Americans pull away from Germany to reach World semifinals

The Americans used a big third quarter to turn a one-point edge into a 15- point lead and cruised from there to remain one of four undefeated teams in the tournament. The U.S. will next play Greece on Friday.

The Greeks also stayed unbeaten and advanced earlier Wednesday with a 73-56 victory over France. Friday’s other semifinal matchup will pit two more perfect teams, as Spain faces Argentina. The Spaniards and Argentines moved on with quarterfinal victories on Tuesday.

The winners of Friday’s games will meet for the gold medal on Sunday. The losers will play for bronze.

Dirk Nowitzki, who led the Dallas Mavericks to the NBA Finals in June, scored 15 points for Germany. He entered the contest averaging 24.5 points in the tournament, but was just 3-for-12 from the field. Ademola Okulaja, a former star at North Carolina, also had 15 in defeat.

"He commands so much attention. We put a lot of different guys on him," United States head coach Mike Krzyzewski said of Nowitzki. "Shane (Battier), Chris Bosh did a really good job...LeBron, Carmelo. He’s the center of attention for everything we were doing defensively."

The United States held a slim 40-39 edge at the intermission and maintained that one-point margin early in the third quarter, but Anthony heated up.

The Denver Nuggets star drained a three-pointer and followed with a dunk off a steal and an assist by James to ignite a 16-2 run for the Americans. Anthony added another shot from beyond the arc during the burst and finished the period with 10 points.

Chris Bosh capped the big spurt with a three-point play off a near half-court, alley-oop feed from Chris Paul, giving the United States a 60-45 cushion.

The Germans pulled as close as 10, but the Americans scored the last five points of the period and a buzzer-beating, three-pointer by Paul gave the U.S. a 67-52 advantage heading to the fourth.

"We came out in the second half with the defensive mind-set that we needed to get some stops and get out and run," said James. "We were able to take control of the game in the third quarter."

A 7-0 run pulled Germany within 72-61 midway through the final period, but Joe Johnson followed with a three-pointer to start a string of seven straight for the Americans and the Germans never recovered.

"They did a good job of packing in the zone and making us shoot," said James. "We missed some early shots, but we never got down on ourselves. The same shots we missed in the first half, we made in the second half. We made the adjustment."

The Americans opened a 23-21 lead after one quarter, then struggled early in the second. They managed just two points in the first five minutes of the period, but Germany could not take full advantage.

Nowitzki picked up his third foul with just over three minutes left in the half, but Germany forged in front, 39-37, on a tip-in by Okulaja with 1:04 left.

Anthony answered with a three-pointer on the next U.S. possession and the Americans went into the break with the one-point lead.

The United States made just 14-of-44 shots in the first half and connected on only 5-of-20 from three-point range.

"We’re going to have nights like that when shots don’t fall," said Anthony. "Our shots didn’t fall tonight. But, we did it on the defensive end. We figured out that we weren’t making our shots in the first half, so we picked it up on the defensive end."

Dwyane Wade left the contest late in the first half after being poked in the eye, but the Miami Heat star returned to the floor in the second half. He finished with just three points, but chipped in five assists and seven rebounds.

Bosh contributed 10 points and seven boards for the Americans, while Johnson scored 11 points.