Marine Johannès dazzled the French crowd to lead her team to the Olympic Semifinals on home soil.
PARIS–– Marine Johannès led France to a quarterfinal victory Wednesday night at Bercy Arena. The guard who competes for the New York Liberty went 5 of 10 from the arc en route to a
24-point performance.
The young star known as "The Magician" had a quiet game against Australia in pool play but shone brightly Wednesday with the help of perspective from her friends.
"I was talking to some friends earlier, and they just told me to, like, be free on the court. But also just the team, like, we are really focused today, but also yesterday during practice, we knew that it was going to be a tough game today," Johannès told Black Rosie Media after the victory.
French player Gabby Williams confirmed once again that she is not only a card-carrying member of the Marine Johannès Fan Club but also the highest-ranking official.
"I'm the President. I'm the President. I think that everyone knows that, right? Yeah, definitely. Man. It's so fun to watch her play like that in the way that we all just kind of feed off of that energy. She opens up everything for us," Williams said.
"She attracts the defenders towards her when she has the ball when she's playing like that, or just in general. And so then we're able to find our mismatches inside," the forward added.
Although the Australia game didn't go how France wanted, when we caught up with Williams on Sunday in Lille, she called it an important loss. She reemphasized her team is feeling confident as they advance to play Belgium on Friday.
"I think the way that we kept our cool after that loss and the way we bounced back today ... we saw Serbia (men's basketball) come back from 20 points yesterday, and these kinds of things happen during this competition. So how we kind of kept our mojo and our rhythm. I think that shows that we're in the good rhythm for the next game," she added.
Once again, Germany came out with a strong start but struggled to maintain it. German forward Satou Sabally struggled to get going. France was able to zero in on her defensively and keep the leading scorer to 10 points and six rebounds.
"I mean, I'm heartbroken about my performance. I didn't think I played or played up to the person, the athlete I can be," Sabally told Black Rosie Media. The Dallas Wings 2020 first-round pick let her tears flow as she reflected on the first-ever Olympic appearance for Germany.
"I need to have some grace. I need to have some grace with my performance and how I came back. But I'm just, I'm just sad I couldn't help on my team today in the first half," she said.
New York Liberty draft pick Nyara Sabally returned to the lineup for Germany and had a stellar performance before again getting banged up in the game's final seconds. Nyara did not enter the mixed zone, and Black Rosie Media was told it was due to injury.
Nevertheless, she tallied 20 points and 13 rebounds for Deutschland.
"I mean, she's a remarkable athlete. She is such a problem, such a force out there. I think she showed that today. And you know, who knows what can happen if, if you get her healthy and she's with us for a significant period of time, so super excited about her contributions," German head coach Lisa Thomaidis told Black Rosie Media postgame.
Overall, the German team faltered under the pressure of competing for an Olympic medal. Thomaidis is proud of what the team accomplished with so little time together and hopes she can keep the core players together.
If and when that happens, New York Liberty guard Leonie Fiebich is confident that Germany can become a top program in women's basketball.
"I mean, I'm proud. You know how we beat Belgium. I think that was one of the biggest wins in our history. And then backing it up with Japan, an extremely hard team to beat as well," Fiebich told BRM while reflecting on her first Olympics. "But it shows that we're not ready to beat these big, big teams yet," she added.
Though heartbroken, Fiebich and Sabally believe the future of their federation is bright. "You can see that if we all get together– the best players in Germany– something big can happen. And I hope we can do that in the next four years," Fiebich said.
" I never thought that I could play in the Olympics, and now I've finally accomplished such a big goal, it kind of set me up for another goal to get a medal one day, and I know now that this is realistic," Satou Sabally added. "I mean, definitely world-class, like I think we can be on the top, and that's a great perspective to have and great future to look forward to," she said.
The current WNBA prioritization rule may be the one wrinkle to Gcermany's plans. Sabally, Williams, and others have been vocal about how this negatively impacts players born outside of North America.
This includes former WNBA Finals MVP and 2019 WNBA champion Emma Meesseman, who helped Belgium win their quarterfinals game over España Wednesday afternoon.
"I mean, there's a reason why I'm not really playing WNBA," Meesseman told Black Rosie Media at Bercy Arena during the Olympic quarterfinals.
"I agree 100% with Satou. I really said since the beginning that I don't feel supported in that role. You make me choose between my home ... so if you make me choose between my national team by only giving me a couple of weeks or days preparation like, that's never going to happen. I don't think it's fair of them, or they ever think about how we feel about it," she added.
When Black Rosie Media told the Belgiam forward that we hope to cover her stateside again someday, she was brazen-faced and replied, "So I mean, you know what to do."
Comments