France upsets Canada 82-73 despite little offensive contribution from Wembanyama

Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images

But Wemby was himself on defense, and that’s all the team needed.

The quarterfinals have been all about double-digit comebacks in Men’s Basketball at the 2024 Paris Olympics. After watching Greece surrender a 12-point lead to Germany for 76-63 loss and Serbia rally back from 24 down to beat Australia 95-90 in overtime (despite more FIBA Patty heroics), France found itself staring down a similar situation. After getting out to a quick start and leading by as much as 19 in the first half, Canada came roaring back in the second, getting as close five points several times late before some timely defense from Victor Wembanyama and heroic shots from Evan Fournier sealed the deal, 82-73.

Guershon Yabusele and Isaia Cordinier combined for 44 points to lead France, while Fournier and Mathias Lessort had all 28 of their bench points. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and RJ Barrett were the only Canadians to score in double figures with 27 and 16 points, respectively.

Observations

It wasn’t a good game for Wemby on offense, as he shot just 2-10 from the field and 0-6 from three. Most of his attempts came later in the game, as he sat with just three attempts for much of the third quarter. Guard play was and remains France’s weakness, and say what you want about the Spurs’ struggles getting Wemby the ball his rookie season, but they were still better at it than France is, and when the threes aren’t falling, it stands out. My unofficial suggestion would be to start Bilal Coulibaly instead of Frank Ntilikina at guard since he has played with Wemby at the club level and they have chemistry together.
That being said, Wemby contributed plenty everywhere else. He led everyone with 12 rebounds, 5 assists, and 3 steals, and his defensive presence was crucial down the stretch. He had a huge (and satisfying for Spurs fans) block of Dillon Brooks with less than 3 minutes left to keep the lead at 7, assisted Fournier on the biggest shot of the night — a long three to stretch the lead to 10 with less than a minute to go — and a tip-in with with 21 seconds left to squash any remaining hope Canada may have had. It was a good thing other players stepped up in the scoring department since both Wemby and Batum (0 points) had bad shooting nights, but Wemby showed yet again that he is much more than a one trick pony.
An interesting change was Rudy Gobert coming off the bench for France, and even then, he only played three minutes, so there was about 10 minutes of gametime when France went without either of its rim protectors when Wemby sat. It was understandable considering Canada lacks a traditional center, but while France survived those minutes in the first half, Canada — notably, SGA — made a concerted effort to attack the glass in those minutes of the second half, and that’s when their comeback attempt began. This may be have just been a matchup move, or it could have been an attempt to improve the offense, so it will be interesting to see if Gobert receives regular minutes again going forward.
Here’s a FIBA rule I was unaware of (and it seemed like the announcers were too): apparently, if an offensive foul occurs after the shot is released, the bucket still counts. To wit, with 2:26 remaining, Fournier made a driving layup, but a charge was called. However, because the ball had already left Fournier’s hands when the contact occurred, the basket still counted, and Dwight Powell also got two free throws for Canada because they were over the limit. Pretty interesting in the sense that it basically offset both the bucket and the foul because both teams came out of it two points richer.

France will now face Germany in the semifinals in a rematch of their only loss in group play. The winner will have a shot at gold (worst case, silver) in the finals, and the loser of that game will play for bronze in the third-place game.