World champions Spain entered Wednesday the semifinals by trouncing Croatia 72-59 at the men's basketball competitions of the Beijing Olympic Games.
Spain will meet the winners of the following match between Luthuania and China in the semis on Friday night.
Pau Gasol had 20 points and 10 rebounds when he shot 8-out-of-11 in the field to lead Spain to their first medal finishing in 24 years, after they won the silver medals at the 1994 Los Angeles Olympics.
Trailing all the way down to the fourth quarter, Croatia closed it by 51-41 on Marko Tomas' 3-pointer at the start, but were scoreless in the next 4:51 minutes.
Spain scored 12 points in a row to extend the lead to 63-41 and made it 70-46 with three minutes to go when coach Aito Garcia benched his starters.
Croatia, led by Marko Banic's 15 points, had some consolation points in the garbage time.
(Xinhua News Agency August 20, 2008)