Great Britain Suffers Narrow Defeat to Germany in Women’s EuroBasket 2023

Heartbreak for Great Britain Women’s Basketball Team as they lose by a single point to Germany

The Women’s EuroBasket 2023 tournament saw another thrilling match between Great Britain and Germany. Ranked 20th in the world, GB had already qualified for the next stage before Sunday’s game against Germany.

GB was leading with nine points at half-time but let their advantage slip allowing Germany, ranked 16 places below them, to make an astonishing comeback. In the final seconds of the game, GB missed two free throws that cost them victory over their opponents from Europe.

A Strong Start From GB

In earlier games of this group stage tournament co-hosted by Slovenia and Israel, Great Britain showed promising performance making a comeback victory against hosts Slovenia and narrowly losing to world number six side France.

Nail-biting Finish

In the third quarter of Sunday’s game against Germany, things started to go awry for GB when they were outscored by 18-6 points margin. However, in the fourth quarter both teams gave each other tough competition with changing leads multiple times during this nail-biting finish.

With just nineteen seconds remaining on the clock and trailing behind at a scoreline of 62-61,Kristine Anigwe from team GB missed two crucial free-throws which eventually proved expensive for her team as they lost by one point after giving it all till last moment.

Captain Temi Fagbenle & Anigwe Top Scorers But Not Enough Against Germans While captain Temi Fagbenle led her team from front contributing with highest scoring 18 points, Anigwe also played her part by scoring 14 points. However, the German side distributed their scores more evenly among their players which eventually gave them an edge over the Brits.

What’s Next For GB?

This defeat for Great Britain means they finish third in Group C and will now have to play runners-up from Group D on Tuesday in a qualifying match for the quarter-finals. The Germans finished second and will play against the third-place team from Group D in this stage of the tournament.

The Road Ahead

France is expected to win group C irrespective of Sunday’s result against hosts Slovenia and qualify directly for last eight. With five Olympic qualifying spots available at this tournament, four Women’s EuroBasket 2023 semi-finalists along with one winner out of a play-off competition between losing quarter-finalists would secure places in Fiba Olympic qualifying tournaments.France has already secured their spot as hosts.

Basketball Fun Facts

If you’re not familiar with basketball as a sport yet or looking to learn something new about it then here are some interesting facts: Basketball is team sports that require fast movements & strategy making; playing basketball can burn up to 600 calories per hour; basketball was invented by Dr James Naismith who himself was Canadian but introduced this game while working as physical education instructor at Springfield College located in Massachusetts (USA).