USA beat Brazil to reach basketball semi-finals

The United States continued their campaign for a fifth straight Olympic gold medal with a 122-87 victory over Brazil in their men’s quarter-final.

The victory for the serial winners never looked in doubt, as they took a 63-38 lead at half-time.

Brazil briefly pushed back after the break, outscoring their opponents by four points in the third quarter.

But a team rammed with NBA talent added 28 points to Brazil’s 16 in the last 10 minutes to secure a semi-final against Serbia on Thursday.

The Serbs set-up the fixture with an overtime victory against Australia in their quarter-final.

With the scores level at 92-92 at the end of the fourth quarter, Serbia outscored the Tokyo bronze medallists 13-8 in the first overtime session to take the win.

Tokyo silver medallists France will play Germany in the other semi-final after they defeated Canada 82-73.

Germany, who have never won an Olympic basketball medal, beat Greece 76-63 in their quarter-final.

Team USA features 12 NBA All-Stars, four NBA MVPs and six NBA champions, who have 11 Olympic appearances and 10 gold medals combined. – bbc.com