Beijing - The United States boxing team bid adieu to the Beijing Olympics Friday with two days to spare as the country's last surviving boxer, heavyweight Deontay Wilder, suffered a one-sided defeat at the hands of Italian world champion Clemente Russo. Wilder's tame 7-1 semi-final exit, where he rarely threw a punch and scored his only point with 15 seconds remaining in the final round, seemed the appropriate finale to a desperate Games for the once proud boxing nation.
Having achieved just one gold medal in the past two Olympics, this US team travelled to Beijing looking to restore some pride in American boxing. Instead, they go home with just Wilder's bronze, beating the country's previous worst-ever showing of a single silver medal, set in 1948.
The US failed to medal in 1908, when it did not send a boxing team to London Games, and 1980, when it boycotted the Moscow Olympics.
"He was the strongest, I couldn't have done more," said last-man- standing Wilder of his fight with the wily Russo.
At least the 22-year-old could be proud of reaching this far, considering he only took up the sport three years ago, but he admitted that the overall performance of the US team hurt.
"I'm happy to have got a decent amount of experience and to have got a medal but overall I'm not happy," he said. "My expectation was for all of us to medal."
When asked what gold medal tally he realistically expected from his teammates he replied: "At least about four or five."
The US came nowhere near that target. Instead of meeting such high expectations, mediocrity and disquiet has plagued the US team.
Light flyweight Luis Yazell crashed out in the round of 16 to Mongolia's Serdamba Purevdorj with US team coach Dan Campbell berating his fighter for not doing what he was being told to do by his corner.
Middleweight Shawn Estrada also fell at this stage, going down to eventual finalist James DeGale. Featherweight Raynell Williams lost to France's Khedafi Djelkhir, another man to subsequently progress all the way.
Flyweight Warren Rau'shee fared even worse, the 2007 world champion bizarrely losing to South Korea9s Oksung Lee when he did not even attempt to land punches that he would have needed to win. The confused 22-year-old, a gold medal favourite, thought he was in front but ended up losing 9-8 to record a second straight first-round exit at an Olympics.
Sadam Ali also made a first-round exit, going down 20-5 to Romania9s Georgian Popescu, as did Javier Molina, who lost 14-1 to Bulgaria's Boris Georgiev after fighting with a hole in his lung.
At least reigning world welterweight champion Demetrius Andrade made it to the quarter-finals but he lost 11-9 to South Korean fighter Park Si-Hun.
Russo then extinguished any hopes the US had that the inexperienced Wilder might salvage some much-needed pride by making it to the final.
"You have got to accept life sometimes," said Wilder.
"Things happen. You have got your bad days, you have got your good days. Unfortunately it wasn't successful for us."
