Ten US Olympians to watch in Paris

(PARIS) — From Bacon (both Sarah, a diver, and Phoebe, a swimmer) to Coffey (both Olivia, a rower, and Sam, a soccer player), Team USA will be sending a veritable smorgasbord of talent to Paris for the 2024 Olympics.

You probably know the big names — such as gymnast Simone Biles and swimmer Katie Ledecky — but there are 592 U.S. Olympians competing in Paris.

The returning members of Team USA have already won 110 gold medals before arriving in Paris, led by swimmers Ledecky (seven) and Caeleb Dressel (seven) and women’s basketball player Diana Taurasi (five). Ledecky also has the most total medals (10) while Biles has seven total medals, including four gold. No one else on the team has more than four gold.

Not sure who else to pay attention to in Paris? We’ve compiled a list of the 10 Americans to know when the Summer Games kick off this weekend.

Chase Budinger, beach volleyball

If you think you remember a basketball player named Chase Budinger, who played eight seasons in the NBA and was co-MVP of the McDonald’s All-American Game in 2006 alongside Kevin Durant, you’re probably confused why “beach volleyball” is next to his name above. But no, that’s not a typo.

Budinger, the California Basketball Player of the Year in his senior season in high school, hung up his basketball shoes in 2017 and hit the beach for his second-best sport — volleyball. Then again, maybe it’s his best sport?

The 36-year-old was actually a huge volleyball recruit in high school, too. But he passed up playing the indoor game for a college basketball career at Arizona. Now, he and partner Miles Evans will be heading to Paris to play beach volleyball as part of Team USA.

Evans and Budinger only started playing together last year, but they are the U.S.’s No. 2 team behind Andy Benesh and Miles Partain. Partain, just 22 years old, and Benesh are a great story in their own right and probably a better bet to win gold from the U.S. teams. They’re ranked No. 9 in the world.

But Budinger and Evans are ranked No. 13 and have two tournament wins in less than 20 matches as partners.

Katie Moon, pole vault

There was definitely a pun to be made with Moon’s last name, but for now we’ll just focus on her out-of-this-world talent.

Moon, then known by her maiden name, Nageotte, won gold in pole vault in Tokyo and followed that up with world titles in 2022 and 2023. She also took home top honors on the Diamond League circuit (a regular season, so to speak) last year.

Her toughest competition will likely be Great Britain’s Molly Caudery, who has also grabbed headlines for her modeling work, and Australia’s Nina Kennedy, who won at the last Diamond League event before the Olympics. Caudery won the indoor world championships in March and has the world best this year (4.92 meters).

Moon can be a streaky jumper. She finished eighth (last place) at last week’s London Diamond League event and was upset by unheralded (and unsponsored) Bridget Williams in the U.S. Olympic trials.

But Moon’s personal best of 4.95 meters, set ahead of the Tokyo Games, is better than any of her competitors and back-to-back gold is easily within her reach.

Katie Grimes, swimming

Theoretically, swimming is swimming, no matter where you are doing it. But it’s unusual for a talented swimmer in the pool to also compete in open-water swimming. No American woman had ever done both until this year.

Grimes will be doing the double in Paris, swimming in the 1,500 meters and the 400-meter individual medley indoors as well as the 10-kilometer open-water event — still scheduled to be held in the Seine River as long as no one’s skin melts off during training.

Grimes is actually a bit of a prodigy. She was Team USA’s youngest member in Tokyo at just 15 years old. At 18, she’s still one of the youngest Americans at the Games (gymnast Hezly Rivera, 16, is the youngest).

She had already qualified for Paris in the open-water event before showing up at the indoor swim trials in Indianapolis last month by taking bronze in the 10-kilometer outdoor event in July 2023. She was actually the first American to make the U.S. team in any sport.

No woman has ever won a medal in their career in both the pool and open-water competition (though it has happened on the men’s side). Grimes has a real chance to do both in the same Olympics.

Salif Mane, triple jump

No slight to Fairleigh Dickinson University, but the New Jersey school isn’t exactly known as a track and field powerhouse. In fact, Mane was the only competitor from FDU at the NCAA track and field championships in Eugene, Oregon, last month as he wrapped up his senior season.

That didn’t stop the triple jumper from winning Fairleigh Dickinson’s first individual national title in any sport and then upsetting everyone at the U.S. Olympic trials.

Mane jumped a personal best 17.52 meters at the U.S. Olympic trials just weeks after setting a previous personal best (17.14 meters) at the NCAA championships.

Now the Bronx native has a chance to continue a legacy in triple jump for the U.S., which has won five of the last 10 gold medals in the event.

Tara Davis-Woodhall, long jump

Mane was a jumper who wasn’t on many people’s radar not long ago, but Davis-Woodhall has been a star jumper with gold medal potential for awhile. She won gold in junior world championships and even broke future Olympian Marion Jones’ California high school state record that had stood since 1993 (well before she was born).

She’s hardly been a disappointment on the senior level, but Davis-Woodhall is finally realizing her full potential. No doubt the most exuberant and outgoing member of Team USA — she’s never not bouncing around with a megawatt smile — she is currently ranked No. 1 in the world in long jump.

Davis-Woodhall, who is married to three-time Paralympic medalist Hunter Woodhall, finished second in the U.S. Olympic trials in 2021 and qualified for the Olympics as well. But the then-22-year-old finished a disappointing sixth at the Tokyo Games.

The weight of expectations appeared to lie heavily on her shoulders at this year’s trials. She scratched on both her first two jumps in the finals, but qualified to continue on with her third and final jump. but she qualified for the Paris Games on her last jump of the competition.

Davis has had the best season of her career, finishing first in every competition she’s competed in, including a win in the indoor world championships in March. She hasn’t competed in any Diamond League events, but has the second-best jump (7.18 meters) in the world this year. Germany’s Malaika Mihambo, the gold medalist in Tokyo and the owner of the longest jump in the world this year (7.22 meters), will be Davis-Woodhall’s stiffest competition.

Fiona O’Keeffe, marathon

There’s beginner’s luck and then there’s just beginner’s talent. O’Keeffe, who won at the U.S. Olympic trials in the first professional marathon of her life, hopes it’s the latter.

The 26-year-old literally put her blood, sweat and tears into her first marathon in Orlando back in February. She crossed the finish line in 2 hours, 22 minutes and 10 seconds — a trials record — with her bib covered in blood, which she ascribed to a “little chafing situation.”

O’Keeffe was an All-American at Stanford University as a 5,000-meter and 10,000-meter runner before taking her talent to the road.

Medalling in Paris is unlikely given the depth of the Ethiopian and Kenyan teams, but she has huge potential in a discipline that is traditionally dominated by veteran runners.

Jimmer Fredette, 3×3 basketball

“College player” is a derisive term that has plagued college basketball and football players for decades. From Tim Tebow to Adam Morrison to Charlie Ward (in both sports), the names are well-known by sports fans.

Fredette, who was a star at Brigham Young University, was given the label well before he even left college. He still developed a legion of fans for his reputation as a gunner and ultimate competitor (think Caitlin Clark before Caitlin Clark). He led the nation in scoring as a senior in 2010-11, earning Associated Press player of the year honors, and setting just about every scoring record in BYU history.

He was drafted 10th overall by the Sacramento Kings in 2011, but bounced around to the Chicago Bulls, New Orleans Pelicans, New York Knicks and Phoenix Suns in an unremarkable NBA career. He was certainly never close to making the men’s Olympic basketball team.

And yet, at 35 years old, more than five years removed from his last game in the NBA, he’s shooting for gold in Paris as a member of the U.S. 3×3 basketball team — a half-court, outdoor version of the game that debuted in Tokyo. (The U.S. men’s team didn’t even qualify for the Tokyo Games, so this is technically the United States’ debut in the sport.)

Jimmermania has been revived again.

Kennedy Blades, wrestling

Blades already has the coolest name on the U.S. team, but now she’s looking for some hardware in Paris.

The 20-year-old from Chicago, who is already posing for photos in Paris with Snoop Dogg and getting praise from MMA legend Jon Jones, is a rising star in wrestling — and maybe combat sports in general (can it be long before the UFC comes calling?).

Blades barely missed the Tokyo Games, losing to Tamyra Mensah-Stock in the final match in the 76 kg weight class, at just 17. Mensah-Stock went on to win gold in 2021 and Blades’ profile in the sport skyrocketed. She was used to defying expectations though, becoming the first girl to win a state title against boys in the annual Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation tournament at just 12 years old.

Blades defeated Adeline Gray, a six-time world champion who took the silver medal in Tokyo, to qualify for Paris.

Her timeline for greatness has moved up.

Emma Hunt, climbing

It will take the women’s Olympic gold medalist about 10.5 seconds to run the 100-meter dash. Hunt wonders why they waste so much time.

The 21-year-old — who was ranked No. 1 in the world at just 18 — owns the American speed climbing record, climbing the 15-meter-high wall in 6.55 seconds. She’ll be looking to spend as short a time competing in Paris as possible as speed climbing is contested as a standalone sport for the first time (In Tokyo, bouldering, lead and speed were combined in one event).

Hunt set the U.S. record in Salt Lake City in May when she won the World Cup final against Aleksandra Kalucka of Poland. Kalucka’s countrywoman, Aleksandra Miroslaw, holds the current world record — which has fallen repeatedly in recent years — at 6.25 seconds.

Both Polish climbers will be among the top competition for Hunt in Paris, as will be Indonesian star Desak Made Rita Kusuma Dewi, who edged out Hunt for the world title in 2023 (Miroslaw took bronze, while Kalucka took fourth).

Victor Montalvo, breaking

We’re not here to legislate whether breakdancing — officially known as breaking — should be in the Olympics. Besides, the United States has the best competitor in the world, so just wait for another gold medal.

Montalvo, 30, is the defending world champion in breaking. Known as B-Boy Victor, he has carried on a back-and-forth rivalry with Canadian Phil Wizard in each of the last three world championships. Victor won in 2021 and 2023, while the Canadian won in 2022.

The sport, which developed from the 1980s dance craze, takes place in head-to-head “battles” over multiple rounds. Each dancer is graded in five categories: technique, vocabulary, originality, musicality and execution. The scoring is done by the judges in real time with winners advancing through a bracket.

No cardboard needed.

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