Rizzotti Coaches U19 National Team to Gold Medal

Jennifer Rizzotti

University of Hartford women’s basketball coach Jennifer Rizzotti has struck gold for the second-straight summer, leading the USA Basketball U19 National Team to the 2011 FIBA Championship with a 69-46 victory over Spain on Sunday night. The USA U19 team finished the 2011 championship with an 8-1 record in winning its fourth-straight FIBA title.

This is the second-straight summer Rizzotti has led a national team to a gold medal after leading the U18 National Team to gold at the 2010 FIBA U18 Championships. Overall, Rizzotti has won three gold medals with USA Basketball, having served as an assistant coach, under DePaul Head Coach Doug Bruno, with the 2006 U18 National Team.

Rizzotti led the U19 team to a perfect 3-0 record, with wins over Japan, Russia and Argentina, in the preliminary round, advancing to the second round as the top team in Group E. During the second Round, the U19 team finished with a 2-1 record defeating China and Italy before falling to Canada in the final game of the round.

Despite the second round loss, Team USA entered the medal round with a 5-1 record and faced France in their quarterfinal match-up. After trailing by 12 after the first quarter, Team USA finished with a 14-7 advantage in the second round and advanced to the semifinals after outscoring the French 23-15 in the fourth quarter to finish with a 70-64 advantage on the scoreboard.

In the semifinals, the United States defeated Brazil, 82-66. After trading leads for much of the first quarter, Team USA would take a 13-point lead into the halftime break and never looked back.

In the title game, a 5-0 run early in the first half led to the third lead change of the game and what would prove to be the final lead change as the US never trailed from that point forward. Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis (Anaheim, Calif./Conn.), Elizabeth Williams (Virginia Beach, Va./Duke) and Stefanie Dolson (Port Jervis, N.Y./Connecticut) all finished with 15 points to lead Team USA.