RIO DE JANEIRO – When Serbia finished their third game in Pool B of the 2016 Rio Olympics Women’s basketball preliminary round, their hopes for a medal were dim after going 0-3 to Spain, Canada and the USA. The Serbian women rebounded from that deficit to fight into the medal round, past their second defeat to Spain in the semifinals, to beat France 70-63 for the Bronze medal – their first ever Olympic medal.
“Its typical Serbian way, the hard way,” said Serbian leading scorer (18 points) Jelena Milovanovic. “This time with started with our rhythm. They (France) could not do anything. The way we came out, the way we all fought in the first quarter.”
In the first quarter Serbia jumped out 12-3 in the first five minutes only to see France claw back into the game in the second quarter and evening the game at 27 by halftime.
“In the second quarter, (it was) the same old Serbian problems and we let them come back,” said Milovanovic. “Our coach got extremely mad at halftime, she really didn’t want to talk to us. So she just yelled at us and ran out of the locker room. We realized it’s our only chance with the last 20 minutes. We came out and fought for 20 minutes and we got up by 15 and France just gave up.”
Serbia built a double digit quickly into the third period and just continued to make shots, including 10 of 12 from the foul line, to keep France from closing closer than either points in the last quarter. It was a great finish for a team that started the competition with three straight losses in Pool B.
“We love to start (down 0-3) like that,” laughed Milovanovic. “It makes people underestimate us. I am sure people were thinking the European champions came and didn’t do anything the first three game (Spain, USA, and Canada). Well we had tough opponents. Those are the great three teams and the teams fighting for a medal and you can see who the first three (from Pool B) is.”
Serbia wins their first women’s Olympic basketball medal defeating France 70-63 for Bronze at the Carioca Arena 1 in Rio.
“My first Olympics, we are bronze,” smiled Serbian forward Danielle Page who player her NCAA college basketball at Nebraska. “It’s such an honor to be a part of this team and to make history with my Serbian teammates. We will have a lot of medals to celebrate in the Serbian camp (at the Olympic Village).”
“Huge, no one can understand how big this is,” said winning coach Marina Maljkovic. “We are a country of great collective sports and for women’s basketball its unbelievable. I can tell you what it means – watch what happens when we arrive in the country on the 23rd – the whole country will be on the streets waiting for us. To say this is the Women’s medal, this is Olympics games, no one in the world expected this.”
NOTES: Serbia gets their first women’s basketball medal under their own country name since they competed separate from the Yugoslavia banner in 1988. France, the 2012 Silver Medalist in London, got 18 points from Endy Miyem and 10 from Valeriane Ayayi but only 6 points and 4 points from Euro star 6-4 forward Sandrine Gruda in almost 30 minutes of play.
