Poland's women's 3x3 basketball team won gold at the Youth Olympic Games in Dakar, defeating China 12:11 in a final decided in its closing seconds, Sport.pl reports. The title is Poland's first gold of the fourth edition of the Youth Olympics and lifts the country's overall medal count at the Games to three.
According to Sport.pl, the Polish side trailed only briefly across the tournament and lost just once, a tight 20:19 group-stage defeat to Senegal. That result turned out to be their only setback of the competition.
Why it matters
The gold is the first top-step finish for Poland in Dakar. Before the basketball final, the Polish delegation had collected two bronze medals in athletics: Lena Kaczkowska in the pole vault and Szymon Dołęga in the 100 metres, both on Sunday, per Sport.pl. The basketball triumph therefore moved Poland's tally to three medals and gave the team its highest result of the Games so far.
For a 3x3 squad, the run also carried weight in its own right. Sport.pl notes that Poland reached the semi-finals as the only European team among the last four, a detail that underlines how the bracket had narrowed around them.
How the Poles reached the final
Poland opened the group phase on Saturday, 7 November, with a 17:15 win over France, according to Sport.pl. A day later they beat Chinese Taipei 20:10, a result that secured their place in the semi-finals. There they overcame Egypt 19:14, a win that guaranteed them at least a silver medal before the final.
The championship match against China stayed close throughout. Neither team managed to build a comfortable cushion, and with three minutes left on the clock the scoreboard showed a tie, Sport.pl reports.
Lena Olejniczak then connected from beyond the arc to edge Poland ahead. China missed at the other end, and Stefania Onuorah converted to stretch the Polish lead to 11:9 with a little over a minute remaining.
The finish stayed tense. Hanyun Sun missed a free throw, but China cut the deficit to a single point and regained possession with a chance to swing the result. With ten seconds left before the final buzzer, Yihan Tang was called for a travelling violation. Poland held on at 12:11 and could begin celebrating, with Sport.pl reporting tears of joy among the players afterwards.
What to watch
The result closes out Poland's basketball campaign in Dakar. Attention now turns to whether the delegation can add to its three-medal haul before the Games conclude, with the two athletics bronzes and the basketball gold already on the board.
