Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team at the 2012 Summer Paralympics

The Gliders line up for the national anthem in the match with Canada

Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team at the 2012 Summer Paralympics
Coach	John Triscari
Results
2012 Summer Paralympics	Silver
Home Away

The 2012 Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team, known as the Gliders, was a wheelchair basketball team that played in the 2012 Summer Paralympics. The team of twelve included nine Paralympic veterans with fifteen Paralympic Games between them: Bridie Kean, Amanda Carter, Sarah Stewart, Tina McKenzie, Kylie Gauci, Katie Hill, Cobi Crispin, Clare Nott and Shelley Chaplin. There were three newcomers playing in their first Paralympics: Amber Merritt, Sarah Vinci and Leanne Del Toso. The Gliders had won silver at the 2000 Summer Paralympics in Sydney and the 2004 Summer Paralympics in Athens, but had never won gold.

The first stage of the Paralympic competition was the group stage, a round robin tournament. The Gliders faced a formidable task just to make the finals, as their pool included Brazil, Great Britain, Canada and the Netherlands, the last two of which had recently beaten them. After a narrow victory over Brazil and an easier one against Great Britain, the Gliders were again defeated by Canada, but they won their final match against the Netherlands to finish at the top of their pool. The Gliders went on to win in the quarterfinal against Mexico and the semifinal against the United States, but lost to Germany in the final, winning silver.

Background

Prior to 2012, the Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team, known as the Gliders, had won silver in the 2000 Summer Paralympics in Sydney and the 2004 Summer Paralympics in Athens, and bronze at the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing, but had never won gold.^[1] The official announcement of the membership of the Paralympic team was made on 5 July 2012. The team of twelve included nine veterans with 15 Paralympic Games between them: Bridie Kean, Amanda Carter, Sarah Stewart, Tina McKenzie, Kylie Gauci, Katie Hill, Cobi Crispin, Clare Nott and Shelley Chaplin. Amber Merritt, Sarah Vinci and Leanne Del Toso were newcomers competing at their first Paralympics. Kean was selected as captain.^[1]

The oldest team member was Amanda Carter, aged 48, who was coming back for a fourth Paralympic games having competed in the 1992 Summer Paralympics in Barcelona, the 1996 Summer Paralympics in Atlanta and the 2000 Summer Paralympics in Sydney, at which she had been sidelined by a crippling elbow injury. She returned to the Gliders' lineup in 2009. The youngest, who had not even been born when Carter had played in Barcelona, was her 19-year-old teammate Amber Merritt.^[2][3][4] British-born Merritt was originally a swimmer, but had been recruited into basketball by the Paralympic Hall of Fame coach Frank Ponta.^[5][6] Merritt had averaged 20 points and 8.4 rebounds per game in the Gliders World Challenge series against Japan, Germany and China in Sydney in July 2012, including a game against Germany in which she scored 21 points and eight rebounds. Another young player from whom much was hoped was Cobi Crispin, whose performances in the Paralympic World Cup in Manchester and the Gliders World Challenge led to her being named Australian Women’s Wheelchair Basketball International Player of the Year.^[4][7]

2012 Australian women's national wheelchair basketball team

Sarah Vinci Spearwood, Western Australia 35 international games  Cobi Crispin Ashburton, Victoria 125 international games  Bridie Kean Alexandra Headland, Queensland 98 international games  Amanda Carter Heidelberg West, Victoria 126 international games  Tina McKenzie St Peters, New South Wales 168 international games  Leanne Del Toso Watsonia, Victoria 62 international games  Clare Nott Landsdale, Western Australia 134 international games  Kylie Gauci Rooty Hill, New South Wales 177 international games  Shelley Chaplin Ashburton, Victoria 166 international games  Sarah Stewart Maroubra, New South Wales 165 international games  Katie Hill Panania, New South Wales 110 international games  Amber Merritt Wanneroo, Western Australia 70 international games

Source: Basketball Australia;^[1] International Games as at 29 August 2012 from Official Results Book, p. 4152.

Group stage

The first part of the competition was the group stage. The Gliders' pool included Brazil, Great Britain, Canada and the Netherlands.^[1] Canada had beaten them in the bronze medal game at the 2010 Wheelchair Basketball World Championship in Birmingham in July 2010,^[8] and the Netherlands had also beaten them recently. Australian Gliders head coach, John Triscari admitted that Canada would be hard to beat.^[1] He added:

We’ve worked really hard to improve the team’s shooting percentage, we’ve had strength and conditioning coaches working with the girls to up their fitness and we’ve increased the volume of shooting during training. Hopefully all the hard work the girls are putting in now, will pay off in London.^[1]

Team	Pld	W	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Tiebreaker 1	Tiebreaker 2
Australia	4	3	1	211	180	+31	7	+2	1–0
Netherlands	4	3	1	236	194	+42	7	+2	0–1
Canada	4	3	1	248	231	+17	7	−4
Great Britain	4	1	3	151	217	−66	5
Brazil	4	0	4	190	214	−24	4

     Qualified for quarterfinals

     Eliminated

Key: Pld = played, W = won, L = lost, PF = points for, PA = points against, PD = points difference, Pts = competition points

Brazil

30 August 2012 18:30

Report:[9]

Australia	52–50	Brazil
Scoring by quarter: 14–12, 11–13, 14–12, 13–13
Pts: Crispin 18 Rebs: Merritt 10 Asts: three players 3		Pts: Soares Martins 27 Rebs: Soares Martins 14 Asts: Guimarrães da Costa 12

Basketball Arena, London Referees: Linas Radykas (LTU)

Key: Pts = points, Rebs = rebounds, Asts = assists

Match against Brazil. Amber Merritt takes a catch.

The Gliders' first game was on 30 August in front of a crowd of 3,288 at the Basketball Arena in Olympic Park in Stratford, London,^[10] also known as "the Marshmallow".^[11][12] The Gliders had not played Brazil in four years, and what little they knew about them came from watching video tapes.^[13]

The scores were tied fifteen times, and at no point were the Australians more than five points in front. With six minutes to go in the final quarter, the Gliders were up by only two points, with the score 45–43. Crispin was sent to the free throw line where she extended her team's lead to 47–43. A technical foul saw her straight back to the free throw line to make it 48–43, the Glider's biggest lead of the game. Brazil then struck back, scoring five unanswered points to tie the score again at 48–48, but Merritt scored one from the paint to put the Gliders back in front. She followed by taking a defensive rebound and then another shot to make it 52–48. Brazil scored once more, but time ran out, and the Gliders won, 52–50. Leading scorers for the Gliders were Crispin with 18 points and Merritt with 16.^[10]

Triscari said that they could have played better. "The chemistry in our team", he said, "is fantastic. It's good to get a win under your belt and then we'll take it from there. But we didn't play to our maximum today I don't think. We made some mistakes passing the ball, turning the ball over so we've got some improvement to do. We can work on a few things."^[13]

Great Britain

31 August 2012 13:00

Report:[15]

Great Britain	24–51	Australia
Scoring by quarter: 5–11, 6–14, 3–14, 10–12
Pts: Hamer 8 Rebs: Strange 7 Asts: three players 2		Pts: Merritt 10 Rebs: Crispin 7 Asts: Gauci 4

North Greenwich Arena, London Referees: Nureddin Bilmez (TUR)

The Gliders' next match was against Great Britain, and was held at the North Greenwich Arena, which could accommodate a larger crowd than the Marshmallow.^[16] A crowd of 5,331 saw a low-scoring affair.^[17] The Gliders concentrated on defence, and led by only 11–5 at quarter time.^[18] By half time, they had extended their lead to 25–11. The third quarter went badly for Team Great Britain, which only scored three more points to Australia's 14, making the score 39–14 at three-quarter time. The final quarter was Great Britain's best, but the score was still 51–24.^[19] Merritt and Crispin were again the Gliders' top scorers, with 10 and 8 points respectively, but they shared the ball around, and every Glider except McKenzie scored at least two points.^[16] The British coach was scathing about his team's performance. "They know that's not the way we play", he said, "and I'm disappointed for the crowd and them because they are tons better than that. It was an absolutely disgraceful effort out there. It really was bad."^[20]

Canada

1 September 2012 18:30

Report:[22]

Australia	50–57	Canada
Scoring by quarter: 12–20, 20–13, 8–10, 10–14
Pts: Merritt 16 Rebs: Crispin 15 Asts: Chaplin 7		Pts: McLachlan 28 Rebs: McLachlan 21 Asts: Ouellet 9

Basketball Arena, London Referees: Karen Molina (COL)

Match with Canada. Left to right: Bridie Kean, Katie Hill, Kylie Gauci and Cobi Crispin, with Canada's Cindy Ouellet

The Gliders returned to the Marshmallow the next day for a match against Canada,^[23] another team considered a strong chance for a medal,^[24] in front of a capacity crowd of 7,200.^[25] The Gliders squandered early opportunities,^[26] and Canada won the first quarter 20–12. Strong defensive play by Nott and Gauci helped the Gliders reverse this in the second, and left Canada with only a one-point 33–32 lead at half time. The second half saw Canada slowly increase their lead, keeping tied with Australia 4–4 in the first half of third, 6–4 in the last half of the third 6–4 in the first half of the fourth, and 8–6 in the last half of the fourth.^[23] Australia's top players were Crispin, who had 13 points and 15 rebounds; Merritt, who earned 16 points;^[27] and Chaplin, with eight points, five rebounds and seven assists. The loss raised the prospect that Australia might not make the finals at all, but Crispin remained confident that they could.^[26]

Triscari identified the Gliders' poor shooting as their critical problem. "That was a really tough game," he said, "and full credit to Canada, but we can't beat top teams in the world when we only shoot at 34%, that was the key statistic."^[26] Merritt, in her British accent, said that she had "the utmost respect for Canada. They're a great team, but we'll refocus on the game tomorrow and go out and play like we know we can, the Australian way."^[28]

Netherlands

2 September 2012 21:15

Report:[30]

Netherlands	49–58	Australia
Scoring by quarter: 12–18, 8–12, 9–10, 20–18
Pts: Huitzing 14 Rebs: Huitzing 8 Asts: Huitzing 7		Pts: Merritt 19 Rebs: Crispin 7 Asts: Chaplin 7

North Greenwich Arena, London Referees: Darrell Hargreaves (USA)

Match with Canada. Left to right: Clare Nott, Katie Hill and Cobi Crispin. Clare and Katie have pinned a Canada's Cindy Ouellet so she cannot move.

The loss to Canada meant that the Gliders needed a win against the Netherlands, considered one of the competition's best teams,^[31] and one which had beaten Canada.^[32] Crispin told the media that "We will go out like we have in every other game and stick to our game plan and hopefully we'll come out on top".^[26]

The Netherlands scored first, but Kean soon equalised, assisted by Stewart. The Dutch team responded, but Gauci took two points with a fast break, and then assisted Crispin in putting Australia in the lead, one which the Gliders would not relinquish. Stewart made the next two scores, from outside the paint, and assisted Crispin to bring the score to 6–16. The Dutch team fought back, but there was a six-point 12–18 deficit at quarter time. The Australian defence shut down their opportunities in the second quarter, and the score was 20–30 in Australia's favour at half time, and 29–40 by the end of the third quarter. The Dutch team redoubled their efforts in the final quarter, and won the quarter 20–18, but the Gliders won the game, 39–58.^[33]

Once again Merritt led Australia's scoring, with 19 points, with a considerably improved accuracy of 9 shots from 14 attempts, while Crispin had ten points and seven rebounds.^[34] The rest of the team performed equally well. Stewart scored six points and five rebounds. Chaplin's reputation as a play maker was burnished with four rebounds and seven assists. Gauci had eight points and six assists. Nott had played all 40 minutes of the game against Canada the night before, then over 32 minutes in this game,^[31] and was particularly active in the final quarter.^[33] Triscari praised both the Gliders and their opponents:

We wanted to get on top early and have them chasing us, so, in that respect, I suppose it did. We focused on stopping a lot of their big players, particularly Beijer [Mariska Beijer], from getting into the keyway, and the girls did a sensational job. Gert [Gertjan van der Linden] is very hard to coach against because he throws a lot of stuff at you. Tonight, he was the one having to make the changes. Another day, it will probably be me.^[31]

Finals

	Quarterfinals				Semifinals				Gold medal
	Australia	62
	Mexico	37
					Australia	40
					United States	39
	United States	67
	Canada	55
									Australia	44
									Germany	58
	Netherlands	59
	China	37
					Netherlands	46			Bronze medal
					Germany	49
	Germany	55
									United States	47
	Great Britain	44
									Netherlands	71

Quarterfinal – Mexico

4 September 2012 13:00

Report:[36]

Australia	62–37	Mexico
Scoring by quarter: 21–10, 23–10, 6–9, 12–8
Pts: Merritt 14 Rebs: Kean 5 Asts: Gauci 7		Pts: Estrada Bernal 11 Rebs: Estrada Bernal 4 Asts: Estrada Bernal 16

North Greenwich Arena, London Referees: Valerie Farrugia (FRA)

The loss to Canada meant that the Gliders had won three out of four games, the same number as Canada and the Netherlands, but they were placed ahead of the Netherlands based on defeating them. Canada failed to defeat Great Britain by a sufficient margin, and therefore finished third. As a result, the Gliders topped their pool, and received a quarterfinal berth against Mexico, which had managed to qualify despite only winning one game.^[37] Triscari was confident, but was not taking the match lightly. He warned the media:

No game's easy, you know. We finished on top, so the crossover with the other side is in our favour. But they are by no means easy. We only beat Brazil by two points and Brazil only beat Mexico by two in the PanAm (Parapan championships) play-offs for third and fourth, so it's going to be tough."^[31]

Bridie Kean in the match against Mexico

The Gliders planned to dominate Mexico early, playing as aggressively against them as they had played against the Netherlands.^[38] Stewart took the tap, and lost. Australia's first shots at goal were taken by Kean from the free throw line, but she missed both. Mexico's Lucia Vazquez Delgadillo then opened the scoring to give Mexico a two-point lead, which turned out to be their biggest of the game. Gauci then put points on the scoreboard for the Gliders. Mexico turned the ball over, and Crispin got her first from the paint, assisted by Gauci, which was repeated on the next play, with Stewart providing the assist this time. Mexico scored, but the Gliders responded with another shot from Crispin. On the next play, Gauci stole the ball and charged down the court, but failed to make the shot. Nott then took a defensive rebound, leading to Crispin scoring again. She was also fouled, but missed the resulting free throw. Shortly thereafter, Stewart drew another foul, and made both shots to bring the score to 14–4.^[39]

The Gliders put Mexico under intense defensive pressure.^[5] Mexico had six team turnovers to the Gliders' one, and wound up with 19 turnovers in total to Australia's 6. Australia scored 18 points from turnovers, compared to 6 for Mexico. Gauci, a two-point player, took a three-pointer to take the score to 17–8. Mexico was unable to recover from Australia's high scoring from Merritt, who ultimately scored 14 points with 70 per cent shooting, and Crispin, who scored twelve points with 67 per cent shooting. The two teams went into the quarter time break with the score 21 points to 10. Mexico fell further behind in the second quarter. Amanda Carter immediately stole the ball from Mexico, which let Merritt score two points. A few minutes later, Carter, assisted by Chaplin, scored a basket from the paint, and was fouled in the process. A successful free throw made the score 36–16. Another steal by Merritt led to a runaway break, bringing her contribution to ten points, and the score to 38–16. At the half-time break, the score was 44–20.^[39][40]

Match against Mexico. Amanda Carter takes a shot

In the third quarter, a team turnover and a series of missed shots by Hill, Kean and Crispin, allowed Mexico to outscore Australia by one point, leaving the score at 50–27 at the end of the quarter. The final quarter saw Australia's Del Toso miss a shot at one end, and Mexico's Floralia Estrada Bernal miss one at the other. Stewart also missed, before a Mexican turnover led to the first score of the quarter, by Stewart. Mexico's Rocio Torres Lopez scored in response. Another shot by Stewart missed, but Carter took an offensive rebound, and scored. Turnovers by Kean and Del Toso allowed Mexico put four points on the board, but successive fouls sent Kean to the free throw line to score three points in response.^[39]

Merritt brought the score to 59–35 with her seventh scoring shot.^[39] As the game drew to a close, there were several missed shots by Sarah Vinci and Hill, but Mexico was unable to capitalise on the opportunities, continuing to miss shots and turn over the ball. With nineteen seconds of play remaining, Hill took a two-point shot from inside the paint; attracting a foul, she scored another point from a free throw. Although Mexico's Wendy Garcia Amador scored the last two points of the game, her team lost to Australia 62–37.^[39][41]

Semifinal – United States

6 September 2012 13:00

Report:[42]

Australia	40–39	United States
Scoring by quarter: 10–12, 16–14, 12–2, 2–11
Pts: three players 8 Rebs: Merritt 6 Asts: three players 3		Pts: Murray 18 Rebs: Murray, Schneider 9 Asts: Murray 3

North Greenwich Arena, London Referees: Sébastien Gauthier (CAN)

In the semifinal, the Gliders had to beat the reigning champions, Team USA, in front of a small crowd of 4,428 at the North Greenwich Arena. Stewart took the tap, and lost. Team USA had first possession and earned the first points of the game, but Gauci responded quickly. Then Team USA turned the ball over, but Nott lost it. Chaplin stole it back, but Kylie Gauci put the ball out of bounds. Nott stole it back again, but Gauci turned it over again. Team USA took a shot at the basket inside the paint, and missed, but took a rebound and scored. A Team USA free throw extended their lead to 2–6. Thereafter both teams' shooting was poor, and the score was only 10–12 at quarter time.^[43][44][45]

Match against USA. Amber Merritt takes a shot.

The second quarter started with Merritt scoring twice to give Australia the lead 14–12. Team USA turned the ball over the Gliders several times, but they were unable to capitalise on their strong defence, leaving the score tied at 26–26 at half time. In the third quarter, an early goal by Gauci from outside the paint gave the Gliders the lead. A series of steals gave the Gliders additional shots, most of which they missed, but Team USA gave over a series of turnovers, and their shooting was worse than their rivals, resulting in a 10–0 run by the Gliders. Team USA were unable to score at all until the last minute of the quarter. A hurried goal with seconds to go by Hill saw the Gliders leading 38–28.^[43][44][45] Team USA would ultimately post 28 turnovers to Australia's 17, and the Gliders would score 12 points from turnovers to Team USA's three.^[46] "They will come back!" Triscari warned his players. "We've got to stop them!"^[47]

In the fourth quarter, the Australian defence remained strong, but their shooting did not improve. For the entire game, Crispin made only 3 out of 10 attempts, and Merritt just 4 out of 16. Nott, who played the entire game, ended up being the team's most accurate player, with four out of five attempts. Meanwhile, Team USA fought back to 40–39. Three timeouts were taken in the last minute. The game went down to the last seconds.^[43][44][45] Trailing 40-37 with less than 30 seconds to play, America's Desi Miller scored to have the USA trail by a point. Deliberately fouling Merrit put Miller out of the game, and sent Merritt to the free throw line. It was risk, but it paid off; Merritt missed both shots. The second was rebounded by Team USA's Rebecca Murray, who took the ball down the court, in the face of the Gliders' relentless defence. The ball was passed to Rose Hollermann, at 16 the youngest of Team USA's players. Spectators saw Hollermann's shot from the paint hit the ring with a second to go, but the shot clock was not reset. Team USA's Alana Nichols rebounded, and put the ball in the bucket, but not before time ran out and a shot clock violation was called. This left Australia with possession. In another 1.9 seconds, it was all over, and Australia had a controversial one-point.^[47]

Gold medal match – Germany

7 September 2012 21:15

Report:[48]

Australia	44–58	Germany
Scoring by quarter: 10–14, 9–12, 9–8, 16–24
Pts: Gauci 15 Rebs: Gauci, Merritt 5 Asts: Crispin, Chaplin 5		Pts: Adermann 19 Rebs: Mohnen 9 Asts: Adermann, Zeyen 5

North Greenwich Arena, London Referees: Sergio Giordano (CAN)

The Gliders had to defeat Germany in front of a capacity crowd of 12,985 at the North Greenwich Arena to win the gold medal.^[49] Australia had narrowly defeated the German team 48–46 in the Gliders World Challenge in Sydney a few months earlier,^[50] and at that point had beaten them three of the previous four times they had played.^[51]

Amanda Carter and Shelley Chaplin with their medals

Once again, Stewart took the tap, and lost. A defensive rebound by Kean after Germany missed two free throw shots resulted in the Gliders scoring first, with Gauci assisting Crispin. The Gliders played Germany like they had played against and defeated the United States, with a strong defence against a normally high-scoring team. At first, they were successful; with three minutes to go in the quarter, despite several missed shots, Australia was ahead 10–4. In the last minutes, Germany scored ten points that gave them a 10–14 lead at quarter time.^[49][52]

In the second quarter, Germany extended their lead to ten points, but Kean scored a point from a free throw, and then, with seconds left on the clock, stole the ball, enabling Crispin to score, so the Gliders were only seven points behind at half time.^[52][53] The Gliders won the third quarter in previous games in London, which happened again against Germany, but only by 9–8. The Gliders had six points to make up, with strong defences from both teams.^[53][54] Gauci scored the most in this game, scoring 15 points, including a three-pointer, with five assists and four rebounds. In the end, the Gliders lost by fourteen points, 44–58.^[49][52][53]

Triscari felt that the Gliders did not put enough pressure on the Germans, and that their shooting was not accurate enough.^[55] In Australia, Basketball Australia CEO Kristina Keneally praised the Gliders' efforts. "The Gliders have been nothing short of brilliant at the Paralympic Games," she said, "and this Silver Medal is just reward for their outstanding performance. This is the Gliders' fourth consecutive Paralympic Medal – a remarkable achievement. All of the players, coaches and support staff have done a fantastic job and we can’t wait to greet them on their return home."^[53] In 2013, Keneally announced a four-year development program for the Gliders that included the appointment of a full-time head coach for the first time, based at the National Wheelchair Centre of Excellence at the New South Wales Institute of Sport in Homebush, New South Wales.^[56] In May 2013, Tom Kyle was appointed the Gliders' new head coach.^[57]

"We have had the opportunity to play Germany a fair bit in our preparation so our game plan was to have strong defensive pressure and take it from there", Kean told the media. "It started off really good for us, unfortunately they just got a couple more runs than us and that's the way it goes sometimes. They played a great game. We stuck together 12 deep from the second the buzzer started, to that end buzzer and no one gave up. I think that we can hold our heads high because of that. I guess the plan is, next four years, Rio we go one more."^[54]

It was not to be. The Gliders did not qualify for the 2016 Summer Paralympics after finishing second to China at the 2015 Asia Oceania Qualifying Tournament.^[58]

References

Wikinews has related news:

Gliders defeat USA in 2012 Paralympic semifinals Gliders move into the medal round with victory over Mexico Brazil women's national wheelchair basketball team loses first game in its 2012 Paralympic campaign Wikinews interviews Katie Hill, Australian Paralympic wheelchair basketball medallist Wikinews interviews Australian Paralympic wheelchair basketballer Shelley Chaplin Wikinews interviews Australian Glider Amanda Carter

• Official Results Book – Paralympic Games London 2012. London: London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games. 2012. 

External links

• Wheelchair Basketball – Women's Semi-final – USA versus AUS – London 2012 Paralympic Games on YouTube

Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team – 2012 Summer Paralympics
1 . 2 . 3 . 4 Sarah Vinci 5 Cobi Crispin 6 Bridie Kean 7 Amanda Carter 8 Tina McKenzie 9 Leanne Del Toso 10 Clare Nott 11 Kylie Gauci 12 Shelley Chaplin 13 Sarah Stewart 14 Katie Hill 15 Amber Merritt Coach: John Triscari