3 takeaways from a big sports weekend
CBC
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Only in April can you get important events in golf, swimming, curling and skating happening at the same time. To untangle it all, here are three takeaways from a delightfully diverse weekend of sports:
1. Scottie Scheffler is for real, but Tiger is still the people's champ.
Scheffler arrived at Augusta on a serious roll, having won three of his previous five tournaments to soar to No. 1 in the world rankings for the first time. But there were questions about whether a 25-year-old who'd never won a major, and who was largely unfamiliar to casual golf fans, was truly worthy of that honour.
Scheffler answered them all with an emphatic Masters victory that saw him jump out to a five-stroke lead through two rounds before cruising to the green jacket by three shots. His dominance, both in this tournament and over the last two months on tour, should be the talk of the golf world right now. But everyone seems more interested in the guy who finished 47th.
Sorry, that's an unkind way of putting it, because what Tiger Woods did at the Masters was incredible. No one expected to see him back playing competitive golf so soon after nearly losing his right leg in a February 2021 car crash — much less playing as well as he did on Thursday, when he tied for 10th place in the opening round. The wheels came off after that, and Woods hobbled to a pair of 78s on the weekend — his worst rounds ever at the Masters. He said afterwards that he'll definitely play the British Open in July at his beloved St. Andrews, but he's not sure about the PGA Championship and the U.S. Open in the meantime.
Hats off also to Canada's Corey Conners, who tied for sixth. That's up two spots from last year, and it's the best finish by a Canadian at the Masters since Mike Weir won it in 2003. Conners now has three straight top-10 finishes at Augusta. Read more about Sunday's final round and watch highlights here.
2. This could be the summer of Summer.
There's probably never been a Canadian swimming trials as star-studded as the one that wrapped up Sunday in Victoria. The lineup of decorated competitors was headlined by seven-time Olympic medallist Penny Oleksiak, reigning Olympic and world 100m butterfly champion Maggie Mac Neil, and reigning 100m backstroke world champion and four-time Olympic medallist Kylie Masse. But the star of the meet ended up being someone who's never reached the podium at the Olympics or the main world championships — at least not yet.
Fifteen-year-old sensation Summer McIntosh won four races at the trials — the women's 200m and 400m freestyle, 200 butterfly and 400 medley — to serve notice that she'll be a contender at the world championships in June and the Commonwealth Games in July/August. She was officially named to the Canadian team for both events today — joining Oleksiak, Mac Neil, Masse and others who will do the double this summer. McIntosh's near-future looks especially bright in the 400 free. She placed fourth in this event as a 14-year-old at the Olympics, and broke the Canadian record she set in Tokyo at the Canadian trials.
Other young standouts at the trials included 19-year-old Josh Liendo, who won the men's 100m butterfly along with the 50m and 100m freestyles; and 18-year-old Para swimmer Nicholas Bennett, who won and set national records in his 200m medley, 200m freestyle, 100m breaststroke and 100m butterfly events. Bennett, who competed in the Paralympic Games last summer, is headed to his first Para swimming world championships in June in Portugal. He was among the 31 swimmers named today to the Canadian team for that meet.
If you'd like to know more about some of Canada's best swimmers, CBC Sports' Devin Heroux was in Victoria covering the trials and wrote stories on McIntosh, Mac Neil, Liendo, Oleksiak and Taylor Ruck, who has rediscovered happiness in and out of the pool after battling an eating disorder.
3. You don't always get the sports-movie ending.
That was true of Tiger Woods, and also for a pair of Canada's Winter Olympic stars over the weekend.
