VANCOUVER, British Columbia - When the New Orleans Saints won Super Bowl XLIV, it was the culmination of a five-year turnaround that saw the one-time NFL laughingstock become the face of a region devastated by the greatest natural disaster in U.S. history. In Haiti, where they are still recovering from the devastating earthquake that literally flattened the island nation, any signs of hope come from a different kind of football.
Haiti's women's soccer team defeated Cuba 3-0 on Monday night in their final game at the CONCACAF Olympic qualifying tournament. The victory was the first ever for the Haitians in the final round of qualifying but due to their two losses in the previous games of the tournament to Costa Rica and host Canada, the team failed to qualified for the Olympics.
"They've changed my life in more ways than I could ever explain," said defender Kimberly Boulos, who scored a goal in Monday's win. Boulos, whose Haitian-born grandfather John "Frenchy" Boulos is in the U.S. Soccer Hall of Fame, is from Crofton, N.Y. and played her college soccer at the University of South Carolina.
"Amidst everything they were the most spirited people I'd met in my entire life. They were living in tents and had lost family members. The vibe that was around was just incredible."
Boulos joined the team in 2010 after hearing about the country's soccer plight after the quake and wanted to help. She was asked by coach Roland Luxieux to join the team.
The quake, a 7.0 monster that struck on Jan. 12, 2010, wreaked havoc that dwarfed Hurricane Katrina and surpassed the death toll of the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunamis. It destroyed most of Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince, killed an estimated 300,000 people, injured another 300,000, and left over one million people homeless.
One of the buildings destroyed by the quake was the home office of the Haitian Football Federation, or F?d?ration Ha?tienne de Football. The entire building was flattened during the disaster and it killed 32 of the Federation's employees, including women's coach Jean-Yves Labaze.
One of the survivors was the Federation's president was Dr. Yves Jean-Bart who now oversees the rebuilding of the game in Haiti. The country had to start from square one in terms of its favorite sport.
"Our national headquarters collapsed in just a few seconds," Jean-Bart told CNN. "Of the 50 people present at the time of the earthquake, one dozen were injured and 32 found dead. We also lost inventories of national equipment; the federation's archives were not recovered.
"Our trophies, the awards we have received throughout the history of the federation, pictures of witnesses of our glorious years were not found in the rubble. It was a complete disaster."
FIFA, the worldwide governing body of soccer, donated $3.2 million to the Haitian relief efforts and helped rebuild the infrastructure of Haitian soccer. Haiti's home stadium -- Stade Sylvio Cator -- was damaged during the quake and had become the site of a tent city that housed thousands of Haitians for over a year following the earthquake.
Source: http://www.thegrio.com/sports/haiti-womens-soccer-team-offers-country-rare-hope.php
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