“France is a hell of a team”. However, there was nothing they could do in the third quarter to upset the United States of America powerhouse.
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They will face the Americans on Saturday while France and Serbia play for bronze.
“They have a little bit of everything”.
But unlike the others, France’s fearlessness didn’t drain away after the opening quarter.
With the starting point guard sidelined with a knee injury, the Americans were out of sorts for a half before finally getting it together to pull away from France in an 86-67 win in the semifinals Thursday night.
“At the end of it, I was like, ‘Really, I just did this?” she said.
“I can not explain how we won with such a big margin after suffering so much in quarter-finals”, said Spain’s Laura Quevedo.
In fact, the French matched the U.S. in scoring in the second half, as both teams finished with 21 points in the quarter. “There’s a big difference in our team the way we played today and the way we played the other six games”.
“When Sue’s out, you forget how much she does for this team”, she said.
Icho has won her weight class every year since women’s wrestling was added to the Olympics in 2004.
Reserve Marine Johannes led France with 13 points. “Pretty hard”, she said of not being on the court. “It’s really hard. They’re very talented”. She hadn’t lost in a major tournament in years, but she had been less dominant in recent tournaments.
“We made mistakes, missed some shots, but no one relaxed on defence or rebounding and that was the key to victory”, Torrens said.
France fought hard and made it difficult for the US team during the first two quarters, and the score was 40-34 for the Americans at the half, but the decisive shift came in the third period when the USA squad scored 25 points to their rivals’ 8, and the game stayed out of reach for France from then on.
Ashton Eaton retained his title by tying the Olympic record in the decathlon, Ryan Crouser led an American one-two in the shot put with a new games record, and Kerron Clement delivered another gold for the United States in the 400 hurdles.
Basketball fans can now savour the prospect of a mouth-watering semi-final between the USA and Spain that could double as an NBA All-Star game as both teams are stacked with NBA champions, All-Stars and most valuable players.
Whether Bird plays or not, it would be an epic upset if the US loses this gold medal or its 48-game Olympic winning streak now.
“We knew as a team we could do some things”, Yacoubou said.
“It’s going to be the same old dance”.
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United States women are 9-0 in world and Olympic play against Spain, including a 103-63 rout in the Rio group stage. “I’ve been overseas on the same team with her the last two years”, said Taurasi. The way the flow of the game was going is just different.
