France endures heartbreaking silver, after ‘making the best team in the world quiver’ – Technologist

The organizers of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games can rub their hands. Right up to the final second of the last sporting encounter, this edition of the Olympics proved to be gripping. The Bercy Arena crowd and the French women’s basketball team could have done without it. On Sunday, August 11, just a few hours before the closing ceremony, Les Bleues went down to the wire in the final, losing by a single point to the favored Americans (66-67).

At first disbelieving, Valériane Ayayi’s teammates became inconsolable as the siren sounded. They had come within a whisker – Gabby Williams’ foot was centimeters inside the three-point line – of extending their dream and pushing Team USA into extra time. Never has the invincible American team been so close to falling from its pedestal. Led by Williams (19 points) who was on fire, Les Bleues fell just one point short of the Olympic champions, crowned for the eighth time in a row. Silver medalists like the French the day before, they delivered the closest thing to a perfect final, but can now brood over the outcome.

“There’s a bit of frustration, because gold really wasn’t far away, but above all a lot of pride in the face we showed. We played eye-to-eye with this [American] team,” said captain Sarah Michel Boury. “We mustn’t let our heads drop at all, because what we did was huge,” said Williams. “The whole world will be talking about this match for years to come.”

Invited to bring the curtain down on the Paris 2024 competitions, the French team intended to leave the stage with fireworks. And they set the tone. “If we all play together and stay aggressive, we can create a complicated game for [the American team],” said Williams, at the end of the semi-final against Belgium. There was no question of watching the stars of the WNBA (the women’s equivalent of the NBA) deploy their game, not in an Olympic final at home.

‘Self-sacrifice, willpower and character’

Opposed to a team that hadn’t lost a match in an Olympic tournament since the 1992 Barcelona Olympics semi-final against the CIS, heir to the USSR, Les Bleues knew they were tackling the Mount Everest of their sport. In 2012, Céline Dumerc’s “Braqueuses” were soundly beaten by the American team in the final (50-86). But their heirs never thought it impossible: Every streak has an end, even the US’ 60 consecutive Olympic successes. “Before the tournament started, we had planned this final to win gold,” said Michel Boury.” As soon as you put in that kind of intensity and desire, you can compete with anyone. And we forced them to quiver, we really messed with them.”

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