USA Defeats Germany, Heads to the Women’s World Cup Finals

By Cheri Cheng - 01 Jul '15 10:29AM

The USA women are headed to the World Cup finals for a second consecutive time after defeating heavy favorite Germany 2-0.

The first goal came on a penalty kick from Carli Lloyd. Kelley O'Hara extended the lead with a late goal in the 84th minute.

"We didn't come here just to make the final. We came here to win it,"' Lloyd said. "So we've got to go after it next game."

"I think inside our environment, we knew we had this in us," coach Jill Ellis said. "We do a good job of blocking out the distractions."

Goalie Hope Solo recorded her fifth straight shutout. The Americans, who are ranked No. 2, have gone 513 minutes without giving up a goal. They will have to rely heavily on their defense when they take on the winner of the other semi-final match.

The defending World Cup champions, Japan, who are ranked fourth in the tournament will be playing sixth-ranked England Wednesday night.

In this year's World Cup, which takes place in Canada, more and more fans have been following the USA Women's National team. In last week's quarterfinal game between USA and China, 5.7 million viewers tuned in, making it the third most-watched women's soccer match of all time. That matchup was the most-watched for a non-final, Bloomberg Business reported.

"When the U.S. plays, we see the numbers go up every time," Bill Wanger, the Fox Sports executive in charge of programming, research and content strategy, said. "We're using each game to push to the next game."

During Tuesday's semi-final match, Twitter was also very active. At one point, #LetsGoGirls was trending. Here are some of the tweets:

Congrats #USWomensSoccer on another victory and silencing the doubters yet again!! #onemorewin #USA #USA #USA

— Aaron Rodgers (@AaronRodgers12) July 1, 2015