HAMBURG (FIBA U17 World Championship) - Thanks to good defense and a total of 14 steals - most of them leading into easy breakaway layers - Argentina finished the game strong with a 11-0 run that opened up a gap with Spain to claim the ninth place at the inaugural U17 World Championships.

Altough the Europeans commanded a single-digit lead for most of the game, the South Americans stood close by getting their individually strong big men involved early on. One major factors behin Enrique Tolcachier's squad's success was perimeter defense, where spanish guard Jaime Fernandez could be restricted to a mere 3 points on 1-of-9 shooting from the field.

Argentina rallied late in the fourth, as Spain tired as the final seconds ran down.

Sensing a weakness inside the paint, the "Gauchos" attacked the rim with full force.

As game time expired Argentina finally got the lead, which ultimately broke Spains morale, and ran off to grab the ninth place.

Quotes

Diego Ocampo, Spain head coach: "For us this is a bad and difficult moment. We have played very badly during this tournament. We finished an overall goog game in a bad way, what makes me sad. We could not get our offense going in the last quarter - that's basketball."

Enrique Tolcachier, Argentina head coach: "It was a tough game. Spain was above us in the first three quarters. In the last quarter we played very good defense. We both were close to making the quarter-finals couple days ago by only a couple of points to our rival. Both are good teams for the future."

Luis Conde, Spain number 11: We missed the chances we had and we lost. Our fourth quarter was terrible."

Federico Hernan Herrera, Argentina number 15: "During the whole game there was only a 1-2 point difference. We adjusted a few things in the last quarter. We expected a better position. It was a bad championship for us too."

FIBA/LOC