There will be no Olympic medal for the USA Women’s 7s team after the Eagles lost a tight, tense quarterfinal 5-0 to New Zealand Sunday at Deordoro Stadium in Rio de Janeiro.

The USA was much improved on Sunday from their Saturday effort, tying Australia and almost beating New Zealand, but in the end a crucial lack of tactical awareness saw them lose a quarterfinal they could have won.

The other quarterfinals. Top to bottom, Great Britain, Canada, and Australia all won. Photos courtesy World Rugby.

Both teams played very tough defense, and the USA ability to keep the ball while working trough phases was much improved. But dropped balls at important moments hurt them throughout the game.

Kayla McAllister of New Zealander seemed to break through and was off on what could have been a scoring run, but she was taken down by Alev Kelter, who was superb through the first half.

The Eagles then had a shot to score - a break by Kathryn Johnson and good support from Jillion Potter set up a penalty by the New Zealanders. From midfield Kelter booted the ball to touch well inside the Kiwi 22. This was the perfect scoring opportunity, but the Americans goofed up their lineout call, and no one jumped when Kelter threw the ball in. New Zealand recovered, and cleared away.

Eventually, just as halftime approached, the inimitable Portia Woodman outstripped Victoria Folayan to score in the corner and make it 5-0 at halftime.

Much of the second half was spent with the USA on attack. They tried to free up Jessica Javelet with passes - no go, the New Zealand defenders were too quick - and kicks - ditto. And then the crucial moment. With less than three minutes to go the USA attacked once more, and Lauren Doyle sent a grubber for Javelet to chase. The speedster nudged the ball ahead, but was tackled late, and injured in the process. 

Penalty to the USA, and a yellow card against New Zealand's Tyla Nathan-Wong. But the USA penalty move was pedestrian. They showed now awareness that if the opponents have only six players, and the player with the ball is facing two, then there’s a six-on-four somewhere else. They went left, lost the ball, got it back, and lost it again.

New Zealand did a superb job of milking the clock to get back to full strength, and even then the Eagles had one more shot, and once more passed the ball predictably one direction, and found themselves bottled up and slower to the breakdown than their opponents. New Zealand got a penalty, and then won the ball to kick it into touch to end the game, 5-0.

As far as hard, hard work, and defense goes, this was an excellent showing for the USA - so good that now two wins on Monday and 5th place is a legitimate expectation. But on attack they have showed little flexibility, and the habit of dropping the ball in contact, and when contact is nowhere near, killed them.

The USA will play Fiji in the consolation semis. Australia, Canada, Great Britain, and New Zealand now are in a fight for the medals.

Here is how the quarterfinals went and how Monday shapes up:

Sunday scores

9th place semis:

Brazil 24 Colombia 0

Japan 24 Kenya 0

Medal Quarterfinals:

Australia 24 Spain 0

Canada 15 France 5

Great Britain 26 Fiji 7

New Zealand 5 USA 0

Monday Games - games start at 11:30am ET, 8:30am PT

11th/12th Kenya v Colombia

9th/10th Japan v Brazil

5th-place semis:

Spain v France

USA v Fiji

Semifinals:

Australia v Canada

Great Britain v New Zealand