It's do-or-die time for Canada's volleyball teams
Men's and women's squads face last-chance Olympic qualifiers
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It's last call for Canada's volleyball teams
Both the men's and women's squads are playing in last-chance Olympic qualifiers that start today and end Sunday. The stakes are very high and very simple: only the winner of the tournament gets to go to the Tokyo Games this summer. Everyone else is out. Here are a few more details to know:
The format is the same for both tournaments. Only four teams are involved, and it's a straight round-robin. So after everyone has played their three matches, the team with the best record wins the tournament. There's no playoff round. If there's a tie for first place, it's broken by what they call "match points." Each match is best of five sets, so a 3-0 match earns five points for the winner and zero for the loser. 3-1 is four points for the winner, one for the loser. 3-2 is three and two. If that doesn't settle it, they look at point differential.
The men's team has a very good chance of winning its tournament. Canada is ranked seventh in the world. That's much higher than any of its opponents — No. 18 Cuba, No. 21 Mexico and No. 24 Puerto Rico. Plus, the tournament is happening in Vancouver. It'll be an upset of Canada doesn't earn its second straight trip to the Olympics. The team finished fifth at the 2016 Rio Games, which was its first Olympic appearance since 1992.
The Canadian women have it tougher. They're ranked 18th in the world, and they have to face No. 10 Dominican Republic, No. 13 Puerto Rico and No. 21 Mexico. They also have to play in the Dominican. The Canadian women's team last qualified for the Olympics in 1996.
You can watch every match of the men's tournament live. CBC Sports is streaming them all here and on its app.
Canada's matches are Friday at 9:30 p.m. ET vs. Mexico, Saturday at 9 p.m. ET vs. Cuba and Sunday at 7 p.m. vs. Puerto Rico. The Canadian women play Friday at 4 p.m. ET vs. Puerto Rico, Saturday at 6 p.m. ET vs. the Dominican and Sunday at 3 p.m. ET vs. Mexico. You can follow the Twitter accounts of Volleyball Canada and CBC Sports for updates on the women, and read results stories on CBCSports.ca.
Quickly...
Canada's men's soccer team now knows who it'll have to beat for an Olympic spot. Canada landed in a group with Honduras, El Salvador and Haiti in today's draw for the CONCACAF region's eight-team qualifying tournament in Mexico in March. Canada will need to finish in the top two in its group to advance to the semifinals, where it then must beat one of the top two teams from the other group (likely the U.S. or Mexico) in order to qualify for the Olympics. Only two teams from this tournament — the winners of each semifinal — advance to the Tokyo Games. Everyone else is out. The Canadian men's team hasn't qualified for the Olympics since 1984. Read more about its chances for 2020 here. The women's team has made it three times in a row (and won bronze in the last two) but it still has to survive its own regional qualifier. That starts at the end of the month. Read about what to expect here.
It was a rough night for Canadian tennis. First, Denis Shapovalov and Felix Auger-Aliassime's run at the ATP Cup ended with a quarter-final loss to Serbia. Felix fell easily to the lower-ranked Dusan Lajovic, forcing Shapovalov to beat world No. 2 Novak Djokovic to keep Canada alive. Shapo almost pulled it off. He won the first set and took the 16-time Grand Slam champ to a tiebreaker in the deciding set before finally going down. A bit later in the night, Genie Bouchard lost in the quarter-finals of her tournament in New Zealand. Meanwhile, we're still waiting to hear whether Bianca Andreescu will play in the Australian Open, which starts Jan. 20. She skipped her planned season opener at Auckland this week because she's still working her way back from the knee injury she suffered at the WTA Finals at the end of October.
The NFL's best teams join the playoffs this weekend. Baltimore, Kansas City, San Francisco and Green Bay all had byes last week and are all favoured to reach their conference championship games. Baltimore and K.C. are the top AFC seeds (in that order) and they also look like the two best teams overall (again, in that order). They're both favoured by around 10 points vs., respectively, Tennessee and Houston, so it would be surprising if they don't meet next Sunday for a trip to the Super Bowl. The NFC is more wide open. Top seed San Francisco is favoured by a touchdown vs. Minnesota, but the Vikings look dangerous coming off last week's overtime upset of New Orleans. Green Bay is favoured by 4½ points vs. Seattle, which seems to be involved in a close game every week — and usually comes out ahead.
Canada is still looking for its first medal at the Youth Olympic Games. Calm down, OK? Today was the first day of competition at the event for athletes ages 15-18 in Switzerland. And Canada still had some strong results: the mixed curling team won its opening game vs. Russia, and Canadians placed in the top five in the short programs of two different figure skating competitions. Two Canadians also put in decent showings in the debuting sport of ski mountaineering. It's basically a combination of cross-country and downhill skiing and winter hiking. CBC Sports' Devin Heroux covered that event, and you can read his story here. You can also follow his updates on Twitter throughout the Games. CBC Sports' live streaming coverage continues Saturday and Sunday from 3 a.m. ET to 2:15 pm. ET both days. Watch it here.
And finally...
A goalie scored! Nashville's Pekka Rinne became the 12th netminder in NHL history to do it — and the first since 2013 — when he scored this empty-netter last night in Chicago:
Some quick goalie-goal trivia: Marty Brodeur is the king of them. He scored three — two in the regular season, one in the playoffs. Ron Hextall had one in the playoffs and one in the regular season. No other goalie has scored more than once or scored in the playoffs. The first goalie ever to score was the Islanders' Billy Smith in 1979. Read more about Rinne's goal here.
Today and this weekend on CBC Sports
We already covered the Youth Olympic Games and the last-chance Olympic men's volleyball qualifier. Here's what else you can watch online and on TV:
Short track speed skating
- Four Continents Championships in Montreal: live streams here Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. ET; also on CBC TV Saturday at 5 p.m. ET.
Freestyle skiing
- World Cup slopestyle event in France: live stream here Saturday at 4 a.m. ET; also on CBC TV Saturday at 3 p.m. ET.
Alpine skiing
- World Cup men's giant slalom in Switzerland: live streams here Saturday at 4:30 a.m. ET and 7:30 a.m. ET; also on CBC TV Saturday at 2 p.m. ET.
- World Cup men's slalom in Switzerland: live streams here Sunday at 4:30 a.m. ET and 7:30 a.m. ET; also on CBC TV Sunday at 2 p.m. in your local time.
Bobsleigh
- World Cup women's race in France: live stream here Saturday at 4 a.m. ET.
- World Cup two-man race in France: live stream here Saturday at 7:30 a.m. ET; also on CBC TV Saturday at 4 p.m. ET.
- World Cup four-man race in France: live stream here Sunday at 4:50 a.m. ET; also on CBC TV Sunday at 3 p.m. in your local time.
Women's hockey
- Dream Gap Tour's women's hockey showcase: live streams here Saturday at 12:30 p.m. ET, 3:30 p.m. ET and 6:30 p.m. ET, and Sunday at 9:30 a.m. ET and 4:30 p.m. ET.
Luge
- World Cup doubles race in Germany: live stream here Saturday at 3:30 a.m. ET.
- World Cup men's race in Germany: live stream here Saturday at 6:30 a.m. ET.
- World Cup women's race in Germany: live stream here Sunday at 3:15 a.m. ET.
- World Cup relay race in Germany: live stream here Sunday at 7 a.m. ET.
Cross-country skiing
- World Cup women's and men's sprint races in Germany: live stream here Saturday at 7:30 a.m. ET.
- World Cup women's and men's team sprint races in Germany: live stream here Sunday at 7:30 a.m. ET.
Figure skating
- Skate Ontario Winterfest synchro competitions: live streams Friday at 2:45 p.m. ET here, Saturday at 8 a.m. ET here and Sunday at 8 a.m. ET here.
Sport climbing
Check out CBC Sports' full streaming and TV schedule here.
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