An estimated 11,360 athletes will take part in the Tokyo Olympic summer games — postponed last year in the throes of the global pandemic — which will officially open today, July 23, with the Opening Ceremonies and end Aug. 8 with the Closing Ceremonies. Some events, such as softball and the men’s and women’s soccer tournaments, began Wednesday, before the official start.
Each Olympic athlete dressed in the stars and stripes will be representing the United States, but some states are pumping out potential medalists at a much faster pace than their neighbors.
The United States is sending a team of 821 athletes to compete in the Olympic and Paralympic games. Every state except North Dakota and Wyoming is sending at least one athlete to represent the country, including Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico.
California is sending 150 athletes, and Florida is sending 64. New York tied Colorado with 41 athletes. Texas is sending 40, and Illinois is sending 29, according to biographical information provided on the Team USA website.
New Jersey is sending 24 athletes.
Carli Lloyd plays as a midfielder or forward for NJ/NY Gotham FC in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) and the United States national team. She is a two-time Olympic gold medalist (2008 and 2012), two-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champion (2015 and 2019), two-time FIFA Player of the Year (2015 and 2016), and a four-time Olympian (2008, 2012, 2016 and 2021).
Lloyd scored the gold medal-winning goals in the finals of the 2008 Summer Olympics and the 2012 Summer Olympics. Lloyd also helped the United States win their titles at the 2015 and 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cups and she played for the team at the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup where the U.S. finished in second place. Lloyd has made more than 300 appearances for the U.S. national team, placing her third in caps, and has the fourth-most goals and seventh-most assists for the team. In March 2021, she was named as the highest paid female footballer in the world.
Lloyd lives with her husband, golfer Brian Hollins, in Mount Laurel, New Jersey.
Jessica Springsteen, the daughter of Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa, she is a show jumping champion rider who has represented the United States Equestrian Team in international competition. The family owned and lived on a horse farm in Colts Neck Township, along with homes in Los Angeles, Florida, and Rumson, New Jersey.
Springsteen has been riding since she was four years old,[9][10] with horses kept on the Springsteen family’s 300-acre Stone Hill Farm in Colts Neck.
Springsteen was an alternate rider for the United States at the 2012 Summer Olympics but did not make the short list for the U.S. Equestrian team for the 2016 Summer Olympics.
Athing Mu is a Trenton native who is representing the United States in the 800-meter dash.
Colton Brown, a 2009 Piscataway High School graduate, will be competing in his second Olympics at the 90kg weight class.
Brown competed in three World Championships and two Senior World Championships, and most recently finished in fifth place at the Pan-American Senior Championships in April.
You don’t want to cross swords with Jackie Dubrovich, the Riverdale resident who attended Pompton Lakes High School who will compete in foil for the United States women’s fencing team.
Dubrovich was a three-time NCAA first-team All-American (2013, 2014, 2016) at Columbia University and won three NCAA tournament medals and two NCAA team titles. While at Pompton Lakes, she won the 2010 NJSIAA foil championship.
Bergen County native Tracy Eisser will compete in her second Olympics after partnering with Megan Kalmoe to win the women’s pair final at the U.S. Olympic team trials in June in West Windsor. Rowing will be held in late July at the Sea Forest Waterway in Tokyo Bay.
Eisser, a 31-year-old who trains out of U.S. Rowing’s Princeton headquarters, calls women’s pair the event that she is “most passionate about.” At the 2016 Olympics in Brazil, the Fair Lawn High and Cornell graduate was fifth in the quadruple sculls.
Claire Collins, a Princeton 2019 University alumna, will be part of the United States women’s Rowing four.
A California native who grew up in McLean, Virginia, Collins helped the Tigers win four straight Ivy titles. She was a four-time All-Ivy honoree and three-time All-American, and was nominated as NCAA Woman of the Year.
Nic Fink, a Pingry and University of Georgia graduate who hails from Morristown, made Team USA for the first time at age 27, winning the 200-meter breaststroke (2:07.55) in a 1-2 finish with club teammate Andrew Wilson.
Fink failed to finish in the top two at either the 2012 or 2016 Trials, and he had another heartbreak with a third-place showing in the 100 breast a few days before he finally qualified.
A Toms River native, the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Todd Frazier will be Team USA’s starting third baseman in his first Olympics.
Frazier first emerged to the national stage in 1998 when he led Toms River East to the Little League World Series title. He led Toms River South High School to two consecutive Group 3 titles in 2002 and 2003 before starring at Rutgers and winning Big East Player of the Year in 2007. He’s enjoyed a successful MLB career and owns 218 home runs and 639 RBI for his career.
English Gardner grew up in Voorhees Township, New Jersey, where she graduated from Eastern Regional High School as part of the class of 2010.
The daughter of Anthony and Monica Gardner has two brothers, Anthony Jr. and Brandon, plus one sister, Ariel.
At the 2016 Summer Olympics, Gardner was part of the gold-medal winning 4×100 relay and she placed seventh in the 100. She’s won two World Championship silvers with the relay as well (2013, 2015). Gardner won the 100 meters at the 2016 United States Olympic Trials in a time of 10.74 (+1.0). In addition to qualifying her for the 2016 Summer Olympics, the time tied Merlene Ottey as the seventh fastest competitor in history.
Alen Hadzic is a Paterson native who was a two-time NJSIAA champion and three-time district champion at Montclair before heading to Columbia University. Hadzic was the runner-up at the 2013 NCAA Championships in men’s epee and earned first team All-American honors. Hadzic won the men’s epee competition at the North American Cup in May to qualify as the replacement athlete, eligible to compete in the team competition.
Patrick Kivlehan is an outfielder for the San Diego Padres who previously played for the Cincinnati Reds and Arizona Diamondbacks.
Kivlehan played both college baseball and college football at Rutgers University plus he had minor league contracts with the Seattle Mariners, Texas Rangers, New York Mets, Pittsburgh Pirates, and Toronto Blue Jays.
Tobin Heath will be competing in her fourth Olympics and will be looking to win her third gold medal after winning in 2008 in Beijing and 2012 in London.
Heath, who graduated from Ridge High School in 2006, has won two World Cup titles, in 2015 and 2019, and has won two NWSL championships with the Portland Thorns.
Katharine Holmes fenced for Princeton University from 2011-2014, took two years off to train, qualify and compete in the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio, then returned to Princeton in 2016, graduating in 2017 magna cum laude with departmental honors.
While at Princeton, the Washington, DC native was a four-time All American fencer and four-time All Ivy League fencer. She was individual 2017 Ivy League Champion and team Ivy League Champion in 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2017. She also competed on the team that won Princeton’s first NCAA Fencing Championship in 2013.
Ashleigh Johnson came to be considered by many as the best goalkeeper in the world while playing water polo at Princeton University. She was part of the American team winning the gold medal at the 2015 World Aquatics Championships. In 2016, she became the first African-American woman to make the US Olympic team in water polo. She was part of the gold-medal winning 2016 U.S. women’s water polo Olympic team.
The Miami Heat’s 6-foot-9 center/forward Edrice “Bam” Adebayo was born in Newark, but grew he up in Pinetown, North Carolina.
Alexia Lacatena a member of the Italy women’s national softball team who was selected to compete in the 2020 Summer Olympics but she is native of Byram Township, New Jersey, she attended Lenape Valley Regional High School and signed to play for the University of Kentucky.
Appearing in relief of starting pitcher Greta Cecchetti, made her 2020 Olympics pitching debut on July 22, 2021 in the fifth inning of Italy’s opening round game, a 2-0 loss against the United States. Lacatena allowed one hit and one walk while striking out one batter over the game’s final two innings.
Though Lacatena grew up in Byram and doesn’t speak Italian, she was eligible to play for Italy through her parents, Maria and Dominic. She followed her eldest sister, Maria, onto the national team.
Mohamed Hamza is a rising junior at Princeton University who will represent Egypt in the foil individual and fencing team competitions. He helped Egypt finish seventh in the team event at the 2016 Olympics.
Hamza finished sixth at the 2019 NCAA Championships, and was named second team All-Ivy League.
A Princeton 2017 alumna, Lizzie Bird represents Great Britain, where she set the British national record in the 3,000-meter steeplechase (9:22.8) on July 10 at the Wanda Diamond League Meet, improving her personal best by almost four seconds.
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