By DOUG FEINBERG
VILLENEUVE-D’ASCQ, France (AP) — Breanna Stewart scored 26 points and the U.S. beat Belgium 87-74 on Thursday night, clinching a spot in the Olympic quarterfinals.
A’ja Wilson added 23 points and 13 rebounds for the Americans, who have a 57-game Olympic winning streak that dates to the 1992 Barcelona Games. This was one of the closer games during the historic run of seven consecutive gold medals. Only three contests have been single-digit victories.
The Americans (2-0) faced a loud, spirited pro-Belgium crowd that made up most of the 25,044 in attendance. The arena is about 30 minutes away from the country’s border. The two teams met in a pre-Olympic qualifying tournament in February in Belgium, and the U.S. needed a tip-in from Stewart at the buzzer to come away with that win.
On Thursday, Belgium once again tested the Americans like few teams have done during their unprecedented Olympic run.
The U.S. built an early 13-point lead behind Stewart, but Belgium cut it to eight at the half and closed to 50-46 in the third quarter. Napheesa Collier capped an 8-1 spurt with five straight points, and her 3 with 2:03 left restored a double-digit advantage for the U.S.
The Americans led 60-53 heading into the fourth and then scored eight of the first 10 points to go up 13. Antonia Delaere tried to keep Belgium in the game with consecutive 3’s, but it wasn’t enough.
Emma Meesseman scored 24 points and Delaere added 16 for Belgium (0-2), which needs to win its final game against Japan to have any shot of advancing to the elimination round. Julie Vanloo had 11.
The U.S. closes out pool play on Sunday against Germany, which also is 2-0.
In other games on Thursday, Germany and France both advanced to the quarterfinals with wins over Japan and Nigeria respectively. Australia topped Canada to keep its hopes of advancing alive.
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AP Summer Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games
