 It's a great weekend to be a sports fan. The Stanley Cup final continues tonight after Edmonton's dramatic OT victory in Game 1, while the pressure is on Oklahoma City after Indiana scored a shocking upset to open the NBA Finals. Plus, we've got the French Open title matches, and you'll never guess who's the top Canadian at the Canadian Open.
Before we get into all that, Canada's brightest Olympic star is also competing this weekend, so let's start there. | | | Summer McIntosh is figuring it out at the Canadian swim trials
| | | Canada's most dominant Olympic athlete returns to competition this weekend as Summer McIntosh ramps up for next month's world championships at the national swimming trials in Victoria.
The trials, taking place Saturday through Thursday, will determine who represents Canada at the July 27-Aug. 3 world championships in Singapore. McIntosh, the now 18-year-old phenom who won a national-record three Olympic gold medals and a silver last summer in Paris, will have no trouble making the team in any event she wants. But exactly which events she'll choose to swim in Victoria is a matter of some intrigue.
McIntosh has already declared a lofty goal for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles: five individual gold medals. That would match Michael Phelps' legendary haul in 2008 in Beijing, where he added three relay victories to capture a single-Games record eight golds.
McIntosh confirmed last week that she'll soon begin working with Phelps' old coach, Bob Bowman, as part of her ambitious plan. But the project is already in motion as McIntosh has declared her intention to compete in five solo events at the upcoming world championships. She'll use the Canadian trials to help figure out what those five will be.
McIntosh has officially entered seven events at the six-day trials in Victoria, but it's highly unlikely she actually swims all of them. She recently told my CBC Sports colleague Brittany MacLean Campbell that her program for the worlds will definitely include the three events she won at the Paris Olympics (200m butterfly, 200m medley, 400m medley) and the one where she took silver (400m freestyle). Her fifth event will be either the 200m backstroke, 200m freestyle or 800m freestyle — all of which she's signed up for at the trials along with the core four.
The smart money seems to be on the 800 as McIntosh has devoted a lot of her time this year to longer-distance training with her current coach Fred Vergnoux at his camp on the French Riviera. So look for her to swim the 800 at the trials and, if all goes well, the worlds too.
McIntosh is not the only young Canadian Olympic medallist to watch in Victoria. On the men's side there's 21-year-old Josh Liendo, the 100m butterfly silver medallist in Paris, and 19-year-old Ilya Kharun, who took bronze in both the 100 and 200 fly.
The trials will also decide Canada's team for the Para world championships in September in Singapore. Nicholas Bennett won a pair of golds and a silver at last year's Paralympic Games in Paris, while Aurelie Rivard collected a medal of each colour to bring her career total to 13.
You can watch every race at the Canadian swim trials live on CBCSports.ca and CBC Gem, starting Saturday. Preliminary heats begin at 12:30 p.m. ET and finals at 8:30 p.m. ET each day. Here's the full schedule of events.
For more on the trials, read Devin Heroux's piece on Canada's young stars and watch Devin and Brittany break down the top five storylines to follow.
Other Canadians to watch this weekend in Olympic/international sports:
* The top Canadian in the clubhouse at the Canadian Open was Richard Lee, who fired a six-under 64 in the second round today at Osprey Valley near Toronto to move to 9 under for the tournament and grab a share of second place as of our publish time. Never heard of Lee? You're not alone. He's a 35-year-old who plays on the Asian Tour and hasn't made more than one PGA Tour start in a season since 2015-16. American Cameron Champ (12 under) had the clubhouse lead at our publish time. Here's a live leaderboard.
* The Canadian men's soccer team is in Toronto for the Canadian Shield, a new four-team mini-tournament that will help Canada prepare for the CONCACAF Gold Cup, starting June 14. The 30th-ranked Canadians play No. 25 Ukraine on Saturday afternoon, then face No. 41 Ivory Coast on Tuesday night. New Zealand is also taking part but will not play Canada. The team with the best record after two matches is crowned the champion. Here's a look at Canada's roster for the Canadian Shield and the Gold Cup.
* Olympic 10m platform synchro bronze medallists Rylan Wiens and Nathan Zsombor-Murray are among the Canadians competing in the Canada Cup of Diving in Gatineau, Que., through Sunday. Athletes from 10 countries are involved, though none from China, which swept the eight Olympic golds in Paris last year. Watch live on CBCSports.ca and CBC Gem. Here's the streaming schedule.
* Some of the world's top women's volleyball teams are opening their Nations League season in Ottawa, where ninth-ranked Canada is 1-1 after defeating No. 19 Bulgaria and losing to the eight-ranked Netherlands. The Canadians face No. 7 Japan on Saturday at 4 p.m. ET and No. 10 Serbia on Sunday at 6 p.m. ET. Watch those matches live on CBCSports.ca and CBC Gem. | | |  | Summer McIntosh is gunning for five gold medals at the 2028 Olympics and this year's world championships. But first, she has to decide what her fifth event will be. (Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP via Getty Images)
| | | Quickly…
| | | Some other things to know:
1. The Oilers won't be pushed around this time.
Last year, Florida bullied its way to a 3-0 lead in the Stanley Cup final after outscoring Edmonton 7-1 over the first two games. The Oilers rallied to force a Game 7 but ultimately came up a goal short as their slow start proved too much to overcome.
They avoided that trap on Wednesday night as Leon Draisaitl scored just 66 seconds into Game 1 and again in overtime to give Edmonton a 4-3 win to open the rematch. The Oilers also seemed determined to be the physical aggressors this time around, laying several big hits on the Panthers and top defenceman Aaron Ekblad in particular. "We're a more physical team [than last year]," Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. "We're bigger, we're stronger."
Game 2 goes tonight in Edmonton. Here's more on how the Oilers are matching the Panthers' tenacity.
2. The Pacers pulled off another stunner.
Oklahoma City MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 38 points and fellow Canadian Lu Dort sank five threes, but Indiana erased a 15-point deficit in the fourth quarter and Tyrese Haliburton drained a last-second jumper to shock the heavily favoured Thunder 111-110 in Game 1 of the NBA Finals last night. Canadian Andrew Nembhard had 14 points and six assists for the Pacers while playing some tough defence on Gilgeous-Alexander, who took a whopping 30 shots from the field.
Haliburton finished with a modest 14 points, but his flair for the dramatic continued as he has now hit four game-winning or game-tying buckets with less than 1.5 seconds left in regulation in these playoffs.
Game 2 is on Sunday night in OKC.
3. A pair of exciting French Open finals are on tap.
Saturday's women's title match at the clay-court tennis major pits top-seeded Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus against No. 2 Coco Gauff of the United States. Gauff ended 361st-ranked French wild card Lois Boisson's Cinderella run with a 6-1, 6-2 rout in yesterday's semifinals, while Sabalenka halted Polish clay master Iga Swiatek's 26-match French Open unbeaten streak with a 7-6 (1), 4-6, 6-0 win. Swiatek was trying to become the first woman in the Open era to win four straight titles at Roland Garros.
On the men's side, defending champion Carlos Alcaraz of Spain advanced to Sunday's final when Italy's Lorenzo Musetti quit today's match due to a thigh injury. The second-seeded Alcaraz will face either top-ranked Italian Jannik Sinner or 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic, who were in action at our publish time. Here's the latest. | | | That's it for today. Talk to you later.
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