Houston, Dallas to host CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying
BBVA Compass Stadium and Toyota Stadium will host matches Feb. 10-21 to decide CONCACAF's two representatives at the 2015 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
The road to Rio de Janeiro will go through Texas.
CONCACAF announced Wednesday that the federation's qualifying tournament for women's soccer at the 2016 Summer Olympics will take place Feb. 10-21, with Houston's BBVA Compass Stadium and suburban Dallas' Toyota Stadium serving as the venues.
The eight participating nations will be split into two groups of four, with the two top nations from each group advancing to the semifinals Feb. 19 in Houston. The two semifinal winners will secure berths at the 16-team Olympic tournament, with the Feb. 21 final in Houston serving as a largely ceremonial contest.
"We're excited to host this event at two excellent venues and look forward to some entertaining matches in what will be the first tournament competition for our team since the Women's World Cup," U.S. Soccer president Sunil Gulati said in a news release. "The quality of women's soccer in CONCACAF continues to improve during every cycle and we expect that to be the case once again over the 15 matches in Texas."
The United States will play in Group A, which will be hosted in the Dallas suburb of Frisco. All of the Group B matches will take place in Houston.
Canada and Mexico join the U.S. as automatic qualifiers for the CONCACAF tournament. Those nations will be joined by three Caribbean qualifiers and two representatives from Central America.
The Women's World Cup champion U.S. team has won the past three Olympic gold medals.