By DOUG FEINBERG, AP Basketball Author
SYDNEY (AP) — Alyssa Thomas had 13 factors, 14 rebounds and 7 assists to assist america beat Serbia 88-55 within the quarterfinals of the ladies’s World Cup on Thursday.
Kelsey Plum scored 17 factors and A’ja Wilson added 15 to steer the People (6-0), who will face the winner of Canada and Puerto Rico within the semifinals on Friday.
The People had run by way of pool play, profitable by 46.2 factors per recreation and hadn’t confronted any form of problem. Serbia (3-2) wasn’t afraid although, going proper on the U.S. The Serbians scored the primary basket of the sport — marking the primary time the People trailed within the event.
It was back-and-forth for the primary 17 minutes, with the U.S. failing to go on any main run. Then, with 2:59 left within the half and the U.S. up by 5, Kahleah Copper drove to the basket and was fouled. She landed onerous on her hip and needed to be helped off the courtroom by the U.S. coaching employees. Copper, who has been a sparkplug for the U.S. in her first event, didn’t return.
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Plum changed Cooper and hit the 2 free throws, beginning a 12-0 run to shut the half because the People led 50-33 on the break. Thomas had 13 factors, six rebounds, 4 assists and two steals within the opening 20 minutes.
The U.S. prolonged its run to twenty straight factors within the third quarter earlier than Serbia lastly ended an almost 8 1/2 minutes drought with a 3-pointer by Yvonne Anderson. That minimize the deficit to 22 factors. Serbia did not get a lot nearer after that.
Anderson led Serbia with 14 factors.
Betnijah Laney went down onerous early within the fourth quarter on a put-back. She left the sport and sat on the bench for the remainder of the sport.
The victory was the twenty eighth in a row in World Cup play for the People, who haven’t misplaced because the 2006 semifinals towards Russia. The Soviet Union holds the World Cup file with 56 straight wins from 1959-86.
After going unbeaten in pool play once more, the U.S. reached no less than the semifinals for the twelfth consecutive event, relationship to 1975. That 12 months accomplished a cycle during which the People misplaced 14 video games mixed in 4 tournaments. They’ve solely misplaced 5 video games since.
The U.S. had dominated the paint even with out Brittney Griner, outscoring its opponents by a mean of 60.8-24.4 in pool play. Serbia held a 20-16 benefit on the half. The Serbians outscored them 28-26 within the recreation.
Thomas, who had a triple-double in every of the final two video games within the WNBA Finals, fell simply brief once more of getting the primary one on the World Cup since Erika Dobrovicova in 1994 for the Slovak Republic towards Spain. Assists and rebounds weren’t stored earlier than 1994. Thomas had 14 factors, 9 assists and 7 rebounds within the opener towards Belgium.
Jewell Loyd returned to the U.S. beginning lineup a recreation after resting in keeping with the crew. She had eight factors.
In different quarterfinal video games Wednesday, the matchups had been: Canada-Puerto Rico; China-France, and Australia-Belgium.
Serbia: Event is over.
U.S.: Performs within the semifinals on Friday.
Extra AP girls’s basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/womens-basketball and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
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