World team defeats USA 97-89 at Nike Hoops Summit

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PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) " Serbia's Milan Macvan scored 23 points and Lithuania's Donatas Motiejunas added 21 as the World Select junior basketball team surprised the USA junior national select team with a 97-89 victory on Saturday at the Nike Hoops Summit.

It was the World team's first victory in the series since 1998, when Dirk Nowitzki led the foreign stars.

The U.S. stars were led by Xavier Henry with 22 points, including six 3-pointers. Avery Bradley added 21 as the Americans lost to the world team for just the third time in 12 meetings.

The U.S. team has typically been a mismatch for its foreign opponent but this time was an exception. The Americans held the lead for most of the game, but they could never shake the World stars, who started out cold but surged ahead late.

The Americans led 70-61 entering the final period behind the outside shooting of Henry and the solid guard play of Bradley and John Wall. But the World team quickly cut that deficit to 70-68 after five straight points by Croatia's Tomislav Zubcic and a dunk by France's Kevin Seraphin.

The World stars took the lead for good when Seraphin scored on a tip-in to make it 85-83 with 2:56 left. By the time Motiejunas hit a pair of free throws with 1:03 left, the World team had an insurmountable 95-86 lead.

Zubcic finished with 17 points while Macvan added 14 rebounds for the winners. Overall, the World team had a whopping 48-29 advantage on the boards. Wall finished with 13 points and 11 assists, and John Henson added 10 points for the U.S. team.

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