Spain’s Ricky Rubio drives past Slovenia’s Luka Doncic during a pool play basketball game Sunday in Saitama, Japan. Spain, the world’s second-ranked team, will play the top-ranked United States in the quarterfinals on Tuesday. Charlie Neibergall/Associated Press
SAITAMA, Japan — The U.S. and Spain played for Olympic men’s basketball gold in 2008 and 2012, then in the semifinals in 2016.
And at the Tokyo Games, the top teams in the FIBA world rankings will meet again – just earlier than has been the norm.
The three-time reigning Olympic champion Americans will face reigning World Cup champion Spain in the quarterfinals on Tuesday, a matchup of teams that finished second in their respective groups.
Spain fell outside of the seeded pool, and knew it had exposed itself to a potential matchup with the U.S., by losing its group-play finale to Slovenia on Sunday. About an hour later, when FIBA held the Olympic draw, the matchup was set.
“If you’re going to get that gold medal, you’re going to beat everybody,” Spain center Marc Gasol said. “At that point, it doesn’t matter, the order.”
The U.S. is 16-2 against Spain in Olympic or World Cup competition – yet recent matchups haven’t exactly been runaways. The Americans won 82-76 in the 2016 Olympic semifinals, 107-100 in the 2012 gold-medal game at London, and 118-107 in the gold-medal matchup at Beijing in 2008.
“This Olympics is just going to get better as far as basketball is concerned, because the teams are all pretty passionate and very talented and have a lot of individual players that people will enjoy on TV,” U.S. Coach Gregg Popovich said.
The other quarterfinal matchups are France (3-0) vs. Italy (2-1), Australia (3-0) vs. Argentina (1-2) and Slovenia (3-0) vs. Germany (1-2).
The U.S.-Spain game is scheduled for 12:40 a.m. Eastern time on Tuesday.
The U.S., which lost to France in the Olympic opener, got into the seeded pot of the draw as the top second-place team. That meant it couldn’t face any of the group winners in the quarterfinals, but also had to play another second-place finisher – either Italy or Spain.
Once Italy was drawn to play France, the matchup was clear: The U.S. and Spain would meet again.
GYMNASTICS: All-around gold medalist Sunisa Lee added a bronze in the uneven bars, and U.S. teammate McKayla Skinner won a silver in the vault as a replacement for Simone Biles.
Lee’s long-anticipated showdown with Belgium star Nina Derwael never materialized. Leading off in the eight-woman final, Lee knew in the middle of her routine it wasn’t going to be good enough to top the podium long before her 14.500 flashed across the scoreboard.
Derwael gave Belgium its first-ever gold medal in women’s gymnastics, and Anastasiia Iliankova of Russia won the silver.
Rebeca Andrade of Brazil took gold in the vault. Her 15.083 average for her two vaults put her just ahead of Skinner, who didn’t know if she would compete in the finals until Saturday afternoon when Biles opted out. Skinner averaged 14.916.
TENNIS: Alexander Zverev of Germany won the gold medal in men’s singles, beating Russia’s Karen Khachanov 6-3, 6-1 for the biggest title of his career.
In the women’s doubles final, the top-seeded Czech team of Barbora Krejcikova and Katerina Siniakova beat the Swiss pair of Belinda Bencic and Viktorija Golubic, 7-5, 6-1.
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Andrey Rublev beat fellow Russians Elena Vesnina and Aslan Karatsev in the mixed doubles final, 6-3, 6-7 (5), 13-11.
WEIGHTLIFTING: The United States got its best weightlifting result at the Olympics in 21 years. Ecuador has its first ever female champion.
Neisi Dajomes of Ecuador won the women’s 76-kilogram division, and Kate Nye took silver for the United States.
Dajomes lifted 118 kilograms in the snatch and 145kg in the clean and jerk for a total of 263, beating Nye by 14kg.
BEACH VOLLEYBALL: April Ross and Alix Klineman advanced to the quarterfinals by defeating Cuba’s Lidy Echeverria and Leila Martinez, 21-17, 21-15.
VOLLEYBALL: The U.S. men’s were eliminated after pool play for the first time since 2000 after losing in three sets to Argentina.
The Americans finished fifth in their pool with a 2-3 record.
BASEBALL: Danny Valencia hit a three-run homer off a Mexican Double-A pitcher playing in his 15th consecutive minor league season, and Israel pounded relievers Fernando Salas and Oliver Pérez in a 12-5 win to reach the double round-robin phase of the tournament.
It was the first-ever Olympic victory for Israel. Mexico was eliminated despite two hits and an RBI by Portland Sea Dogs outfielder Joey Meneses, who finished the tournament 6 for 12 with four RBI.
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