America dreams on

Sydney, October 1: Withstanding yet another tension-filled finish, the United States "Dream Team" of National Basketball Associa...

Sydney, October 1: Withstanding yet another tension-filled finish, the United States "Dream Team" of National Basketball Association (NBA) multimillionaires basked in the joy of a prize their money cannot purchase – Olympic gold. Led by 13 points each from Vince Carter and Ray Allen, the US team defeated France 85-75 here Sunday in the Olympic final. With no member of the squad having ever taken an NBA title, the gold medal was even more special. "It’s nothing like I have ever felt before. It’s way up there," US forward Kevin Garnett said. "I don’t have the words. I just can’t explain.

It really doesn’t hit you until you’re back home."It was the third consecutive US Olympic title since the "Dream Team" concept began in 1992 and 12th US gold medal since the sport’s 1936 Olympic debut.

France settled for silver, equaling its only prior men’s hoop medal from 1948. "It makes you feel good to know it wasn’T given to you, that you had to work for it," US center Alonzo Mourning said.

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"That is going to make me appreciate this even more. It makes this more valuable than anything. Yeah, we get paid a lot of money for our services.

But I can’t dig in my pockets and buy this. You can’t buy this. You’ve got to earn it. We earned it." The Americans, who survived a last-second scare to edge Lithuania 85-83 in the semi-finals, saw their lead cut from 17 points to only 76-72 with 4:24 to play on a three-point basket by Antoine Rigaudeau. "We did feel freed up in the second half," France’s Laurent Sciarra said. "Even if they did keep us out, we came back to within four points of them." But that’s when the US team made some defensive adjustments the French could not match. "They were a little hesitant and we didn’T quite put them out of it," Allen said."They came back and that’s when we got back on our heels, but we had enough to sustain it."

Carter punctuated things with a reverse slam dunk and blew a kiss to his mother, having ended France’s hopes. "I just wanted to keep it going, go out and fight, do whatever I could for the team," Carter said. "France really pushed us. This means a lot, winning for your country. It has been wonderful." Two days after the narrow escape with Lithuania, the US team was expecting a tough fight with a team that fell only 106-94 in a qualifying-round matchup. "It didn’t surprise me. We knew they would be competitive," Mourning said. "We weren’t worried. We just had to step up defensively. As soon as we did that, it took them right out of it."