3 × 3 basketball had a golden premiere at the Lima 2019 Pan American Games, with a successful game, public, emotion and intensity, as well as the supremacy of the United States between men and women.
The show offered by the modality was undoubtedly the great winner of the competition, as was the openness of the results, the appearance in the medal table of countries such as the Dominican Republic, which obtained two bronzes, and the feeling that much more is yet to come in this discipline.
Tokyo 2020 will award the first Olympic medals in 3 × 3 basketball, a promise that this show will continue to captivate sports fans.
Both finals had all the ingredients that promise to make the discipline great. Close fight, overwhelming intensity, speed, constant alternatives and intrigue until the last second.
With their men’s team the United States was irregular during the qualifying phase.
The pass to the semifinals was obtained by points difference against two other countries that were eliminated with the same balance of victories and defeats.
The Americans raised their competitive level from the semifinals in which they beat Brazil 21-12.
They met Puerto Rico in the final, the only undefeated so far and the most solid team present in Lima.
The final was explosive and the title remained in the hands of the United States thanks to the outside success of its captain, Kareem Maddox, since Puerto Rico was loaded with fouls very soon.
That was the biggest problem for the islanders, who saw their efforts quickly neutralized by American visits to the firing line.
In the absence of seconds, tied at 19, a disputed staff in favor of the United States left them clear.
Among the women, the Americans fulfilled the predictions and took the gold at the expense of Argentina in another spectacular final that kept all fans on the edge of their seats throughout the match.
The final result was 21-17 for a match that had it all, particularly to some Argentines who gave themselves up in a supreme defensive effort that complicated their rivals a lot.
The Argentines ran on offense and ran on defense, establishing a pattern that threw their opponents out of place.
Argentina’s Melisa Gretter, the only net point guard on the court, performed a colossal task of penetrating the US defense.
Only the precision of Sabrina Ionescu in the outside shot kept the champions in the match, asserting the maxim that in this modality, two-point baskets are the key.
Like Puerto Rico, Argentina’s defensive aggressiveness ended up charging the Albicelestes with fouls, who arrived at seven, granting free throws with three long minutes to play, and that ended up being their sentence.
The bronzes in both categories went to the Dominican Republic, the men’s match obtained in a spectacular and heart-stopping match in which the islanders beat Brazil with an epic comeback in the last 30 seconds of the match.
With 44 seconds remaining, Brazil led 14-17, having maintained control throughout the game.
In the absence of 35, the difference was 16-17.
And at 20, a 17-17 unleashed the enthusiasm of the public at the Dibós Coliseum, as the timer took the game into unexplored territory.
A double by Adonis Núñez, a meter behind the 6.75 line and while the Brazilian defense charged against him put the Dominicans ahead for the first time in the game and with that they took the medal.
The Dominicans also beat Brazil for the bronze, in an easier match than expected and which ended 20-15. EFE