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U.S. blows out Cuba to qualify for Beijing

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VALDIVIA, Chile — The U.S. women’s basketball team took a rarely used route to get back to the Olympics.

Tina Thompson scored 18 points to help the U.S. qualify for the 2008 Beijing Games with a 101-71 victory over Cuba on Sunday in the gold medal game at the FIBA Americas tournament.

“It feels great to win. We got the monkey off our back,” Thompson said.

The U.S. (5-0) was forced to qualify for an Olympics berth for the first time since 1980 because of a third-place finish at the World Championships last year.

“It feels great to get the berth to Beijing and get this behind us.” U.S. coach Anne Donovan said. “I’m so proud of how hard these women have worked and how much it’s paid off. To play five games in five days and we started with the best team in the tournament, we finished with the best team in the tournament.”

The Americans struggled with Cuba when the teams met in their opening round game, needing a fourth-quarter rally to win 85-79. The U.S. had no problem on Sunday, jumping out to a 16-0 lead 4 minutes into the game. Diana Taurasi hit two 3-pointers during the spurt and finished with 15 points and 12 rebounds.

“We jumped on them right away and I thought we stayed focused throughout the game,” Donovan said. “We could see Cuba start to wear down as this tournament went on, and that certainly is where depth and our bench came to play.”

Cuba didn’t sink its first basket until Oyanaisy Gelis made a jumper with 5:50 left in the first quarter. The U.S. was able to extend its lead to 20, but Cuba rallied by hitting two 3s to come within 31-19.

The U.S. responded with a 7-0 run to restore its big lead. The Americans led 49-30 at the half and put the game away in the third quarter, extending their lead to 75-43 at the end of the period.

Katie Smith added 15 points for the United States.

Suchitel Avila led Cuba (3-2) with 14 points, and Gelis added 13.

Yakelyn Plutin, who led Cuba with 23 points and 10 rebounds in the first meeting with the U.S., was scoreless in the first half and didn’t make her first shot until the third quarter when she fell down on the baseline and flung the ball up. She finished with 11 points, most coming in the fourth quarter.

“We watched film and focused on making her work to get her points,” Thompson said.

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