I'm not saying they had any real chance of winning; I'm saying they didn't really try. That's too bad. But it was great to get my first real look at Scola. Can't wait to see him with the Rockets.
Perhaps you should tell this to FIBA, because according to FIBA world rankings, the US is the number one team in the world - prior to this week's tournament. http://www.fiba.com/pages/eng/fc/even/rank/p/openNodeIDs/943/selNodeID/943/rankMen.html The second best team is Argentina. In their last meeting prior to tonight, the US defeated a full-strength Argentina squad by 15 points in Tokyo last summer.
It looks like Argentina rested Scola for the Brazil game. I don't blame them, they just need to beat Brazil to qualify for Beijing. It'll be a good full Argentina squad when they get their 4 regular NBA starters back.
Walton has pointed out several times that the other teams aren't as deep as the U.S. and their stars have a heavier load to carry and have to log more minutes night in and night out. He probably needed the rest. Look on the bright side, Scola on the bench makes it less likely for him to suffer a fluke injury and miss the season.
They did try. Scola picked up 3 fouls early on and had to sit in the 2nd period. it didn't matter because Argentina could get no closer than 20-30 no matter who was on the court, save for the last 5 minutes when the US gave up and it was clear garbage.
Somebody asked who the best team in the world is. If the US isn't the best team, why are they ranked number one? Are you telling me that a crappy spanish team without Pau Gasol is the best team in the world?
I was very impressed with Scola against the USA. I am excited about him coming to the Rockets and I think he is NBA ready after seeing his performance against Team USA.
although scola got in foul trouble (2 calls were very questionable), he still played a really good game with his post up moves on howard and good passing from the high post to the box. he is going to be a good player for the rockets.
The US team bigs are terrible. Absolutely terrible. Don't know how to position themselfs at all, no mid-range jumper either. So they are athletic and that is all. I would love to see them against Spain. gasol would have his way with this guys, with Marc Gargajosa and the rest of the Spaniards helping out. Spain, Argentina, Greece, Italy. They all can beat the US any given night. Btw the reason the US is not allowed to make the excuse of not having their A team is that they say they can dominate the rest of the world. So if your A team can dominate your B team should at least win. So if Argentina say they can beat the US any given night, then the B team should have a decent performance and don't get run off the gym.
scola is definately nba ready..and with adelman's system he will flourish. Defense is another story that isnt so clear cut as to wats going to happen..only time will tell
lol That ranking is made with the results of under 19 competitions too... it means nothing... And of course you beated us last year. But you were third in the World Championships. Spain is the World Champion.
Lets talk international organizations rankings. The Us soccer team was rank 8th prior the 2006 World Cup, and we know what happened after that.
You didn't watch the game, Scola was good but Argentina was still getting beaten badly when he was on the court because their perimeter players could not stop Kobe/Lebron/Anthony. The run in the last five minutes was entirely after the game had been decided, after Jason Kidd was tossing Alley oops to LeBron off the top of the backboard, and when the Mike Millers of hte world were gettng their token appearance
