Basketball at the 1972 Summer Olympics

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Final results for the Basketball competition at the 1972 Summer Olympics. It was held from August 27 to September 9

Contents 1 Medal summary 2 Final ranking 3 Tournament summary 3.1 Pool Play: Group A 3.2 Pool Play: Group B 3.3 Semifinal 3.4 Final 4 Notes 5 External links

[edit] Medal summary

Games	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Men's basketball	Soviet Union Anatoli Polivoda Modestas Paulauskas Zurab Sakandelidze Alzhan Zharmukhamedov Aleksandr Boloshev Ivan Edeshko Sergei Belov Mikhail Korkiya Ivan Dvorny Gennadi Volnov Aleksandr Belov Sergei Kovalenko	United States Kenneth Bryan Davis Doug Collins Thomas Edward Henderson Michael Allen Bantom Robert Clyde Jones Dwight Elmo Jones James Ricardo Forbes James Turner Brewer Tommy Burleson Charles Thomas McMillen Kevin Francis Joyce William Edward Ratleff	Cuba Juan Carlos Domecq Fortuondo Ruperto Herrera Tabio Juan Roca Brunet Pedro Chappe Garcia Miguel Alvarez Pozo Rafael Canizares Poey Conrado Perez Armenteros Miguel Calderon Gomez Tomas Herrera Martinez Oscar Varona Varona Alejandro urgelles Guibot Franklin Standard Johnson

[edit] Final ranking

1.  Soviet Union (URS) (9-0)
2.  United States (USA) (8-1)
3.  Cuba (CUB) (7-2)
4.  Italy (ITA) (5-4)
5.  Yugoslavia (YUG) (7-2)
6.  Puerto Rico (PUR) (6-3)
7.  Brazil (BRA) (5-4)
8.  Czechoslovakia (TCH) (4-5)
9.  Australia (AUS) (5-4)
10.  Poland (POL) (3-6)
11.  Spain (ESP) (4-5)
12.  West Germany (FRG) (3-6)
13.  Philippines (PHI) (3-6)
14.  Japan (JPN) (2-7)
15.  Senegal (SEN) (0-8)
16.  Egypt (EGY) (0-8)

[edit] Tournament summary

[edit] Pool Play: Group A

Team	P:	W:	L:	F:	A:	Pts:
United States	7	7	0	542	312	14			67-48	61-54	66-35	72-56	81-55	99-33	96-31
Cuba	7	6	1	560	445	13		48-67		64-63	77-65	74-53	84-70	108-63	105-64
Brazil	7	4	3	561	490	11		54-61	63-64		83-82	72-69	69-75	110-55	110-84
Czechoslovakia	7	4	3	493	489	11		35-66	65-77	82-83		74-70	69-68	74-61	94-64
Spain	7	3	4	486	500	10		56-72	53-74	69-72	70-74		79-74	87-76	72-58
Australia	7	3	4	523	524	10		55-81	70-84	75-69	68-69	74-79		92-76	89-66
Japan	7	1	6	442	643	8		33-99	63-108	55-110	61-74	76-87	76-92		78-73
Egypt	7	0	7	440	644	7		31-96	64-105	84-110	64-94	58-72	66-89	73-78

[edit] Pool Play: Group B

Team	P:	W:	L:	F:	A:	Pts:
Soviet Union	7	7	0	639	479	14			79-66	74-67	100-87	87-63	94-64	111-80	94-52
Italy	7	5	2	547	471	12		66-79		78-85	71-54	68-57	71-59	101-81	92-56
Yugoslavia	7	5	2	582	484	12		67-74	85-78		74-79	81-56	85-64	117-76	73-57
Puerto Rico	7	5	2	570	531	12		87-100	54-71	79-74		81-74	85-83	92-72	92-57
West Germany	7	3	4	482	518	10		63-87	57-68	56-81	74-81		67-65	93-74	72-62
Poland	7	2	5	520	536	9		64-94	59-71	64-85	83-85	65-67		90-75	95-79
Philippines	7	1	6	526	666	8		80-111	81-101	76-117	72-92	74-93	75-90		68-62
Senegal	7	0	7	405	586	7		52-94	56-92	57-73	57-92	62-72	59-95	62-68

[edit] Semifinal

	Egypt	0	-	2	Philippines
September 5	West Germany	69	-	70	Australia
September 6	Japan	70	-	67	Senegal
	Spain	76	-	87	Poland
September 7	Czechoslovakia	63	-	66	Yugoslavia
	Soviet Union	67	-	61	Cuba
	Puerto Rico	87	-	83	Brazil
	Italy	38	-	68	United States

[edit] Final

	Egypt	0	-	2	Senegal
September 8	Philippines	80	-	73	Japan
	West Germany	83	-	84	Spain
	Czechoslovakia	69	-	87	Brazil
	Cuba	66	-	65	Italy
September 9	Australia	91	-	83	Poland
	Yugoslavia	86	-	80	Puerto Rico
	Soviet Union	51	-	50	United States

[edit] Notes

The gold medal game between the United States and Soviet Union remains very controversial to this day. The Soviets had a 49-48 lead and committed a hard foul on Doug Collins with three seconds left. Collins made two free throws to put the U.S. up 50-49, and the Soviets inbounded the ball quickly. Referee Renaldo Righetto of Brazil stopped play with one second on the clock. USSR coach Vladimir Kondrashkin had attempted to call time out between Collins' free throws and it was awarded, although rules state that a coach cannot call a time out during free throws.^{[citation needed]}

The inbounds pass was intercepted and the United States players and coaches celebrated their victory. But the head of the FIBA ordered that the clock be reset to three seconds, the time that was on the clock when Kondrashkin tried to call time. The Soviets inbounded the ball for a third time, and this time, Alexander Belov scored a lay-up and the USSR won the game 51-50, which not only meant that they got the gold medal, but they also dealt the United States their first loss in Olympic basketball competition.

The members of the United States team have remained upset of the outcome of the game ever since. They refused to accept the Olympic silver medal during the medal ceremony, and on an appeal, the five-judge appeal panel had judges from the USSR, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Italy and Romania. The vote was 3-2 to reject the appeal.

Even when the International Olympic Committee approached the U.S. players about thirty years later to see if they would accept the medals, all of the players still refused them. The medals remain in a vault in Switzerland to this day.

In recent years, FIBA has instituted more stringent rules for international competitions to attempt prevention of similar incidents again:

• A time-out may only be called when the ball is dead.
• The game clock must register tenths of seconds in the final minute of a period.
• A duplicate game clock must be on top of the shot clock, and as of 2004, must have a readout which can be seen by players and coaches on three sides.
• A whistle-stop unit must be installed where the officials can stop the clock on the sound of their whistle, as of 2004.
• Instant replay is permitted, as of 2006.

[edit] External links

• ESPN Classic account of the gold medal game

Basketball at the Summer Olympics
1904 (demonstration) • 1908–1932 • 1936 • 1948 • 1952 • 1956 • 1960 • 1964 • 1968 • 1972 • 1976 • 1980 • 1984 • 1988 • 1992 • 1996 • 2000 • 2004 • 2008 See also: List of Olympic medalists in basketball

Events at the 1972 Summer Olympics (Munich)
Archery • Athletics • Basketball • Badminton (demonstration) • Boxing • Canoeing • Cycling • Diving • Equestrian • Fencing • Football • Gymnastics • Handball • Hockey • Judo • Modern pentathlon • Rowing • Sailing • Shooting • Swimming • Volleyball • Water polo • Water skiing (demonstration) • Weightlifting • Wrestling