Canada flat in basketball loss to France; medal round hopes rest on beating Brazil

Canada's women's basketball team never goes away, but it cannot pull away.

Now its chance of crashing the medal round at London 2012 has slipped farther away after a 64-60 loss to France where they had some flat moments when the game was up for grabs. The loss leaves Canada (1-2), which was sustained mainly bv point guard Shona Thorburn's game-high 17 points and a 14-point, eight-rebound effort by Natalie Achonwa, from Notre Dame, looking like the David Eckstein of the women's basketball tournament. In other words, one person's scrappy is another wondering if they have that extra gear it will take to beat Brazil on Friday and/or Australia on Sunday and crash the medal round party. On Twitter, forward Kim Smith (eight points) called it a "super frustrating loss."

Make no mistake, one should some keep perspective about this group. There was a time very recently when four- and five-point margins against France or Russia would have been a moral victory. The way head coach Alison McNeill has her team, which doesn't have an active WNBA player, conditioned to contest every possession — to to quote veteran Kim Smith, "We're not talented, we don't play nice basketball, but it doesn't matter" — means Canada can stay within single digits against many women's basketball world-beaters. They bear watching because they can stay in games despite what they admittedly don't have; in this case, after two games of potent perimeter shooting, they ended up 0-for-11 from three-point land and shot 35.4 per cent overall. Yet they hung around in a FIBAgame without hitting a three.

The decisive moments, though, belonged to France, which avoided having a letdown after its overtime conquest on Monday against Australia, which was the Opals' first Olympic loss. That was probably best illustrated in the opening sequences of the fourth quarter. Canada came out of the break trailing just 42-40, but two disjointed possessions that ended with a shot-clock violation and post player Krista Phillips (who later did some fine grunt work to keep Canada close) spotting up for a long deuce and French hoops on the ensuing possession stretched out the lead.

With the win, France (3-0) sealed its place in the medal round. Wing Émilie Gomis, who was a tough check for Canada all morning, had 16 points on 6-of-8 from the floor, while centre Isabelle Yacoubou added 14 points, also on 6-of-8.

Canada faces Brazil (0-2 going into its game vs. Australia) on Friday (9:30 a.m. ET/6:30 p.m. PT, Sportsnet). It's reasonable to think Canada will be competitive against the sixth-ranked team in the world.

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Contact him at neatesager@yahoo.ca and follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet.