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 Gold medal game controversy 2 Medal summary 3 Final ranking 4 Tournament summary 4.1 Pool Play: Group A 4.2 Pool Play: Group B 4.3 Semifinal 4.4 Final 5 Controversy 6 References 7 External links

[edit] Gold medal game controversy

The 1972 Olympics marked the first time that the United States did not win the gold medal in Olympic basketball since the sport's introduction as an official medal event at the 1936 Summer Olympics.

It was perhaps the most controversial result in Olympic history. The United States basketball team had been unbeaten in 62 Olympic competitions. Then they met the Soviets in the 1972 gold medal game.

USA guard Doug Collins sank two foul shots late in the game, giving the Americans a 50-49 lead with three seconds remaining and what looked like the gold medal.

The Soviets inbounded the ball right away but the referee, Renato Righetto of Brazil, blew the whistle with one second on the clock.

Following a conference with the officials, it was determined that the Soviet head coach Vladimir Kondrashin had called a time out. The Soviets were given a second opportunity to inbound the ball with three seconds left. After a Soviet player heaved a desperation miss from half court, the U.S. began their celebration, which proved to be grossly premature. The Soviet coach, Kondrashin, protested that the clock had been reset incorrectly and demanded a third chance. FIBA Secretary-General Renato William Jones of Italy--who, by FIBA rules had no authority over in-game officiating decisions--ordered that the game clock be reset to 0:03 to give the Soviet team a third chance to score the winning points. Referee Righetto and his Bulgarian officiating partner complied with Jones' improper order.

The Soviet team received the ball, and this time got the ball to their star player Aleksandr Belov, who sank the winning basket at the buzzer. The U.S. team, convinced they were robbed of the gold, flatly refused the silver and did not attend the victory ceremony, filing an official protest. The official scorekeeper of the game did not sign the scorebook following the game in protest. On appeal, the five-man panel ruled the result fair despite testimony from the referee and the timekeeper pointing to the contrary; the 3-2 vote was split along Cold War lines.

[edit] Medal summary

Games	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Men's basketball	Soviet Union (victory appealed by the US) 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 (refused to accept silver medal) Kenneth Davis Doug Collins Tom Henderson Mike Bantom Robert Jones Dwight Jones James Forbes Jim Brewer Tommy Burleson Charles McMillen Kevin Joyce Ed 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[1]	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] Controversy

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 Kondrashin had attempted to call time out between Collins' free throws and it was awarded.

After the inbounds pass, the horn sounded, and the United States players and coaches celebrated their victory. But the head of the FIBA, Renato William Jones, found that the clock had not been correctly set and ordered that the clock be reset to three seconds, the time that was on the clock when Kondrashin tried to call time, as opposed to one. Jones normally had no authority to act during a game, but his reputation was such that the referees felt they had no choice but to comply.

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 over the outcome of the game ever since. They refused to accept the Olympic silver medal during the medal ceremony and appealed to a five-judge panel. The panel was composed of members from Hungary, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Italy and Poland. The vote was 3-2 to reject the appeal, along Cold War lines (Puerto Rico and Italy voted to uphold the appeal, while Hungary, Cuba and Poland voted to reject it). When asked about the game, Jones was quoted later as saying "The Americans have to learn how to lose, even when they think they are right."

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. At least one U.S. player, Kenny Davis, has stipulated in his will that after his death, his heirs are forbidden to ever accept the silver medal in his name.^[2]

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] References

[edit] External links

• ESPN Classic account of the gold medal game

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