well that was about the most awful 5 minutes of offensive basketball i've ever seen from team USA. the turnovers and shot selection were unbelievable. rose can't dribble, durant can't not travel, billups can't stop shooting 3's, odom tries to drive baseline with no where to go, just pathetic. and then the great rebounding on that last free throw, didn't even try. maybe they can actually pretend they've played basketball before in the medal round.
Has Igoudala looked this bad the whole tournament? I don't understand why Coach K kept him in the game.
certainly every time i notice he's on the court it's because he's just done something terrible on offense. he doesn't have any handles to use his quickness, he doesn't have a shot to spread the floor and twice today he picked up his dribble and instead of finding someone to pass it to, just simply threw it to a brazilian player so he could just get rid of the ball, one time just giving brazil a layup. and i completely forgot in the 4th quarter, rose leading a fastbreak and throwing about an 8 foot high alley-oop to no one that got stolen, billups getting a back door pass for a layup and then blowing the layup, and odom making a beautiful spin move on splitter and then promptly blowing a point blank layup. every time it seemed we had a chance to extend the lead, either we committed an unforced turnover, blew a layup, or brazil hit a 3. a seriously frustrating game to watch. the point guards were far from impressive today.
Pretty much sums up the game. The fact that Brazil shot under 30 percent in the 2nd half and we barely won pretty says everything anyone needs to know who didn't watch the game. I don't get why Coach K refused to make any substitutions in the 4th quarter.
finally a good game for brazil I thought we had NO chance at all, but in the end we almost won. The Fiba rules really expose some of usa failures, and quite frankly the way the game is played really exposes players that benefit form tick-tack fouls and that travel all the time, much better flow to the game, less fouls and the descion to play the defense you want. Well off course USA is the most talented team out there, but they look like a bunch of individuals with no plays to follow.
I think they are a bunch of individuals with no playbook. Or there's one but they just dont pay much attention and don't remember anything.
Just watched USA vs. Brazil. 1. Team USA's offense was atrocious the entire game and was bailed out by KD's domination the first three quarters. 2. Their defense against PnRs was pathetic. Rec league defense with very little focus. 3. The lack of focus on both ends of the floor blew me away. They were not mentally prepared to play well against a legit opponent. Perhaps that can be blamed on having two very easy games and too many youngsters. 4. KD was gassed the entire 4th quarter. With him unable to carry the load, Team USA's "offense" crashed. If KD had an off-game, Brazil would have won. 5. Brazil's entire team was also on fumes in the 4th, which is what saved Team USA's bacon. 6. Very disappointing only 4 players showed up: KD, Billups, Rose and Odom. Iggy was a joke and the bench gave them nothing. 7. When heavy pressure is on people, teams, organizations, etc, they revert to their "comfort zones". The comfort zones for Team USA are isolation on offense and lazy, gambling on defense. They want to hit home runs instead of playing steady, methodical basketball. 8. This game was the proverbial "wake-up call" and should knock the wind of overconfidence out of them. I expect them to medal, but they won't with a repeat performance of today in the elimination rounds. That said, I don't expect them to play this poorly again.
They've been having issues with that during the entire tournament. It comes and goes. Kinda frustrating.
that was just bad decision making brazil in that position, you have to take the 3 at the end of the game......what's your best chance of winning? A) get off a 3 and make it or B) go for 2.......actually make it, then outscore the US in the next 5 min or however long overtime is A by far.
Tiago Splitter is the real deal out there he seemed to outplay odom..parker and ginboili could have a field day on pick and rolls with him
Australia thrash Germany 78:43 Germany where outplayed the whole game good to see Australia doing more then just competing
thought this was worth a gander..from the New Zealand/Spain Game <object width="640" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/zwI5oeev_tM&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xd0d0d0&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/zwI5oeev_tM&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xd0d0d0&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" width="640" height="385"></embed></object> i don't even care much for Rudy Fernandez, but that was purddddy sick.
Interesting results today. Barring any more upsets Spain are likely to be 3rd in Group D. They face either Russia or Greece in the round of 16. Should they advance to the quarters they'll face USA. For Greece or Russia the best position for them now is to finish fourth in Group C but they'd risk being eliminated in the group stages trying to place themselves in that position. Should both advance to the quarters their likely opponents are either Argentina or USA.
You can watch the replay on ESPN3.com. They have the full game on there. I watched the 4th qtr just to see how Spain gave up such a huge lead.
