U.S. Advances to World Championship Game
9/24/2002 5:27:54 PM | Women's Basketball
NANJING, China - The USA Basketball Women's World Championship Team advanced to the gold medal game with a 71-56 victory versus Austrailia on September 24. Syracuse head women's basketball coach Marianna Freeman is an assistant with the USA squad.
The U.S. will take on Russia for the gold medal on Wednesday, September 25 at 9:30 a.m. EDT. NBA TV will televise the game live. Team USA is now 8-0 in World Championship play. The Russians are 7-1 with their only loss coming to the U.S. in the first game of the tournament.
Lisa Leslie (Los Angeles Sparks) scored 24 points and had 13 rebounds versus the Australians. Shannon Johnson (Orlando Miracle) scored 15 points in the second quarter alone.
"Our defense once again was as good as it could be. Lisa Leslie was outstanding, offensively, rebounding and defensively," said USA and Houston Comets head coach Van Chancellor. "I thought the press hurt them. But I also thought that there was one thing that really hurt us tonight, we got limited by foul trouble, but they also got limited by foul trouble. I thought that we had greater depth and I think that was the difference."
Leslie became the United States all-time leader in World Championship play in games played (25), points (376) and rebounds (181).
This is the 13th World Championship that the U.S. has participated in. The United States won the inaugural gold medal in 1953 and earned its sixth gold medal with a perfect 9-0 mark at the last World Championship in 1998. The USA is 79-20 (.798) with six gold medals, one silver and one bronze all-time at the World Championship.
For more information about the 2002 USA Basketball Women's World Championship Team visit www.usabasketball.com.
