U.S. edges China for most golds at Tokyo Olympics; also first in overall medals

The U.S. Olympic team finished atop the gold-medal standings at the Tokyo Olympics with 39 as the Americans edged past China on the final day of action.

Team USA’s 39 golds surpasses the totals it managed at five of the previous eight Summer Games and marks the 11th-most golds it has won at a Summer Olympics.

The USA also topped the standings at Tokyo 2020 for the most overall medals with 113 (41 silver and 33 bronze), making this the Americans’ second-most-successful Olympics since Los Angeles in 1984. (They won 121 at the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro.)

Host Japan finished in third place with 27 gold medals, while Great Britain was fourth (22). The U.S.’s 113 total medals were 25 ahead of China, with the ROC in third at 71 and Great Britain in fourth with 65.

Team USA headed into the final day of action at the Olympics two golds behind China, which had 38. The Americans’ 37th and 38th golds came within minutes of each other as Jennifer Valente won the women’s omnium in the velodrome, while the dominant women’s basketball team secured its seventh straight gold with a 90-75 win over host Japan.

With the curtain coming down on the Games, Team USA was locked at 38 golds with China and had three opportunities left to reach the top, while China had one final event.

The first of the Americans’ three chances saw Keyshawn Davis fight Cuba’s Andy Cruz in the men’s lightweight boxing final. But that went the way of Cuba as Cruz took a split-decision win. The U.S. women’s volleyball team defeated Brazil in straight sets for America’s 39th gold.

China at this stage had one final opportunity to win its last gold to tie the U.S., with Li Qian taking on Great Britain’s Lauren Price for the women’s middleweight category. But Price came through to comfortably take gold, winning on a unanimous points decision.

The U.S. had one last chance to add to its tally through Richard Torrez Jr. in his super heavyweight bout against Uzbekistan’s Bakhodir Jalolov, but Jalolov won on unanimous points, leaving Torrez with silver.