WASHINGTON DC (USA) - FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup Qualifying Tournament 2022 hosts USA used their depth and balance in an 84-75 victory over Belgium, where 8 players played at least 16 minutes.

"We've had great effort all week, coach talked about it all week. We've had tremendous effort defensively, be it a lot of deflections, a lot of turnovers, but it's because we were playing really hard. That's the goal and it was fun."

With the win tonight, not only are the USA now 2-0 in head-to-head matchups against Belgium, but they now have 38 straight victories in FIBA competitions.

The game was tied at 15 after the first quarter before the USA went on a 17-6 run to begin the second quarter.

USA then finished the first half strong, outscoring Belgium 23-11 in the second quarter for a 38-26 lead at halftime.

The lead was stretched out to as many as 23 by USA early in the fourth quarter, but Belgium then picked up the intensity and went on a 24-9 run to close the gap to eight points, but it was too late.

USA took advantage of 17 forced turnovers, converting them into 21 points, while Belgium only had nine points from 13 forced turnovers.

Kelsey Plum made the most of her 16 minutes on the court, as she led USA in scoring with 16 points along with 3 assists, while shooting a perfect 5-of-5 from the field and 2-of-2 from three-point.

This was Plum's first time playing with the senior National Team since the FIBA Women's Olympic Pre-Qualifying Americas Tournament 2019, but she did represent the USA at Tokyo 2020 in the 3x3 games where she won a gold medal.

The 27-year-old described how 3x3 basketball has helped evolve her game.

"I think 3x3 has helped me defensively a ton," said Plum. "I think with 3x3, there's not a ton of help. You're pretty much on an island a lot of times. You have to give significant ball pressure to take time off the clock, and so that's helped me I think just trying to stay in front of people and applying pressure."

Adjusting to the pace

"And then I think just offensively, I'm still working on it. Sometimes I go too fast and get sped up, but just trying to play with tempo. That ability to play with tempo and play with pace, especially because USA has so much depth. If I can give a shot of adrenaline into the game, that's kind of my goal, and so I tried to do that today."

"We've had great effort all week, coach talked about it all week. We've had tremendous effort defensively, be it a lot of deflections, a lot of turnovers, but it's because we were playing really hard. That's the goal and it was fun."

Belgium's Emma Meesseman recorded a double-double with 15 points and 10 rebounds along with 5 assists, while Hind Ben Abdelkadar shot the ball well again, going 3-of-7 from deep and scoring 17 points.

USA will face off against Puerto Rico on February 12 at 16:30 CET, where they will look to close their qualifying tournament with another win.

FIBA