Parker comes to the rescue for unbeaten French in basketball

France survived a late collapse to remain undefeated at the men's European Championships on Wednesday while Spain and Lithuania took a big step to reaching the quarter-finals. France nearly blew a 15-point lead in the fourth quarter but Tony Parker made five free throws in the final 18 seconds to give France a 68-64 victory over Turkey. "We are very happy to win this game because for us it was a very big step to the quarter-finals," said France coach Vincent Collet. "When we got the big lead I think we relaxed just a little bit and we couldn't buy a basket from the outside even when we were wide open. It would have been almost a disaster if we had lost." Parker led all scorers with 20 points while adding six rebounds and five assists as France improved to 3-0 in the second round Group E. Nicolas Batum scored 13 points and Charles Kahudi collected eight points and five rebounds. France led 59-44 at the very start of the fourth quarter. The Turks held France to one basket over the next five minutes and eventually pulled to within two points with 45 seconds left. After two Parker free throws with 18 seconds remaining, Emir Preldzic nailed a three-pointer to cut the margin to 65-64 with seven seconds left. Parker made two more free throws and then Preldzic was unable to inbound the ball with four seconds remaining, giving France the victory. "We had a chance in the end but we turned to ball over. We have to improve on the little things. We didn't have consistency throughout the game," said Turkey star Hedo Turkoglu, who had 13 points to lead the Turks. Turkey dropped to 1-2 in Group E despite Preldzic scoring 11 points and Ersan Ilyasova (10 points and 10 rebounds) and Omer Asik (10 and 11) both collecting double-doubles. Spain improved to 2-1 in the group as Marc Gasol scored 24 points and Pau Gasol had 19 points in a 77-68 victory over Germany. Germany had closed to within 68-65 before the Gasol brothers combined for all nine points in a 9-3 close to the game. Germany dropped to 0-3 in the group though Dirk Nowitzki scored 19 points and Chris Kaman had 15 points and 12 rebounds. But the duo made just 13 of 31 shots. "We did a good job on their stars," said Spain coach Sergio Scariolo. "We kept the lead the whole game but we never had a big run to break open the game. But we were more patient in the fourth quarter." Lithuania also improved to 2-1 in the group with a 100-90 victory over Serbia. Mantas Kalnietis had 19 points and seven assists to pace five players in double figures for Lithuania, who shot 60 percent for the game including 11 of 20 (55 percent) from three-point range. Jonas Valanciunas scored 18 points and Sarunas Jasikevicius added 14 points and seven assists for the winners. Serbia dropped to 1-2 in the group despite 21 points from Nenad Krstic and 16 points each from Milos Teodosic and Dusko Savanovic. The game was back-and-forth until Lithuania began to pull away in the second quarter and led by 10 at the break. The lead grew to 13 points in the third quarter and Serbia cut it to seven. It swelled to 14 points before Serbia trimmed it to seven with five minutes remaining. But Teodosic was called for an unsportsmanlike foul and Robertas Javtokas made a free throw and Paulius Jankunas nailed a three-pointer to push the lead back to 11 points. The other second round Group F will play their first games on Thursday