Nikola Jokic and Serbia erased a 24-point deficit to edge Australia 95-90 in overtime on Tuesday to reach the Olympic men’s basketball semi-finals and a potential clash with the United States.
The United States, led by all-time NBA scoring leader LeBron James, faced Brazil later on Tuesday, aiming to take the next step toward a fifth straight Olympic title and their 17th overall.
Bercy Arena was rocking long before the star-studded USA took the floor thanks to France’s wire-to-wire 82-73 victory over previously unbeaten Canada.
On a quiet night for French sensation Victor Wembanyama, Guerschon Yabusele scored 22 points and Isaia Cordinier added 20 for the hosts, who were buoyed throughout by a raucous crowd as they booked a semi-final meeting with Germany, who beat Giannis Antetokounmpo’s Greece 76-63.
Wembanyama scored just seven points but pulled down 12 rebounds. Evan Fournier’s 15 points included a monster three-pointer with less than a minute to play that pushed France’s lead back to 10 points.
“We had 40 solid minutes and I think if I’d made my shots we would have won the game even earlier,” Wembanyama said. “It just shows that we can be much better.”
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored a game-high 27 points for Canada, who pulled within striking distance in the fourth quarter but couldn’t get over the hump.
Serbia, on the other hand, managed to regroup after falling 44-20 down early in the second quarter against Australia.
Three-time and reigning NBA Most Valuable Player Jokic scored 21 points with 14 rebounds and eight assists and Bogdan Bogdanovic added 17 points.
Five Serbian players scored in double figures — and they needed the contributions of everyone to turn things around after 35-year-old NBA veteran Patty Mills exploded for 14 straight points in a 20-0 Australia scoring run bridging the first and second quarters.
Mills finished with 26 points and Josh Giddey added 25, but Serbia, trailing 54-42 at halftime, out-scored Australia 25-11 in the third quarter to lead 67-65 going into the final period.
Mills drilled a jump shot over Jokic to send it to overtime, but Jokic essentially sealed it with back-to-back baskets that put Serbia up 93-90 with 25 seconds left in the extra session.
Bogdanovic, who scored 17 points, described the atmosphere in Serbia’s locker room at halftime as “a lot of madness”.
“But I think we found momentum in the second quarter,” he said. “We knew we needed to find some momentum and to be ready to play.”
Germany also weathered an early storm, Greece jumping to a 12-point lead in the first quarter before the Germans clawed back to tie it up at halftime.
Franz Wagner scored 18 points and Dennis Schroder added 13 points and eight assists off the bench for Germany, who withstood a 22-point performance from two-time NBA MVP Antetokounmpo.
“I think it speaks to our maturity,” Wagner said of Germany’s ability to recalibrate in the second half. “We even talked about it at halftime, not everything is going to go perfect all the time.
“So you kind of recover from that and adjust and react, and we did a good job. We did a good job responding.”
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