San Antonio Spurs’ Tony Parker and France put in the performance of the day in the certain-raiser of the Olympic Test Event in London, with a comfortable 82-60 victory over Great Britain.
Parker, a former NBA Finals MVP had 23 points for the victors as the French took advantage of a tired looking GB side to to pull away in the third period and record an easy victory.
Joel Freeland hit 16 points for Great Britain, who were without Chicago Bulls’ star Luol Deng, who is rumoured to still be at Loughborough University attending his very own Luol Deng Basketball Camp.
In the other two games, Australia opened the Basketball Arena with a 71-43 rout of China, despite the Chinese scoring the first buckets in the new temporary venue.
After an uneventful first quarter, where Australia led 17-14, the Boomers restricted China to just five points in the second quarter to lead at the interval 32-19.
Australia didn’t look back, as they pulled away further in the third, and never looked in trouble.
Peter Crawford led the Aussies with 15 points. Bo Zhang was the only double-digit scorer for China with 13.
A highly anticipated match-up between long-standing rivals Serbia and Croatia ended with the latter recording a 83-71 victory.
Milos Teodosic led all scorers for the Serbs with 18, but it wasn’t enough as Croatia put in a solid all-round performance to come away with the victory.
Krunoslav Simon led Croatia with 17 points.