Battling Australia, who squeezed past Jordan in their world basketball championship opener, gave world No. 1 Argentina an almighty fright on Sunday before being edged out 74-72.
After an enthralling first three quarters, the two sides went point for point in the final period. Australia were ahead with 6 minutes, 30 seconds remaining, but when Louis Scola (31 points) sunk two free-throws with 8.8 seconds remaining it looked over for the Aussies.
However, Joseph Ingles (22 points) was on hand to knock in a missed three-pointer by Patrick Mills with 3.5 seconds remaining and Australia sensed they had a chance.
Argentina failed to clear the ball, giving Australia one shot with 3.1 seconds on the clock, but it was not to be for Australia with the final shot from Adam Gibson going astray.
In the other Group A game, Germany created the upset of day when they held off Serbia in overtime.
After cruising through their opening victory over Angola on Saturday, Serbia showed few signs of missing captain Nenad Krstic and Milos Teodosic, both currently suspended for their involvement in a brawl during a warm-up game against Greece, but Sunday was a different case.
Both teams held the lead for significant periods of the game, with neither able to gain significant ground over the other. In the end, the only thing that could separate the two teams was a period of overtime after the score was tied 69-69 at fulltime.
It was only a missed lay-up in the final five seconds by Serbia that saw Germany prevail 82-81.
In Group C action, China managed to secure their first victory of the tournament against Ivory Coast, winning 83-73. Yi Jianlian and Wang Shipeng combined for 51 points as Bob Donewald’s team scored timely baskets to end a number of big runs by Ivory Coast.
Turkey also created something of a surprise result, beating Russia 65-56.
In Group D, France continued on from their upset win over champions Spain by easily overcoming Lebanon 86-59. Spain were also able to record their first victory, defeating New Zealand 101-84.
The US continued their bid to return to world glory, with coach Mike Krzyzewski again giving his whole squad court time in their 99-77 victory over Slovenia. Brazil also continued their winning ways, holding off Tunisia 80-65.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier