Getty Images
Team USA is in the semi-finals of the women’s basketball tournament at the Tokyo Olympics. With a 79-55 win over Australia in the quarter-finals on Wednesday morning, it emphatically reached its incredible Olympic winning streak of 53 games.
Slow starts were an issue for Team USA in Tokyo as they were behind in all three group stage games after the first quarter. However, there was no such problem against Australia. Whether it was losing to the Opals in a pre-Olympic exhibition game or just wanting to put some shaky early appearances behind them, Americans looked like they had something to prove.
With a 17-0 run in the middle of the first frame, in which they kept Australia goalless for five minutes, the Americans took the lead 26:12 after the first quarter and did not look back. Aside from a few ball possession in the second quarter, Team USA led the rest of the way in double digits and was on cruise control for the entire second half.
On an individual level, Breanna Stewart took the lead with her best performance in the tournament. She was a big part of the first quarter rebound to take control and had 20 points at half time (Australia as a team only had 27 points at break). Stewart finished with 23 points, five rebounds and three assists in just 23 minutes. If the game had been closer and she hadn’t sat out much in the second half, she would have had a chance to hit Lisa Leslie’s American Olympic record of 35 points.
Team USA is now only two wins away from an historic seventh consecutive gold medal. First, the team must pass a semi-final against Serbia, which made a huge comeback in the fourth quarter to beat China in the quarter-finals. This game is scheduled for Friday and will be the first time the two countries meet in the knockout phase. They met in the group stage at the 2016 Olympics, and Team USA won that meeting 110-84.
