Olympic belief silver lining for Australian Opals after loss to US at basketball world cup
OPALS captain Jenna 0’Hea says the Australian team now has the belief it is good enough to win a historic Olympic gold after overcoming injury adversity to win silver at the World Cup.
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OPALS captain Jenna 0’Hea says the Australian team now has the belief it is good enough to win a historic Olympic gold after overcoming injury adversity to win silver at the FIBA woman World Cup basketball tournament in Spain on Monday.
O’Hea also applauded teammate Liz Cambage, who missed MVP honours to American Breanna Stewart but made the tournament All-Star Five, after the US beat Australia 73-56 in the gold medal decider in Tenerife.
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“She is my MVP, our MVP,” O’Hea told The Daily Telegraph from Spain after the 17-point loss.
“She had an amazing tournament. She did everything for us. She carried our team the whole time. In my eyes she is our MVP. I am so proud of them all.’’
Undefeated at the tournament prior to the match, the Opals were unable to match the US who stifled Australian star Liz Cambage’s offensive output with the WNBA star leaving the court with 14 rebounds but just seven points.
Prior to the gold medal decider Cambage was averaging 27 point per game and had not shot under 20.
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O’Hea said the Opals making it to the final after an injury interrupted preparation, which included two last changes to the team, showed her Australia has the talent to make its mark at the Tokyo Olympics.
The Australian captain also admitted the Opals were not at their best in the decider.
“They are a big obstacle but we know we can beat them,’’ O’Hea said.
“We had a lot of adversity and we still got a silver medal.
“I think we showed we can stick with them now. You play for gold medals and that’s what we will be doing.
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“Everyone stepped up. I think there is a belief we can take them down. It’s a good building block going forward.’’
The Opals defeated Nigeria 86-68, Argentina 84-43, Turkey 90-64, China 83-42 and Spain 72-66 to advance to the final.
With Penny Taylor, the captain of the winning Australian 2006 side watching from the sidelines, the US defended their world crown went one better than the bronze won in 2014.
“The silver is amazing. It is a little bitter sweet because we wanted to win that game but I am so proud for the campaign we had,” O’Hea said.
“It’s so cool to be back in the medals.”
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“We really wanted that gold. We believed we could win it. We felt we had a good enough team to do it.
“The USA though, they were tough. They had a lot of firepower.”
The silver medal follows on from the gold in 2006 and bronze medals in 1998, 2002 and 2014.