Lithuania, Spain secure quarter-final berths in men's basketball
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2004-08-20 12:27

European champions Lithuania and runners-up Spain secured their quarter-final berths of the Athens Olympic men's basketball tournament with respective victories in Athens on Thursday.

Spain rallied past Italy 71-63 for its third straight win in group A while Lithuania trounced Greece 98-76 to improve to 3-0 in group B.

Earlier on Thursday, New Zealand upset world champion Serbia and Montenegro 90-87 after a tremendous comeback in the fourth quarter.

Rallying from a 79-67 deficit five minutes and a half from the end, New Zealand tied it at 81-81 with a 14-2 burst and went on to claim its first victory in Athens.

In the other group A match, world runners-up Argentina blasted Asian champions China 82-57 to stand second in the group behind Spain with two wins against one loss.

Serbia and Montenegro, New Zealand, Italy and China all had one win and two defeats.

The Dream Team of the United States rallied past Australia 89-79 on Thursday for its second straight win in group B.

In Thursday's other action, Puerto Rico held off Angola 83-80. The African champions remained as the only winless team after three rounds of competitions.

Twelve teams are competing in two groups of the preliminaries with top four finishers from each group to qualify for the quarter-finals.

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