The Paris Olympics featured a number of U.S. athletes who could also be prominent performers in Los Angeles four years from now. As the youngest member of the U.S. wrestling team, Amit Elor dominated the field to win gold in wrestling in Paris even though she’s only 20. Another 20-year old, Olivia Reeves, won the first U.S. gold in weightlifting in 24 years. Both figure to return. Tennis phenom Coco Gauff is just 20. So is gymnastics whiz Fred Richard. Sprint canoe queen Nevin Harrison won gold in Tokyo and silver in Paris, and the two-time Olympian is still just 22. The U.S. swim team features accomplished Paris Olympians Carson Foster, 22, and three established 21-year-olds: Jack Alexy, Phoebe Bacon and Torri Huske. The women’s soccer team is back on solid footing thanks partly to youngsters Trinity Rodman, 22, and Sophia Smith, 24.
As the Paris Games come to a close, here are some other names to watch as the countdown to the next Olympics begins.
The quarter-mile sensation is just 16, so he’s one to look for in Brisbane, too. The teen from Potomac, Md., broke the under-18 world record both indoors and outdoors in July twice and was selected for the Olympics as part of the U.S. relay team after a strong showing at trials. In Paris, Wilson ran the leadoff leg in the heats of the 4x400-meter relay, becoming the youngest U.S. track athlete in history, surpassing Jim Ryun, who was 17 when he ran the 1,500 meters in 1968. Wilson did not run in the relay final, but his teammates captured gold—and so did Wilson. After Paris, he will enter his junior year of high school. His older sister, Kadence, runs for James Madison.
EMILY AUSMUS, water polo
After winning three straight Olympic titles and gold medals at six of the last seven world championships, the U.S. women’s water polo team settled for fourth place in Paris after a heartbreaking loss in the shootout against Australia in the semifinals and an 11–10 loss to the Netherlands in the bronze-medal game. The team was loaded with veterans such as Maggie Steffens and goalkeeper Ashleigh Johnson. Some of those experienced players may be back in 2028, but Ausmus, 18, is the sure bet—she is a youngster who emerged as a solid defender and has already started established her place on the team. A star player at King High School in Riverside, Calif., Ausmus redshirted her freshman campaign at USC in order to train with the national team. Look for her role to grow as the squad heads to Los Angeles.
Morris still hasn’t gotten his drivers’ license and he trains out of his family’s garage in Marietta, Ga., but even from such humble training circ*mstances, he hoisted a total of 298 kgs between his best snatch and clean and jerk lifts to win the bronze medal in the 61kg class in Paris. It was the first Olympic medal for a U.S. male weightlifter since the Games were last in Los Angeles in 1984. Morris’s cumulative scores in recent years haven’t always reflected his talents, because his single-stage snatch lifts are not yet on par with his two-stage clean and jerk lifts. At a World Cup event in Thailand in April, Morris, 20, set the existing clean and jerk world record for his weight class of 176 kgs. A more experienced Morris should be in the medal hunt for years.
HEZLY RIVERA, gymnastics
At 16, Rivera was the youngest member of the U.S. delegation in any sport. Though she was not one of the front-runners to make the team, injuries at the U.S. trials to Shilese Jones and Kayla DiCello opened the door for a younger gymnast to join veterans Simone Biles, Suni Lee, Jordan Chiles and Jade Carey on the U.S. squad for Paris. Before the Olympics, Rivera, a New Jersey native, won silver medals at the 2023 junior world championships in the team and floor exercise events. In Paris, she fought through some noticeable nerves in the qualifying round, especially on beam, and was not included in the three-up, three-count team final. In the quadrennium leading to the L.A. Games, she’ll be expected to be among the team leaders.
The Oakland native was within seconds of reaching the gold medal bout in Paris, before his foe, Tunisia’s Firas Katousi, scored the decisive kick that turned the contest. Nickolas, 23, later narrowly dropped another close contest against Italy’s Simone Alessio in the bronze-medal bout. Throughout the tournament, Nickolas proved to be the consummate showman with superior quickness, yet his defense let him down and cost him a medal. Nickolas is an appealing athlete. He started in the sport after his mom noticed how transfixed he was after watching Power Rangers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He once traded his gold medal from a tournament with a female teammate who was in tears after taking silver. In 2023, Nickolas won his own silver at the world championships, so he’s still a step—and a kick—away from the top of the podium.
CASEY KAUFHOLD, archery
Kaufhold, 20, had a disappointing showing in the individual event in Paris, placing just 17th. She later won a bronze in the mixed team event with veteran Brady Ellison. The architecture student at Texas A&M has been a national team member since 2019, when she won team and mixed-team titles at the Pan-Am Games in Lima at age 15. Since this is a sport in which athletes can compete successfully for decades, Kaufhold could be making regular visits to the Olympic stage for years. Her parents own the world’s largest archery supply store, the Lancaster Archery Supply Pro Shop, a 10,000-square-foot emporium of archery gear in Pennsylvania.
Brooks, 24, may be a bit older than some on this list, but the 2023 world champion has already confirmed his intention to atone for a heartbreaking semifinal loss in Paris to Magomed Ramazanov of Bulgaria. Brooks had a 3–0 lead and was dominating the match, before he gave up a pair of two-point takedowns, including the decisive maneuver with four seconds left on the clock. He defeated Uzbekistan’s Javrail Shapiev, 5–0, to secure bronze in Paris. After a stellar career at Penn State, Brooks made his first Olympic team in 2024 by upsetting Olympic champ David Taylor at the U.S. trials.
LAUREN SCRUGGS, fencing
After Scruggs, 21, won two world junior titles in individual foil, it seemed inevitable that the Harvard philosophy major would contend for an individual medal in Los Angeles when she would be 25 and at her peak. Instead, Scruggs sped up the time frame and won the individual silver medal and team gold in Paris as a 21-year-old No. 11 seed in the tournament. In so doing, the native of Queens, N.Y., became the first Black woman to win an Olympic fencing medal. Scruggs dropped a 15–6 decision in the final to teammate Lee Kiefer, who repeated as Olympic champion. Though Kiefer hasn’t discounted a return to the Games in L.A., she’d be 34 then and further along in her demanding medical career, leaving Scruggs as the logical heir apparent.
The 18-year-old sensation from Southlake, Texas, set a world record in the speed event at the Paris Games, scaling the wall in just 4.74 seconds to secure an Olympic medal. Unfortunately for Watson, that was the climb for the bronze after he lost to China’s Wu Peng in the semis. (Indonesia’s Veddriq Leonardro subsequently won gold.) Watson has been a star-in-waiting since he won a major world cup event in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 2022. Now he may have to wait another four years. Watson is an avid chess player and compares the strategy of the game to the decisions involved with getting up a wall as fast as possible.
ALEX and AARON SHACKELL, swimming
The teenage siblings made their Olympic debuts in Paris. Alex, 17, swam in the heats of the women’s 4x200 free relay, qualifying her for a silver medal when the team’s top four took second place behind Australia. Alex also finished sixth in the 200-meter butterfly. She later won gold by swimming in the heats of the medley relay. The U.S. women later set a world record 3:49.63 to win gold in the final, although Shackell did not swim in it. Aaron, 19, became the first swimmer—excluding open-water swimmers—to qualify for the Olympic team when he led the 400 free wire-to-wire at the U.S. trials, insisting that the 20,000 fans in the stands and the gravity of the moment made him swim faster. He transferred last season from Cal and later his club team in Carmel, Ind., to join Michael Phelps’s former coach Bob Bowman at the University of Texas. Aaron reached the 400-meter freestyle final in Paris, but placed eighth. The siblings’ father, Nicholas, swam for his native Great Britain, placing 28thoverall in the 100-meter freestyle at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.
