Swish Appeal - 2014 FIBA World Championships: Canada is 5th placeBasketball is basketball.https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/49391/swish-fave.png2014-10-05T15:30:00-04:00http://www.swishappeal.com/rss/stream/65925562014-10-05T15:30:00-04:002014-10-05T15:30:00-04:00Australia wins bronze, Canada & France win too
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<p>Three of the four Sunday games in the FIBA World Championships are now complete, headlined with Australia's bronze medal winning performance.</p> <p>As of the time of this post, we have a bronze medal winner, and all the final rankings in the FIBA World Championships have been decided except for the Gold Medal winner, which will either be Team USA or Spain. Below are quick recaps of the third, fifth, and seventh place matches on Sunday in Turkey.</p>
<h4><b>Australia blows out Turkey, 74-44 to win the Bronze Medal</b></h4>
<p>The Opals held the hometown team to 29.1% shooting, and even held them to 12-of-42 shooting from two point range. The Turks also committed 17 turnovers while only dishing 7 assists as a team. When you couple that with Australia outshooting, outrebounding, and taking care of the ball much better, that spells a big win. Opals center Marianna Tolo led all scorers with 21 points in the win.</p>
<p>Australia's bronze medal finish in the 2014 FIBA World Championships also continues a very long streak for medal winning performances in this tournament and the Olympics. The Opals have been third place or better in the Olympics and the FIBA World Championships since the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.</p>
<h4><b>Canada wins the fifth place game over China, 61-53</b></h4>
<p>Kim Gaucher scored 16 points, while Miranda Ayim scored 15 points and 9 rebounds to lead Team Canada to their highest FIBA World Championship finish since 1996 when they won the bronze medal. For Team China, Ting Shao, led the way with 12 points and seven rebounds in the loss.</p>
<h4><b>France wins seventh place game against Serbia, 88-74</b></h4>
<p>France's Sandrine Gruda sat this game out due to injury. But even without her, the French doubled up the Serbians in rebounding (41-20), which proved to be the difference in this game. The Serbians actually outshot the French (they shot a blistering 53.7% from the field), but their lack of rebounding, which has been an issue throughout the FIBA World Championships, haunted them once again. It was also exacerbated when they could not steal the ball many times as a team. They only did so four times, considerably less than during group play.</p>
<p>On the bright side for Serbia, Ana Dabovic scored 19 points on 7-of-10 shooting and regained the scoring touch she had earlier in the tournament. Both she and her older sister Milica combined for all of Serbia's four steals.</p>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/5/6913759/fiba-world-championships-2014-australia-third-place-winnerAlbert Lee2014-10-04T16:40:00-04:002014-10-04T16:40:00-04:00Spain, USA in the FIBA World Championship Game
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<p>One more day of competition left after Saturday's games in Turkey.</p> <p>The Spanish men's national basketball team was "supposed" to play Team USA in the FIBA World Cup Final, but France put a dent in those plans. The Spanish women however are pulling their weight and will face Team USA in the World Championship final. Now, let's go over some final scores from the semifinals and the consolation bracket:</p>
<h4><b>Semifinal Bracket</b></h4>
<h5><b>Team Spain defeats Turkey, 66-56</b></h5>
<p>Alba Torrens scored 28 points and Sancho Lyttle added 18 more to help Spain advance to the championship game. The game was decided in the fourth quarter once the Spanish went on a 25-17 run to close the game. For the home team, LaToya Sanders (she goes by Lara Sanders on the Turkish team) scored 18 points and grabbed 8 rebounds in the loss.</p>
<h5><b>Team USA beats Australia, 82-70</b></h5>
<p>Maya Moore and Tina Charles scored 20 points each to lead Team USA to a solid win over the Opals. Though Team USA won by only 12 points here, this game felt like an even bigger win than that, once you consider that the Americans outshot (50.8% for USA vs. 34.2% for AUS) and outrebounded the Australians (49-31) by big margins.</p>
<h4><b>Consolation Bracket</b></h4>
<p>Teams are also playing for 5th through 7th place in the tournament. Here's how they fared.</p>
<h5><b>China beat Serbia soundly, 85-69</b></h5>
<p>The Chinese had a wire-to-wire win in this one, especially with ball movement, where they had 22 team assists as opposed to the Serbians' 12. Ting Shao had a nice bounce back game as she scored 24 points, grabbed 5 rebounds, and made four steals.</p>
<p>The Serbians shot poorly from 2 point range (17-of-47), which negated a good performance from three (7-of-17). They also weren't able to grab many steals as a team, which was why they had a strong performance earlier in group play. To be fair, both Milica and Ana Dabovic had five of Serbia's six steals, and they also combined for 23 points. Jelena Milovanovic also scored in double figures. She made three of her five three point shots, but was 0-of-6 from two point range.</p>
<h5><b>Canada beat France, 55-40</b></h5>
<p>Neither team shot well in this game, but France was really bad, where they only made 15-of-55 shots, good for a field goal percentage rate of 27.3%. For the Canadians, Miranda Ayim scored 12 points and grabbed 5 rebounds.The win guarantees the Canadians their highest finish in the World Championships since 1986 when thy were third place.</p>
<p>For France, though Sandrine Gruda had a double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds, she did so shooting 3-of-11 from the field.</p>
<h4>Sunday's Games</h4>
<p>Here is the schedule for the final day of FIBA World Championship competition. All games are on WatchESPN or LiveBasketball.TV as an online option. TV options are in parentheses if applicable:</p>
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<li>Serbia vs. France in the 7th place game, 6:50 a.m. ET</li>
<li>Canada vs. China in the 5th place game, 9:05 a.m. ET (NBA TV Canada - in Canada)<br> </li>
<li>Australia vs. Turkey in the 3rd place game, 11:50 a.m. ET <br> </li>
<li>United States vs. Spain in the Championship Game, 2 p.m. ET (ESPN2 - in the USA)</li>
</ul>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/4/6908241/fiba-world-championships-2014-team-usa-spain-womens-basketball-semifinals-roundupAlbert Lee2014-10-03T18:45:00-04:002014-10-03T18:45:00-04:00FIBA World Championship Semifinals field set
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<p>The Final Four teams have been set in the FIBA World Championships.</p> <p>The FIBA World Championship quarterfinals were held on Friday. Here's a quick roundup of the quarterfinals:</p>
<h4><a target="_blank" href="http://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/3/6904779/2014-fiba-world-championships-canada-vs-austrailia-game-recap">Australia defeated Canada, 63-52</a></h4>
<p>After a close first quarter, the Opals went on a 17-7 second quarter run and were leading by double digits for the rest of the way. If there is one stat that stands out in the final box score, it's the number of free throws the teams took. The Opals made 21-of-25 free throws while the Canadians only made 6-of-10 of theirs. Link to Aneela's recap.</p>
<h4><a target="_blank" href="http://www.fiba.com/world/women/2014/0310/Spain-China">Spain beat China, 71-55</a></h4>
<p>The Spanish went on a big start, and held the Chinese to single digit scoring in both the first and second quarters. Sancho Lyttle led Spain with 24 points, 7 rebounds, and 5 steals in the win. For China, Shao Ting was held to just 3 points in the losing effort, after being the team's leading scorer up to this point.</p>
<h4><a target="_blank" href="http://www.fiba.com/world/women/2014/0310/Turkey-Serbia">Turkey squeaks by Serbia, 62-61</a></h4>
<p>The run toward a gold medal ends for the Serbians, who are the lowest ranked team in the tournament. For Turkey, Latoya Sanders scored 14 points and grabbed 19 rebounds in the win. For Serbia, Milica Dabovic scored 18 points and Nevena Jovanovic added 16 more. Ana Dabovic only scored 2 points on 1-of-7 shooting, while Jelena Milovanovic scored 11 points, mostly off of threes, but she also shot 1-of-8 from two point range.</p>
<p>If there's a factor that hurt Serbia in this game, it's pace. The Serbians' defense was predicated on stealing the ball by causing turnovers. Today, they only made three steals, and caused 8 turnovers, well under their averages.</p>
<h4><a target="_blank" href="http://www.fiba.com/world/women/2014/0310/USA-France">The United States gets revenge on France, 94-72</a></h4>
<p>Sandrine Gruda nearly had a double double in this game with 18 points and 9 rebounds, but Team USA shot 41-of-58 from the field which was more than enough to win. That is a shooting percentage of 70.7%. Video Game-like right here. And it took care of <i>Unfinished Business in Paris</i>.</p>
<p>Brittney Griner led the Americans in scoring with 17 points, while adding 5 rebounds and 2 blocks.</p>
<h4><b>FIBA World Championship Semifinals</b></h4>
<p>Saturday's FIBA World Championship semifinals schedule is as follows:</p>
<p> </p>
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<li><span>Turkey vs. Spain at 11:50 a.m. ET</span></li>
<li><span>United States vs. Australia at 2:05 p.m. ET</span></li>
</ul>
<p>All games are on WatchESPN or LiveBasketball.TV online. And in the US, you can watch the Team USA game on NBA TV.</p>
<h4><b>FIBA World Championship Consolation Bracket</b></h4>
<p>Though the FIBA World Championship tournament is a single-elimination affair, there are still opportunities for the teams that lost in the quarterfinals to show what they can do. There is a consolation bracket to determine who will be 5th through 8th place. They play before the semifinals teams, but here's the schedule for Saturday:</p>
<p> </p>
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<li><span>Serbia vs. China at 6:50 a.m. ET</span></li>
<li><span>France vs. Canada at 9:05 a.m. ET</span></li>
</ul>
<div>Again, games are on WatchESPN or LiveBasketball.TV online. In Canada, you can watch the Team Canada game on NBA TV Canada.</div>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/3/6905403/2014-fiba-world-championships-usa-australia-spain-turkey-semifinals-roundupAlbert Lee2014-10-03T18:17:44-04:002014-10-03T18:17:44-04:00Canada fell to Australia, short of history
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<p>Team Canada loses to Australia and now aims for a top 5 finish. Australia moves on to the semi finals in hopes for a medal.</p> <p>All's well that ends well.</p>
<p>Team Canada could not figure out how to get past the Australians all game long and lost by a final score of 62-53. With this loss, Team Canada is still on track on finish better than any previous tournament. Miranda Ayim led Canada with 11 points and 7 rebounds. Australia took care of business and got the win despite less than stellar play they displayed in the group stage. They now face the winner of USA-France in the semi finals.</p>
<p>Team Canada must now face the loser of USA-France in classification matches that start tomorrow.</p>
<p>For more on this game click <a href="http://www.fiba.com/world/women/2014/0310/Australia-Canada" target="_blank">here</a></p>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/3/6904779/2014-fiba-world-championships-canada-vs-austrailia-game-recapAneela Syed2014-10-02T22:00:02-04:002014-10-02T22:00:02-04:00Canada faces Australia in FIBA quarterfinals
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<p>Team Canada attempts to make history when they face Australia in quarterfinal action (7 a.m. EST, ESPN3).</p> <p>With plenty of confidence and momentum in their favor, Team Canada will look to make even more history when they face Australia in the first quarterfinal game of the 2014 FIBA World Championships for Women.</p>
<p>Canada is looking to advance to their first-ever semifinals at a Worlds tournament while Australia hopes to continue their dominance.</p>
<p>The two teams had very different paths coming into this game. Australia cruised to a 3-0 record with wins over Belarus, Korea and Cuba. They averaged 88 points per game per contest and gave up 52 points per game. Canada finished 1-2 in pool play and had to win an elimination game to reach the quarterfinals.</p>
<p>This game will be an interesting as it will test Team Canada's ability to defend. This is the best team they will see in the tournament (outside of the USA of course) so they will need to be ready. They need to contain Penny Taylor and Erin Phillips. They also need to figure out how to make the rest of Team Australia's players non-factors in the game. It will also be interesting to see how Team Canada will play offensively and how they will attack Australia.</p>
<p>Although stats and history favors Australia, Canada shouldn't be discouraged: it will be a much closer and tightly contested contest than what most people would think. Whoever wins this game will likely go on to face Team USA in the semifinals. The loser will go on to classification matches to finish either 5th through 8th. Team Canada can still finish in the top 6, which would be a step up from their previous finish in international play at the 2012 London Olympics (8th place).</p>
<p>The game will be televised on Friday morning at 7:00 am EST on NBATV Canada, ESPN3 and online through FIBA's website. It will also be on tape delay later on at Sportsnet 1 in Canada.</p>
<p id="paragraph6"><i>For more on how the Canadians got to the quarterfinals, check out <a href="http://www.swishappeal.com/2014/9/22/6828515/FIBA-world-championships-2014-team-canada-preview-results" target="_blank">our Team Canada storystream</a>.</i></p>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/2/6896689/2014-fiba-world-championships-canada-vs-australia-game-previewAneela Syed2014-10-01T13:00:02-04:002014-10-01T13:00:02-04:00Canada advances to the quarterfinals
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<figcaption>Team Canada celebrated advancing to the quarterfinals of the 2014 FIBA Women's World Championships. | Photo by Getty Images.</figcaption>
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<p>Team Canada advances to the quarterfinals after a big win against the Czech Republic. They face Australia on Friday.</p> <p>Wow. Just wow.</p>
<p>What an impressive win.</p>
<p>Team Canada is through to the quarter finals after a resounding win against the Czech Republic by a final score of 91-71. They were led by one of Team Canada's veterans Kim Smith Gaucher who had 17 points and 7 rebounds.</p>
<p>It was Team Canada's first appearance in the FIBA Worlds Quarterfinals since 1994. They also advanced to the top 8 in the 2012 Olympics.</p>
<p>This game was a total team effort as Canada had plenty of help from both their young players as well as veterans. 4 players were in double figures (Nirra Fields, Kia Nurse, Katherine Plouffe and Kim Smith Gaucher) Team Canada led wire to wire and had a dominant fourth quarter which sealed the deal. They now face Australia in the quarter finals on Friday.</p>
<p>This was Team Canada's best game of the tournament and how many expected them to play during the group stage. It was nice to see them step up when they needed to and finally come through. The execution, the focus was all there and it shows what a force Team Canada can be when they all play well collectively. It also can be even better when they face Australia on Friday. If they play good defense and score effectively, they might give Australia a scare. Or even win the game. Either way, Canada should be proud of how well they played today.</p>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/1/6880331/fiba-world-championships-2014-canada-vs-czech-republic-game-recapAneela Syed2014-10-01T07:00:02-04:002014-10-01T07:00:02-04:00Canada vs France/Canada vs Czech Republic
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<p>Canada fell to France and finished with a 1-2 record. They now face the Czech Republic in the 1/8 finals in a must win situation.</p> <p>Team Canada has work to do after their latest loss to France.</p>
<p>After a much better effort both offensively and defensively yesterday, they are going to have to do much of the same against the Czech Republic today.</p>
<p><span><b>Quick notes on Canada-France</b></span></p>
<p> </p>
<p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px;">Even though Canada lost to France and would have preferred a win, it was their best effort of the tournament. They were able to contain Celine Dumerc, tried their best to contain Sandrine Gruda and disrupted the French offense many times. It was a close game all the way through and Canada had their chances to go ahead but couldn't quite deliver.</p>
<p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px;">Michelle Plouffe led Canada with 10 points and 5 rebounds, but listed below are some key things noticed in the game.</p>
<p><b></b>- <b>Good watchable game - </b>The first two games that Team Canada played in, it was quite painful to watch at times but in this game, they were effective offensively, played better as a team and other non women basketball fans would enjoy watching the game.</p>
<p>- <b>France has problems - </b>In this game, Celine Dumerc was a non factor at times. It's pretty rare for her not to be a factor. They also had their own problems scoring outside of Sandrine Gruda. They lack something or rather are missing something.</p>
<p><b>- Mental strength - </b>Canada has problems when it comes down to the final minute. They are great defensively and get stops, but lack the mental toughness required to over come deficits and make good plays. Many times Canada could've went ahead but missed layups, got a turnover, etc.</p>
<p>For more on the game click <a target="_blank" href="http://www.fiba.com/world/women/2014/3009/FrancevCanada">here</a></p>
<h4>Canada vs. Czech Republic</h4>
<p>Canada's game against the Czech Republic will be televised live at 9:15 am EST on NBATV Canada. It should be a good one as both teams will be looking for a win so expect a battle.</p>
<p>Canada needs to figure out how to pull away from the opposition when given opportunities. They also need to rebound better and they have to play with a hunger and will to win if they want to advance to the quarterfinals against Australia.</p>
<p><i>For more of the game preview from FIBA, <a target="_blank" href="http://www.fiba.com/world/women/2014/0110/Czech-Republic-Canada" style="color: #c8181d !important; text-decoration: none !important; background-color: transparent;">click here</a>. For more on all of Canada's journey through the Worlds, <a target="_blank" href="http://www.swishappeal.com/2014/9/22/6828515/FIBA-world-championships-2014-team-canada-preview-results">check out our Team Canada storystream</a>. </i></p>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/10/1/6876813/2014-world-championships-canada-vs-france-czech-republicAneela Syed2014-09-30T16:00:18-04:002014-09-30T16:00:18-04:00Canada falls to France to close group play, 63-59<h3 class="link-title"><a rel="nofollow" href="/rss/stream/6592556">Canada vs. France final score: France pulls out a win to close group play,&nbsp;63-59</a></h3>
<div class="description"><p><p>Canada turned in a valiant effort, but couldn't execute down the stretch and eventually lost to France to close out group play. </p>
<p>France will now advance to play Brazil while Canada will face the Czech Republic...and of course, avoid the U.S. in the quarterfinals. </p>
<p>For more on Team Canada, check out <a href="http://www.swishappeal.com/2014/9/22/6828515/FIBA-world-championships-2014-team-canada-preview-results" target="new">our storystream</a>.</p></p></div>
https://www.swishappeal.com/2014/9/30/6875065/canada-vs-france-final-score-france-pulls-out-a-win-to-close-groupNate P