Italy - Australia

This is a straight shootout for a place in the last eight, and the winner picks up Spain in the quarter-finals. Neither of these teams has been shooting well enough to turn it into a track meet. Italy have been the coldest three point shooting side in the tournament so far at around 16 percent from behind the arc, which is a brutal number at this level, and Australia have not been much better from deep at roughly 26 percent. Both sides are grinding possessions out inside the arc rather than pulling away with runs of threes. Then there is what is riding on it. Italy are chasing a top eight finish for the first time since 1979 and the Opals want a clean route through to Spain, so this should be a tight, physical game where nobody wants to start trading wild shots. Italy do have real size in the frontcourt with Lorela Cubaj among the options, and a lot of the night comes down to how they handle Ezi Magbegor around the rim. Matchups like that slow a game down rather than open it up. Knockout basketball in Berlin, two cold shooting teams, and a number sitting in the mid 130s. That total looks a touch high for what these two have actually produced here.