A rampant United States swept past Japan to their seventh straight women’s basketball crown on Sunday, with Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi collecting their fifth Olympic gold medals to cap remarkable careers.
Brittney Griner scored a game-high 30 points with five rebounds and two assists as the hosts were overpowered 90-75 by a team that stretched its Olympic win streak to 55 games dating back to the 1992 semifinals.
Beating the Americans was always going to be a huge ask.
They had won eight of the past nine Olympic titles. Their only blemishes in the history of the tournament were a silver behind the Soviet Union at the inaugural event in 1976 and bronze in 1992.
The Americans’ seventh title equalled the longest ever streak by a team in any Olympic sport — matching the feat of the US men’s basketball team between 1936 and 1968.