It's Soccer Week in America

Some things are decades in the making and yet seem to come out of nowhere.

I know the United States won the Women's World Cup in 1999. The title game was in Pasadena, Calif., so I didn't put a lot of stock in it. It seemed like one of those college basketball "classics," where the home team feeds on cupcakes brought in to be run over.

But it wasn't really like that, and the U.S. was ousted in the semfinals of the next two Women's World Cups. Germany won both, proving other countries were indeed serious about this.

Sunday, while on the golf course at the John Deere Classic, someone I knew excitedly recited the events of the U.S.' extra-time win over Brazil in the quarterfinals. Not long after that, I bumped into two friends on the court  who I wouldn't have pegged for soccer-viewers, Ever. They  said they listened to the game on the ride to the Quad Cities from Cedar Rapid, and had to see how it ended, so they went to a bar to watch the conclusion before making their way to TPC Deere Run.

A women's soccer game. A game with all sorts of drama and controversy, with great heroics on offense and from a goalkeeper named Hope Solo who I had never heard of before Sunday. She suddenly is an American sports star.

Excellent. No one from women's tennis or women's golf has really fired us up lately. Why not Hope Solo, and Abby Wambach, who scored a goal that was not only picture-perfect, but came with the sands of time running out and the Americans playing shorthanded.

It's the U.S. against France Wednesday morning in the semifinals. If the Americans win, I suggest we all take the afternoon off. If they lose, we may want to consider rioting.

Fortunately, there are still a couple of days to consider this more carefully.