Olympics men’s basketball results: August 10th
2016 Olympics men’s basketball results from Day 5 of the Games on Wednesday, August 10
USA Basketball was back on the floor at Rio 2016 on Day 5 with the rest of Group A in the Olympics men’s basketball competition. While there were two other games on the docket, there’s no getting around the fact that the main event of the day’s action was Team USA playing. The reason for that, of course, was the fact that they would be up agains their biggest competition to date in Australia in a titanic matchup budding with NBA talent.
Every bit of the matchup between USA Basketball and Australia in Olympics men’s basketball lived up to the hype. Andrew Bogut proved to be the perfect foil for the dominant center duo for the US while Patty Mills was just unconscious. Going into the half, the Aussies were actually up on the United States, the first time that’s happened since 2004. However, Carmelo Anthony and Kyrie Irving finally got rolling even more so in the second half and ultimately pulled away for a hard-fought 98-88 victory.
The first Olympics men’s basketball matchup of the day wasn’t so bad either, though. Serbia and France had both looked impressive coming into Day 5 of Rio 2016 and met up on Wednesday to do battle. Despite the fact that France went up big early, Nikola Jokic and Serbia clawed their way back into contention in the matchup and ultimately took the lead. The fourth quarter was essentially jockeying for position from that point, but a sloppy final few possessions left Serbia ahead 76-75 when the final buzzer sounded.
Ending the day in the competition was another close game between two struggling teams in Venezuela and China. These two had both been beaten on coming into this matchup, but needed a win on Wednesday to stay relevant. Despite not being expected to do much in the tournament, it was the Venezuela squad that ended up with the victory, 72-68. That closed out the night in Olympics men’s basketball.
After yet another riveting day in the competition, USA remains perfect but looks vulnerable. With matchups against Serbia and France still looming, things are just now heating up. Even if you’re a fan of the United States, you have to be excited about the hoops action to come.