Paula Creamer answers her critics with impressive performance in opening match

Raise your hand if you thought Juli Inkster was crazy to put a struggling Paula Creamer on the U.S. Solheim Cup team. Raise your other hand if you thought Juli Inkster was even crazier to put a struggling Paula Creamer into the event's opening match.

Maybe Juli Inkster knows a bit more about this stuff than most.

The U.S. captain's bold move paid off with Creamer teaming up with Morgan Pressel to take down the European's top two players, Suzann Pettersen and Anna Nordqvist, in a 3-and-2 victory that got the Americans off to a strong start. Creamer and Pressel are taking on Nordqvist and Caroline Hedwall in an afternoon four-ball match.

The two teams wound up tied 2-2 after the opening session, but certainly, the U.S. squad -- especially Creamer who came in with four consecutive missed cuts -- has to feel a lot better about its chances of winning on foreign soil to end its first losing streak to the Europeans in the biennial event.