U.S. women basketball team reclaims the gold

BEIJING -- They can take down that dang bronze medal now.The United States women's basketball team rolled to its fourth consecutive gold medal Saturday night and advanced their streak of consecutive Olympic wins to 33 with a 92-65 win over Australia.The better news for this team is they can take the bronze medal off the locker room wall, the one center Lisa Leslie put there before each game of this tournament to remind the team what happened two years ago when the U.S. was upset by Russia in the semifinals of the World Championships."Obviously finishing third in the World Championship and then the last two years all of the talk has been about how the rest of the world has caught up," guard Sue Bird said, "how this is the Olympics to get the U.S. This is the Olympics to knock them off."Hold that thought world, at least for another four years."Definitely a lot more satisfying coming out and going through the disappointment," said forward Tamika Catchings, ""but to be able to come out and redeem ourselves, this is the first time we've all been together this month, all 12 players, so I'm just excited that we could pull it out."The U.S. was dominant throughout its eight games here, as much over the highly touted Australian team as the rest.After spotting the Aussies a 9-4 lead early, the U.S. went up for the first time 13-12 on guard Kara Lawson's short jumper with 2:51 left in the first quarter and never again trailed.Surprisingly it was Lawson, the last player selected to the U.S. squad, who led the way in the finals with 15 points. Leslie and forward Candace Parker had 14 apiece."I would have never guessed that I was ever the leading scorer in the gold medal game for the United States," said Lawson, draped in an American flag during the post-game press conference. "But I think that shows the unselfishness of our team. I think that shows the talent level we have."Lawson's selection to the team was not a unanimous decision by any means. She was picked over some bigger names."I pushed my rear end off to get Kara Lawson on this team," said Donovan. "There were a lot of people questioning that selection... She showed tonight why she belonged on this team. For me personally there was big satisfaction in that."Leslie presumably put or maybe threw away that bronze medal after the game. In its place at the awards ceremony were four golds dangling from her neck - one won by each of the last four Olympic teams, all of which she was a member. "It's just been awesome for me to experience this for the fourth time with such a great group," said Leslie, who has already said this would be her last Games.She looked like she could definitely play some more Saturday night. Her point totals came inside which was some dangerous territory against the tall Australians, led by 6-foot-5 WNBA star Lauren Jackson.Coming off a sub-par game against Russia in the semifinals, Leslie was giving no ground against Jackson. Both players fouled out. Jackson was held to 6 points.Donovan credits victory to that fact that this group of WNBA superstars never acted like anything more than a part of the machine."When you get superstars together the tendency is that at some point the ego has to step in; that's what make these great players great," she said. "But this group had an ego only for this team. That is something all coaches preach but very few times can you see 12 players act on that. This group did that and that's what made them special. Never has a team of 12 players that I coached been so selfless." So, once again the next to last night of the Summer Olympics ended with the U.S. women's basketball team standing on the highest podium as the Star Spangled Banner played."I think there is a lot of pressure I put on myself for this," said Donovan, "and there is just a tremendous amount of satisfaction. The last three years there have been a lot of challenges. So this is a great way to go out."(Contact Steve Ahillen of The Knoxville News Sentinel in Tennessee at ahillens(at)knoxnews.com.)