Germany withstood Latvia’s jaw-dropping rally, 81-79, to clinch their Semifinal ticket for the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup on Wednesday, Sept. 6., within Manila’s Mall of Asia Arena.
The Germans have finally ended Latvia’s underdog story throughout this World Cup as they survived a massive come-from-behind attempt of the Cinderella team from the Baltic region.
With a 62-59 lead at the start of the last quarter, Germany cast an 8-0 blitz capped off by Moritz Wagner’s two-way play jam with 8:09 left, 70-59.
But Latvia slowly regained their composure behind Rolands Smits and Arturs Zagars’ long bombs, pulling their nation to a 10-4 run to trim Germany’s lead to five, 74-69.
The Germans went back as Schröder burst for a score, nailing back-to-back layups with the last one clinching a foul to put his team up nine, 78-69.
As Schröder hit the freebie, Rodions Kurucs and Arturs Zagars powered the Latvians’ sudden 8-0 rally to bring down the Germans to settle for a two-point margin with 1:11 left, 79-77.
As Daniel Theis got fouled and eventually made his two trips to the line, Zagars responded with a scoop shot to bring Latvia trailing in another one-possession game, 81-79, with 0:33 still on the clock.
But as Schröder bricked his pull-up jumper in the next possession, Latvia failed to seize the crunch time to pull a comeback victory as Bertans missed his go-ahead trey.
After missing the tournament since their debut against Japan, Franz Wagner dusts off the rust from his ankle injury to power Die Mannschaft with 16 markers and eight boards. Andreas Obst supplied the main help for the Orlando Magic rising star with his 13 points, while Moritz Wagner chipped in 12 points and four boards.
Schröder ended up with nine points, but was highly inconsistent for his nation throughout the evening upon displaying a 4-of-26 shooting from the field (0/8 threes).
Germany is now slated at the World Cup Semis — first time for their national program history since 2002. They are set for a Friday face-off with the United States for the right to advance to the Finals.
Zagars and Bertans tried to will Latvia to make an outstanding entry to the Semifinals with 24 and 20 points, respectively. But with the painful loss, the tourney debutants will settle at the 5th-8th Classification phase with Italy as their opponent on Thursday.
