USA Women Move on to Wheelchair Basketball Semi-Finals

The USA Women’s Team has moved onto the semi-finals in the 2010 International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF) Wheelchair Basketball World Championships after winning in the quarter-finals against Great Britain.

The game started with the two sides matching each other point for point. Rebecca Murray (USA) was the outstanding player on the court as she scored all of her team’s first ten points. The first period ended with Team USA leading 17:10. The second quarter started slowly as neither side took any chances, both scoring just two points halfway through. Team Great Britain edged a low scoring quarter of 8-7 points, giving a half-time score of 24-18 to USA.

Team USA went on to win 53-37. Team Great Britain will now battle it out for final standings.

On the men’s side, Great Britain’s quarter final match against France got off to the perfect start as Jon Pollock scored a three-pointer in the first offence of the game. The early score clearly unsettled France as they missed opportunities early in the quarter.

As the second quarter began, France looked strong and began to take a lot more of their chances. The second half continued in a similar fashion as Great Britain’s Terry Bywater scored two free throws and Simon Brown contributed with his first points of the game. The consistency of the French however lead to their dominance for field goals, and it was beginning to make the difference between the two sides. In the end, France won 59-50, giving the team another reason to celebrate the country’s Bastille Day.

In other quarter-final games for the men’s teams, Australia beat Poland 68-34, Italy beat Canada 63-47 and USA beat Turkey 92-50. For the women’s teams, Germany beat the Netherlands 63-40, Australia beat China 77-38 and Canada beat Japan 62-39.

Teams are competing in the semi-finals today.

Taking place from 7-17 July in the National Indoor Arena, the 2010 IWBF Wheelchair Basketball World Championships are seeing 12 men’s teams and ten women’s teams compete in the most important and biggest Wheelchair Basketball event before the London 2012 Paralympic Games. Countries represented at the Championships include the Netherlands, Brazil, Great Britain, Japan, Australia, Germany, Mexico, USA, Canada, China, Poland, Italy, France, Turkey, Algeria and South Korea.