Germany stun US to reach Basketball World Cup final

AFP |  Manila

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Germany head coach Gordon Herbert hailed his “special group” of players after they stunned the United States yesterday to reach the Basketball World Cup final. Germany stood toe-to-toe with their celebrated American opponents for the full game in Manila and emerged with a 113-111 win to advance to a final showdown with Serbia on Sunday.

The Germans are unbeaten at the World Cup and had given the US a huge fright before going down to a narrow loss in a pre-tournament warm-up game in Abu Dhabi.

They got the job done when it really counted, though, and Herbert said they were “not where we want to be yet”. “This group of players wants to win gold,” he said.

“One more to go. We’ll let the players enjoy this tonight and tomorrow morning when we wake up, this is over. “We’ve moved on, we’re getting ready for Sunday.”

Andreas Obst, who was a constant thorn in the Americans’ side, finished as Germany’s top scorer with 24 points.

Franz Wagner with 22 points and Daniel Theis with 21 also made huge contributions.

Germany finished third at last year’s EuroBasket championship and Wagner said they were determined not to let another chance “slip away”.

“We had a big goal coming in and we’re one win away,” said Wagner, who plays for Orlando Magic in the NBA.

“From the first day we got together in the summer, we believed that we’re a special group and we can win against any team.”

Things started to go wrong for the United States in the third quarter when Josh Hart and Jalen Brunson both made simple mistakes to hand Germany a six-point lead.

Germany built on the advantage and Dennis Schroder nailed a shot to put his team 94-84 ahead at the end of the third quarter.

Germany kept their discipline to see out the win with the Americans pushing hard in the fourth quarter. “It’s a special group,” said Herbert.

“The way we played, we stuck together at different times when things got tough. We had players who made some huge plays.”

The result means the United States will miss the final for the second straight tournament, after finishing seventh in China in 2019.