Source :- PERTH NOW NEWS
Breanna Stewart delivered again and the Americans continued their domination of international play, winning a fifth successive women’s FIBA World Cup title with a 97-79 victory over France.
The Americans have won 36 successive World Cup games, dating to the semi-finals of the 2006 World Cup, where they lost to Russia.
“We are the standard,” said Stewart, who scored 22 points in the victory and earned MVP honours of the tournament for the second time.
“USA Basketball has continued to show up and go for gold and to have done that however many times consecutively is an insane stat. We want to make sure that we continue to build on that standard and everybody else knows it.”
Despite the final score, this game wasn’t easy; the Americans faced their biggest deficit in the tournament since that loss to Russia when they were down 14 points in the first half to France.
They calmly rallied behind Stewart and Jackie Young to get within two at halftime, with Caitlin Clark hitting a 3-pointer just before the buzzer.
“I think we felt really good about where we were at,” said Clark, who finished with 12 points. “I think France was 8 for 14 (from 3-point range). We dug ourself a hole, but we climbed out of it, and I felt like we were never rattled by anything.”
The US dominated in the second half, starting the third quarter with a 11-2 run to go up 54-47. Stewart, who now has four World Cup titles to her name, had four points during the game-changing burst.
France were able to get within 55-51, but the Americans used a 16-3 spurt that included two unsportsmanlike fouls against France on the same play. The Americans were up 73-57 heading into the fourth quarter, and France were never able to close the gap.
Earlier, Spain, who knocked Australia out of the tournament in the quarter-finals, won the bronze medal with an 81-58 win over hosts Germany.
The 20-year-old Iyana Martín scored 22 points to give Spain, who didn’t qualify for the last World Cup, their third third-place finish in the tournament after 2010 and 2018.
The Spanish players looked sharper and faster throughout, with turnovers again an issue for Germany after the hosts had 25 in their semi-final defeat to France on Saturday. Germany had six in the first quarter alone and finished with 18 against Spain.
