Article by Iris Perez

“This was new territory for me, and it was pretty confusing,” Love wrote. “But I was certain about one thing: I couldn’t bury what had happened and try to move forward. As much as part of me wanted to, I couldn’t allow myself to dismiss the panic attack and everything underneath it. I didn’t want to have to deal with everything sometime in the future, when it might be worse. I knew that much. So I did one seemingly little thing that turned out to be a big thing. The Cavs helped me find a therapist, and I set up an appointment.”

“This just one more example of the willingness to kind of go above and beyond and say not only am I going to work on my physical engine, I’m going to work on my mental one as well,” said Dr. Erin Ayala, Premier Sport Psychology, PLLC.

Dr. Erin Ayala affirms Love’s show of strength was a risk, but one that inspires change in the way we all frame mental illness.

“Athletes in general are taught to step outside of their comfort zone in order to get better and reach their peak performance and this is another act of doing that,” said Ayala.

Love’s allowing himself to be vulnerable is a source of inspiration to many. Not even 24 hours after he shared the essay on his Twitter page, the article had been retweeted more than 33,000 times and liked more than 80,000 times.

“I want to make it clear that I don’t have things figured out about all of this,” Love wrote. “I’m just starting to do the hard work of getting to know myself. For 29 years, I avoided that. Now, I’m trying to be truthful with myself. I’m trying to be good to the people in my life. I’m trying to face the uncomfortable stuff in life while also enjoying, and being grateful for, the good stuff. I’m trying to embrace it all, the good, bad and ugly.”

Read the full article and watch the video on Fox 9 News

By SCOTT CACCIOLA  FEB. 23, 2018

Tyler George, the American vice skip who wears really ratty sneakers, made two outstanding shots to set up Shuster, who came through in a huge way: a double takeout on his last throw to score two for the Americans and tie the match. More chants of “U-S-A!” are filling this place.

Throughout their run here, the members of the American team have given huge credit to Dr. Carly Anderson, who came on as U.S.A. Curling’s sports psychologist after their dismal showing at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.

“We’ve had team meetings where we’re kind of slumping, and she’s just tough on us,” Matt Hamilton said in an interview before the start of the Olympics. “She’ll tell us, ‘You guys have to pull your heads out of your butts!’ She’ll tell it how it is.”

Anderson has worked with the players in individual and group sessions. A huge emphasis, she said, has been developing strategies to help them execute in pressure situations. So far, so good.

Devin Heroux: In this third end, it was all about placement of stones and getting the proper angles. Edin changed the end around by making a double and rolling perfectly. This is how precise the game has become. But a slight error by Edin on his last rock allowed Shuster a tough double takeout and he threw his rock perfectly to score two.

Sweden likes low-scoring battles. They wait for their opponents to crack. The USA has hung tough with teams throughout this Olympic competition. We’ll see how Shuster and his team handle the added pressure of this game, though. Sweden is the top-ranked team in the world right now. USA has the ability to play a simple style of curling but can also complicate the game and draw opponents into making mistakes. Many curlers in the game say Shuster has the ability to single-handedly win a curling game because of his shotmaking brilliance. He’ll need to do that today to propel the Americans to their first gold at the Olympics.

Read the full article in the NY Times at John Shuster and the U.S. Curling Team Win First Gold Medal