland Cavaliers head coach as assistant on USA team.


I was excited to be going to this event. The Pan Am Basketball games were at the Old Maple Leafs Gardens on Carlton St.  It's now Ryerson Athletic Center.  Where their basketball team plays.  It's super nice.  With a Loblaws on the bottom floor.  The ice rink is gone.  But inside is amazing.  There's a fitness center.  I've actually been in the old one once.  But I can't remember very well to compare.  I thought the old one was nice too.


It was a close game, with Canada leading (with there largest lead at 8) for most of the game until the 3rd QTR and from there it would seesaw back and forth, and Team USA leading by 8 late in the 4th.  And I thought it was game over. But late game heroics from Bennett would get Canada back in and tied at 97-97 with less than 20s left and Canada with possession for the last shot of the game.  At 12.8s left I noticed the game clock just stop.  Then it continued.  Team USA with a foul to give, fouled with 7.7s left.  Then officials changed the time so 5.1s because of the stopped clock problem.  Team Canada inbounded but missed their last attempt.  So it was off to 5min OT.

Where it was still pretty close, but Canada pulled ahead by 5.  And then USA started to mount a comeback, with 7s to go in OT down by 3, and USA with possession, they could tie it up and send it to double OT. But with the pressure on and Canada playing a strong D. Team USA missed their 3pt attempt.  I think it was Bobby Brown who shot it.

In any case.  It was a nail biter of a game.  If Canada couldn't pull away, then it was either team's game to win.  And when USA had the lead, they could not pull away either.  In OT Canada managed to squeak it out.  Wow. Exciting. This is why I love attending live games.
There were Americans in the crowd.  One fellow was from Texas.  But it was very respectable in the stands.  When USA scored, Canadian fans would comment on how good of a move or shot it was.  It wasn't a heckling type of crowd. These were real fans of the game. The ones that respect the players and the game.


Canada plays Brazil for the Gold Medal game on Saturday.
However Andrew Nicholson who scored 31 pts for Canada tonight against USA was injured in OT.  So I don't know if will be playing.

We could have stayed for the Puerto Rico vs Argentina match, because our tickets entitled us to that game as well. But it was 9pm and would have went on til 11pm and there was really nothing on the line for these two teams. It was just for 5th and 6th place.