CANADIAN WOMEN’S BASKETBALL TEAM I MPROVES TO 2- 0 AT AMERICUP

SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO Canada’s women’s basketball team held on to beat Brazil 71-67 on Sunday, and improve to 2-0 at the AmeriCup, the team’s first international tournament in more than a year. Nirra Fields scored 17 points to top world No. 4-ranked Canada, while Kayla Alexander had 11 points and seven rebounds. Clarissa Dos Santos had 25 points to lead 15th-ranked Brazil. The Canadians had opened the tournament with a 101-41 rout of the U.S. Virgin Islands, Canada’s first game together in 16 months. Sunday, the two undefeated teams played to a 21-21 tie to end the first quarter. Canada started to pull away and took a 45-37 lead into the halftime break, but Brazil rallied to tie it up late in the third and led 59-58 with one quarter left. Canada, which hadn’t played together since clinching an Olympic berth in February of 2020 in Belgium, plays El Salvador on Monday and Colombia on Tuesday. The Canadians are without WNBA players Natalie Achonwa, Kia Nurse and Bridget Carleton, who will join the team in Tokyo.