Greece stun US to reach world champs final

Updated September 02, 2006 00:20:00

Greece shocked odds-on favourites the United States 101-95 to reach the final of the world basketball championships in Saitama in Japan on Friday.

Guard Vassilis Spanoulis led a surging Greek team with 22 points to leave the US shell-shocked and extend the Americans' agonising six-year world and Olympic title drought.

The final buzzer sparked scenes of pandemonium at the Saitama Super Arena as the European champions celebrated as if they had won the gold medal.

The US suffered an astonishing second-quarter meltdown, blowing a 12-point lead with 6:15 left in the first half after a strong start.

Greece outscored the US 24-9 from that point to take a 45-41 half-time lead and some explosive long-range shooting made it 77-65 through three quarters.

Co-captains Carmelo Anthony and Dwyane Wade led a US fight-back but an off-balance three-pointer from Spanoulis with 1:58 put Greece back up by seven and effectively iced the game.

Anthony scored a game-high 27 points and Wade added 19 but it was too little, too late to save the US team's collection of big-name NBA stars.


Topics: basketball, japan, greece, united-states

First posted September 01, 2006 20:21:00