9 points!
When the 20-point deficit had dwindled to just 9 in the blink of an eye, everyone found it unbelievable.
Most people had not even realized that China Team had closed the score, because USA Team had not played badly at all in the third quarter!
Yet the score had been closed just like that!
China Team had taken seven minutes to turn the impossible into possible!
In the last three minutes of the third quarter, both teams scored another 6 points.
At the end of three quarters, the score stood at 68-59, with USA Team holding a 9-point lead.
Everyone thought China Team trying to trade offense with USA Team was suicide, including USA Team themselves.
But by doing the impossible, China Team had miraculously pulled it off!
Just like those upset games, when the pregame underdog won, it was always seen as unreasonable, unscientific!
But an upset was something beyond reason and science, and that was part of basketball's charm.
Just like Dream Team VI in Athens in 2004.
Everyone remembered them losing to Argentina Team's Golden Generation, but few remembered that they had also lost to Lithuania, and even Puerto Rico.
Lithuania was a European powerhouse with consistently excellent results in Major Tournaments. At the time, they belonged to the second tier behind USA Team, roughly on Argentina's level.
USA Team had only lost by 4 points then, so it was not much of an upset.
But at those Olympics, USA Team had not only lost to Puerto Rico, they had lost by a historic 19 points!
What did that Puerto Rico team have?
Their most notable player was probably Carlos Arroyo, who averaged 12.6 points and 5 assists per game in the NBA during the 2003-04 season!
Compared with China Team's third quarter performance, that