(Submitted/Paige Crozon)

By Ben Tompkins

FIBA 3x3

Crozon, Canada claim bronze at 2025 World Cup

Jul 7, 2025 | 5:24 PM

The 2025 FIBA 3×3 World Cup was held in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, recently, and the new-look Canadian Women’s squad, featuring Humboldt native Paige Crozon, brought home a bronze medal.

The third-place finish at the biggest and arguably most important tournament of this year’s 3×3 season capped off a multi-week stay in Mongolia for the Canucks, as it followed a Women’s Series stop, also in Ulaanbaatar.

“I’m really glad that we had the women’s series before the World Cup because it was great preparation. Obviously, you can have training camps and have exhibition games, but nothing quite prepares you like being on the court in a competitive atmosphere. That was our very first time playing with this combination of four players, so it allowed us to really grow and try a few things, improve upon a few things, and then have a few days to sit back, reflect, and talk about what worked and what didn’t work,” Crozon told northeastNOW.

“I think just the level of competition at the World Cup goes to show that the combination worked. We won bronze, however, I think there’s even more potential for us to get better. So much of it is just the trust that is built from playing with each other over a course of years, and then the chemistry that is built understanding each other’s nuances and kind of tendencies. I’m just really excited for kind of the future of this group.”

Normally, Crozon and long-time teammate Kacie Bosch are alongside the Plouffe twins, Katherine and Michelle.

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According to Crozon, although the two haven’t announced anything regarding retirement, they have indicated that the number of competitions will be less than usual.

Without the Plouffes, Canada placed fifth in the women’s series, losing to the eventual champions, Team Australia, 20-16 in the quarter-finals.

At the World Cup, the Red and White claimed bronze with a dominant 21-9 win over Team Poland, following a 21-15 loss to the eventual champion, Team Netherlands, in the semi-finals.

“Something that was really positive with our team is that we got better every single game. We got better in crucial moments, obviously winning the quarter finals against Spain by one point in a very hard-fought defensive battle, and then in the semi-finals, we matched up against the Netherlands,” Crozon added.

Both teams have experience playing together and that showed in the one-point game differential until the last three minutes when their opponent ran up five points to hit 21.

“Sometimes that’s just the way 3×3 goes, teams make shots or they get on a hot streak, and that’s what happened in that game,” Crozon said.

With only one hour to recover before the bronze medal match, she said she was happy the team could keep their heads in the game.

“3×3 is so emotional, and you have to go from losing a semi-final into preparing for a bronze medal game, 60 minutes later, and we were able to do that and not lose confidence and not be discouraged,” she said.

The team played their strategy as best they could and focussed on asserting their dominance.

“I thought we came out so strong in the bronze medal game, and from the beginning, just wanted to kind of assert our dominance and play to our strengths, which is something that we had been kind of discovering and uncovering throughout the tournament. I thought we were just confident, prepared, had a lot of fun, and played with joy in that last game,” Crozon said.

The Canadians will now come off the World Cup Bronze with a handful of stops left on the women’s series season, including one in Edmonton, Alta., in early August before wrapping up the season in Shanghai, China, in mid-September.

Crozon said the World Cup runs second in line to the Olympics in terms of level of importance and competition; however, her team always tries to bring their best to every tournament, no matter the stakes.

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Ben.Tompkins@pattisonmedia.com

On X @BenTompkins_8