Spain - USA

Nobody sensible is picking Spain to win this one. The USA arrived in Berlin on a thirty game World Cup winning streak and have added four more to it, Kara Lawson has them rolling, and they routed Hungary in the quarter-finals. That part of the market is entirely correct. Twenty four points is a different question. Spain are not a team hanging on in this tournament. They went two and one in the group and then blew out Australia, the reigning bronze medalists, to get here. Iyana Martin has been excellent at 16.5 points and 3.3 assists a game, and the roster is packed with players who already compete in the WNBA, among them Awa Fam, Maria Conde and Megan DiLeo. That is enough quality to trade baskets for long stretches rather than get buried in one quarter. There is also direct evidence the Americans can be dragged into a real game. Their group stage included a three point win over Italy, sitting between two blowouts. Jackie Young leads them at eleven points a game and Caitlin Clark has been among the tournament assist leaders on her World Cup debut, so the talent gap is obvious and nobody is disputing the result. The margin is the bet, and the evidence from this tournament says this American team does not win by twenty four every single night. Take the points.