“(It was) totally not like our team”.
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Point guard Milos Teodosic led Serbia from the start – he scored six of their first 12 points and finished the night with 22 points and five assists. “Everyone dreams of making the game-winning shot to win a medal for their country but what we were saying is we were one defensive stop away”, Mills said.
“We got our arses kicked from start to finish”. They executed well against us. The Americans were heavily favored, but Spain gave them a game before ultimately falling short. “They played really well”.
Serbia came out of the gate with suffocating defense, and their game plan was absolutely ideal to contain the off-ball movement that has been Australia’s calling card. Serbia finished 43-30 on the boards.
Stefan Markovic scored 14, Nikola Jokic had 11 rebounds and the Serbs, a squad with a mixture of moxie and muscle, earned another crack at the USA on Sunday.
“There’s no real positive you can take from this”, Bogut said. He battled Andersen inside, the two players exchanging shoves and dirty looks as each team tried but couldn’t shake free from the other.
The defeat was going to “eat at me” for a little while, Bogut said. The centre, who at times has struggled with foul trouble will not only have offensive duties to take care of, but he must also find a way to play big minutes and shut down the threat of Bogut and Baynes or they will run all over Serbia.
“We spoke nothing about basketball throughout that whole All Star break”, Mills said. Even though Australia lost the game, they won the hearts and the respect of basketball fans everywhere. “You have one bad game out of seven and you’re kind of out”. When asked if it would be hard to regroup and play for bronze on Sunday, the big man was pragmatic. With both teams taking the lead multiple times throughout the final moments, any one possession could’ve been the difference. Hopefully we can play for a bronze medal.
Following the game, five-time Australian Olympian Andrew Gaze, the second leading scorer in the games’ history working in Rio as a TV commentator, summed up the way he and his countrymen were feeling. “We’re going to prepare for the win”.
They then beat Croatia in their quarter-final before a semi-final loss to Serbia, arguably their only poor match of the tournament, set up the bronze medal match with Spain. Right now, I’m feeling hurt. “But we’ve got a quick turnaround”.
“We’re still in undiscovered territory for Australian basketball”. Australia, however, kept their hopes alive thanks to a three from Mills and Anderson each, as well as a couple of free throws from the latter that forced the game to 40-38 by the end of the half.
The Boomers were out-hussled by a Serbian team that resembled what the men in green and gold had looked like for the best part of the past fortnight.
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So good had they performed, whispers of maybe – just maybe – challenging the United States for a gold medal began to get louder.
