Team USA Basketball

[redst3]

Team USA looks pretty good running the floor tonight in beating Turkey. The players seem to be pretty intense for a change and taking things seriously. Looking good!

[xfl2001fan]

I wasn't sold. I saw a lot of stuff that better teams like Spain, Greece and Argentina would exploit.

I'm looking forward to watching the Lithuania game to see what they worked on. Unfortunately, I accidentally saw the end result of the game on ESPN (tried to avoid it til after I watched it.)

[revefsreleets]

If you have Kobe and LeBron, you should and would and can and will just outscore all your opponents.

[xfl2001fan]

Kobe's defensive focus is going to help, but the American's haven't (in the past) adjusted to FIBA rules and play stye very well. When's the last time they won a Gold medal? Think about how many NBA players have played for us. Yes, there are a few players on the various European team, but the rest of those guys are people who know which role to play.

That's what the American team needs. A couple of Superstars alone won't win you the game. We have struggled to beat the zone and struggled with defending the Pick and Roll.

Right now, I've seen some weak teams that could hang with us for a quarter or so...and make an occasional push to play, but haven't been deep enough to keep up. Spain, Greece and a few other teams are much deeper and will give us much bigger fits than some of these JV teams have been.

[revefsreleets]

I doubt it...not this time. Lithuania was ranked, what? 5th in the World? The US destroyed them. Krzuzewski has these cats respecting their opponents, and it'll show. They'll be challenged, but they won't lose a game.

[xfl2001fan]

I hope you're right. But we do have more challenging opponents ahead of us that are more than capable of beating us than Lithuania.

With that being said, I am going to watch the game against Lithuania to see how we actually play. I want to see how they react to zone defenses and pressure defenses and such.

There were some pretty sloppy stretches against Turkey that didn't give me a warm fuzzy. I'm hoping that the sloppiness will be rectified by the time we actually get to Beijing.

[revefsreleets]

I'll grant you this: Teamwork will always trump raw talent. LJ's junior year at StV/StM, the team they played in the state finals had nothing to stop him, but they played solid team ball, good defense, and the undisciplined Irish lost the game. They were outcoached as well.

But that was 1 versus 5. The NBA is becoming a more disciplined league because of the infusion of European players and their value of teamwork (assists, playing D, hustle)...and it will pay dividends this year.

[xfl2001fan]

Yeah, they certainly have a better set of team values this year than in years past.

I like that Kobe has asked to be a defensive stopper and that Kidd has no problem taking 0 shots in a game. That's the kind of stuff we need.

This isn't even close to being the same competition that "The Dream Team" faced in the early 90's. I think they would have been in for a rude awakening if they came into the games thinking they'd skate through each team. The rest of the World is beginning to catch up to the US in terms of talent and (it seems like) they have a much better grasp of team/individual fundamentals.

[xfl2001fan]

This just bites, my cable provider is not showing the game today. I've got to work tomorrow, so I won't be able to watch the game when it's being shown in the A.M.

[fansince'76]

Originally Posted by xfl2001fan

This isn't even close to being the same competition that "The Dream Team" faced in the early 90's. I think they would have been in for a rude awakening if they came into the games thinking they'd skate through each team. The rest of the World is beginning to catch up to the US in terms of talent and (it seems like) they have a much better grasp of team/individual fundamentals.

Agreed, but by the same token, the Dream Team had Jordan, Magic and Bird, and those three alone made the Dream Team light years better than what we have now. The rest of the world has gotten better at the game by leaps and bounds, and at the same time, our national team has regressed since then. I for one don't think Olympic gold is a lock this year either, even with Kobe and LeBron - if they go out and play fundamentally unsound (i.e. miss about 1,000 free throws and not bother playing D) again, they'll wind up getting beat by someone like Argentina.