Even playing without the injured Sandrine Gruda, France is making the United States work in a game to decide the Group B title at the FIBA World Championships.

The U.S. was stuck on three points for a long portion of the first quarter before Candice Dupree came in off the bench to spark the U.S. Still, the U.S. only led by seven at halftime.

One interesting side note - when Maya Moore replaced Tamika Catchings with 3:45 left in the second quarter, the U.S. lineup featured all UConn products as Tina Charles, Swin Cash, Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi were already on the court. The all UConn lineup played together for 73 seconds. I just checked the play by play in the first two games and it is the first time in the three games that U.S. coach Geno Auriemma used a lineup exclusively made up of players who suited up for him at UConn.

The U.S. will not play on Sunday and if finish off France, they will begin the second round of pool play on Monday against the loser of today's Canada/Belarus game.