Iyana Martín has helped lead Spain to the medal podium.
The 20-year-old Spanish basketball player scored 22 points in the women’s FIBA World Cup on Sunday to give Spain an 81-58 win over host Germany.
Martin now has scored 103 points at the Women’s World Cup, only two players have reached that milestone at a younger age over the last 20 years: Candace Parker (20 years, 155 days) and Liz Cambage (19 years, 45 days).
Spain, which didn’t qualify for the last World Cup, claimed its third third-place finish in the tournament after 2010 and 2018.
The Spanish players looked sharper and faster throughout, with turnovers again an issue for Germany after the hosts had 25 in their semifinal loss to France on Saturday. Germany had six in the first quarter alone and finished with 18 against Spain.
Frieda Buhner wiped away tears while the Spanish players hugged and danced in celebration at Berlin Arena.
“We have to take the pain with us to be better as individual players and as a team,” Leonie Fiebich said as she fought tears while talking to reporters and reflecting on the importance of the game.
“It’s unique, it happens only once in a career,” she added. “I’m super thankful that we could be part of it, the team, the staff, the organization, everything all around it. It was one of the coolest experiences ever. I’ll be thinking of it for a long time.”
Germany had been looking for its first medal in the tournament in its second appearance as a unified country including its last time as host in 1998. East Germany finished fourth at the 1967 tournament.
It was Spain’s second victory over Germany after defeating the hosts by 30 points in their opening game — Spain’s biggest win over a European team and Germany’s heaviest defeat in the competition.
Buoyed by enthusiastic home support, Germany recovered from its opening loss with increasingly impressive wins over Japan, Mali, South Korea and European champion Belgium. Germany was the first team in the tournament to keep France below 90 points with an 86-64 defeat in their semifinal.
“The growth has been very, very positive,” said Germany coach Olaf Lange, who had hailed German basketball’s “best day” after the win over Belgium.
“We’ve made good progress. Now we have to keep working on ourselves and use this as motivation for the future,” Lange said. “We have EuroBasket coming up next year — we have to qualify first — and then the 2028 Olympics. We have to keep going. That’s our motto — keep going — and it doesn’t change today.”
Spain was dealt a shock defeat by Mali in its second game but beat Japan to top the group, then defeated Australia in the quarterfinals before a battling 76-66 loss to the United States in their semifinal.
The U.S. earned its fifth straight title when it defeated France in the final on Sunday.
