Our Bloody Boomers Belted Venezuela To Finish 2nd In Their Olympic Group

Australian basketball is having a banner year at the Rio Olympic Games.

With the Opals advancing through to the knockout-stage of the tournament undefeated, the men’s Boomers side have put together an equally impressive effort.
Dropping just one game (an agonisingly close loss to the superstar-filled Team USA), the men’s team has today secured a second-place finish in their group after thumping Venezuela in their final group-stage match.
Fielding a side that was without the Games’ leading scorer Patty Mills (who sat this game out as part of routine squad rotation), and featured significantly reduced minutes for regular starters Andrew Bogut and Matthew Dellavedova, the Boomers were instead lead more than capably by an extremely productive bench, headed up by Chris Goulding whose 22 points was the highest for the game.
The bench produced 39 of Australia’s 81 points, in a comfortable 25-point win over Venezuela that saw the Boomers hold them to just 6 points in the first quarter.
Our typically dogged defensive efforts were again the shining jewel in the Boomers’ arsenal, forcing the Venezuelans down to just 35% shooting efficiency.
The Boomers now book themselves a well-earned spot in the quarter finals of the tournament, where they will take on the team who finishes third in Group B. With one day left in Group B play, that could quite easily wind up being any one of Argentina, Spain, Croatia, or Lithuania.
You’d like to think, given the way they’ve carried themselves through the tournament, Australia is a very serious show against any of those sides.
GET UP ‘EM, LADS.

Photo: Jamie Squire/Getty.

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