those things you’re going to have a chance you can win it,” stated Auriemma. “France was probably playing as well as anytime I’ve ever seen them, since I’ve been the coach anyway. And when you’re going into it the way they’re playing, they got a lot of confi- dence. We tried to really disrupt them and get them into the kind of game they weren’t comfortable playing, and I think we did that right from the beginning. “When Candace Parker came in the
game, the game changed completely,” Auriemma continued. “I thought she was the biggest difference in the game tonight. We all just kind of took that and ran with it. We beat a really good team, but we’re a great team.” “I don’t remember who scored what
points or how many rebounds you had,” said Parker. “You just remember you won a gold medal and who was on your team. I think that this is just so sweet to get the second one. I was told a lot that Michael Jordan, when he was playing in Chicago, always said it’s easy – well, it’s not easy – but you can stumble on a championship once, but it’s really hard to do it twice. And for USA Basketball to do it five times in a row, that’s truly special.” Shooting 10-of-14 from the field on
her way to 21 points, Parker also grabbed 11 rebounds, and Bird added 11 points. All 12 U.S. players scored in a balanced attack that featured 22 assists on 34 made field goals. “I think our depth is by far the
biggest key for us,” Bird said. “We are able to wear teams down. Not very many teams go 12 deep and with that over a two-week tournament, these teams have to play a lot of minutes ... seven, eight players play a lot of minutes, and I think none of us have to. So we are just able to wear teams down and by the end for the most part you can see teams get tired, and that’s where we really capitalize.” The gold medal is a third for Bird,
Taurasi, who added nine points and six assists, and Catchings, who finished with four points and five rebounds. “Even if you win a game by 30, if
you win by 10, the whole process is real- ly difficult to try to get 12 really good players to kind of just buy into one thing,” Taurasi said. “It takes awhile; it takes a lot of effort. By the end of it, I think we succeeded in what we wanted
52
Fowles, the USA once again closed the stanza with an 11-4 run to take a 37-25 lead to the halftime locker room. The USA lead shifted between nine
and 12 points through the first three minutes of the third quarter. With the USA leading 43-32 at 6:54, two straight scores from Taurasi ignited the USA’s largest run of the game – a 19-0 spurt that featured six U.S. scorers and put the game out of reach. In fact, France did not score from the field for a full eight minutes. A free throw ended the USA’s run at 1:13 to bring the score to 62-33, and Celine Dumerc broke France’s cold shooting streak with a score at 9.3 seconds to end the period with the USA well in control, 63-37. The U.S. lead continued to grow in
the fourth quarter, and with a made free throw from Catchings at 4:30, all 12 American players had scored. Overall, the USA outscored France 20-13 in the last 10 minutes to bring the game to its 83-50 final.
A starter in all eight Olympic games, Tamika Catchings provided experience and leadership in 2012 and earned her third Olympic gold medal.
FRA
to do, we were lucky enough to win a gold medal doing it.” “It’s hard,” Moore said of blending
together as a team. “That’s why team sports are so much fun to watch because it’s really an artwork of a game of how can you fit these pieces together knowing that anyone of us could score 30 if we had to, but we don’t have to. So it’s kind of hard to do what you are usually not called on to do. But we made it work, and it was beautiful.” The USA held France to 28.1
percent shooting for the game (18-64 FGs) and caused 21 turnovers, which it converted into 27 points. The USA also delivered the ball inside to record 46 points in the paint. With the USA shooting just 4-of-12
from the field in the game’s first seven minutes, France owned a 13-11 lead after hitting a 3-pointer at 3:54. Four different U.S. scorers helped the
Americans close out the quarter on a 9-2 run to take a 20-15 lead at the first break. With the USA leading 26-21, Parker
led the USA with nine points over the next 5:26, and along with a score from
Beikes Gruda
USA 86, France 50 August 11, 2012
MIN FG FT R A PF PTS 9 0- 2 0- 0 212 0 24 4-12 4- 6 311 12
Dumerc 26 2-10 4- 4 331 8 Gomis
27 2- 7 0- 0 121 4
Ndongue 19 2- 5 0- 0 801 4 Yuoubou 16 4- 8 0- 0 323 8 Miyem 10 1- 3 0- 1 100 2 Lawson-Wade 24 3- 7 4- 4 214 12 Lepron Laborde Godin
9 0- 3 0- 0 012 0 3 0- 2 0- 0 000 0 14 0- 0 0- 0 313 0
Digbeu 19 0- 5 0- 0 501 0 Totals 200 18-64 12-15 38 12 19 50
USA Bird
Moore
MIN FG FT R A PF PTS 24 5- 7 0- 0 233 11 26 3- 6 0- 0 721 6
Catchings 16 1- 5 2- 4 521 4 Taurasi 29 3- 8 2- 2 363 9 Charles 18 1- 5 2- 2 202 4 Whalen 16 1- 3 1- 2 223 3 Augustus 15 4-10 0- 0 100 8 McCoughtry 11 2- 5 2- 2 121 7 Jones Cash
Fowles Parker
USA
7 2- 4 0- 0 101 4 5 1- 3 1- 2 111 3 12 1- 2 4- 6 623 6 21 10-14 1- 2 11 21 21
Totals 200 34-72 15-22 46 22 20 86 France
15 10 12 13 -- 50 20 17 26 23 -- 86
3PT FGs- France (2-11): Lawson-Wade 2-3, Dumerc 0-5, Gomis 0-1, Laborde 0-1, Digbeu 0-1; USA (3-8): Taurasi 1-3, Bird 1-1, McCoughtry 1-1, Moore 0-2, Whalen 0-1; TO-France 21, USA 11; BLKS-France 3, USA 2; STLS-France 9, USA 8.
USA Basketball News
Garrett Ellwood/NBAE/Getty Images
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