Jones falls short in bid for five golds

Friday, Sept. 29, 2000 | 11:34 a.m.

SUN WIRE REPORTS

Marion Jones lost out on her bid for five track and field golds by less than half a foot -- her own foot.

Jones stepped over the foul line on four of her six attempts in the finals of the long jump today. The best of her two legal jumps covered 22 feet, 8 1/4 inches, but that was still three inches shy of German gold medalist Heike Drechsler's best effort.

The loss crushed Jones' attempt to win five track and field gold medals in a single Olympics. No female athlete has won five track golds in an entire career.

Nobody came close to Jones in either the 100 or 200 meters, her first two races. But the long jump is her weakest event. Her style has often been criticized for relying too much on pure speed, not enough on good form, and on a hot night Jones failed to deliver one of her occasional amazing jumps.

Drechsler hugged Jones, and then danced with a German flag. Italian Fiona May finished second.

"I don't regret at all saying I was going to go for five," Jones said. "I had a shot, and it just didn't pan out."

Jones will still compete in the 400- and 1,600-meter relay finals Saturday, but golds are not assured in those events, either.

World-class sprinters Gail Devers and Inger Miller each withdrew from the 400 earlier Friday because of hamstring injuries.

The United States stayed out front in the medal count Thursday with 79 (33 gold, 19 silver, 27 bronze) to Russia's 61 (20-19-22) and China's 56 (26-15-15).

In the day's other big story, an air ball at the buzzer is all that that separated the Dream Team from disaster.

Lithuania took the U.S. men's basketball team right to edge of an enormous upset but lost 85-83 when Sarunas Jasikevicius' 3-pointer went left of the rim, allowing the Americans to escape into the finals of the Olympic tournament against France.

It was the closest game for the United States since it started stocking its Olympic team with NBA players in 1992.

Lithuania lost by nine to the Americans in round-robin play, an unimaginably close game before the 2000 Olympics. But the semifinal was much tighter.

The U.S. women also found the going tough in their semifinal, but Natalie Williams' strong inside play helped the United States pull away from South Korea in the second half and win 78-65. The Americans led by only two points with less than 14 minutes to play.