Sudbury, Ont., soccer star earns spot on Olympic team
Sudbury athlete Cloé Lacasse will represent Canada in the Paris 2024 Olympic Women's Football Tournament.
Canada Soccer and the Canadian Olympic Committee made the formal announcement on Canada Day.
Lacasse, 30, is among the 18 players and four alternates named to the team. Canada qualified for the Olympic Games in September 2023 by defeating Jamaica across a two-match series in the 2023 Concacaf W Olympic Play-In.
The Sudbury native will make her Olympic debut. The bilingual Lacasse grew up participating in soccer, Taekwondo (she's a black belt), volleyball and cross-country running, according to her official Olympic bio.
'She was five years old when she started playing soccer in Sudbury (the purple Timbits),' her bio said.
Lacasse represented Canada at the FIFA World Cup Australia & New Zealand 2023. She also won a Concacaf silver medal with Canada in 2022 when the event was held in Mexico.
She was 18 years old when she made her debut in the Canadian youth program in 2012 with coach Andrew Olivieri. She was 28 years old when she made her debut for Canada on Nov. 27, 2021, and scored her first international 'A' goal on Oct. 6, 2022.
Canada has successfully reached the knockout stage in all four of their previous appearances at the Olympic Games, securing two bronze medals at London 2012 and Rio 2016, and gold at Tokyo 2020.
Canada is the only nation to have reached the podium in women's soccer at each of the last three Olympic Games.
The Paris 2024 Olympic Games soccer tournament will feature 12 participating nations divided into three groups. The top two teams from each group, along with the two best third-placed teams, will advance to the knockout rounds, which include the quarterfinals, semifinals, third-place match, and final.
The Olympic soccer tournament will take place from July 24 to Aug. 10 and will be held in several iconic cities in France.
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