pick and roll! Pick and ROLL! Coach K could not find a defensive set to stop the PICK AND ROLL! Greece used that play all NIGHT!!
i watched the replay of the game a couple of hours ago. that was ugly. and trench said it, pick and roll. we couldnt stop them. a couple things to work on for 2008: defense against pick and roll, free throws, better understanding of int'l play, better shot selection, and more aggressive defense.
Well if US would of won, then tournoment would be way to boring Before the tournoment i tought that only Spain will be able to chalange US, but i underastamated greeks a bit... Well it will be fun to see what will hapen in 2 years. And i hope that teamUSA will finaly drop the arrogance and take international basketball seriously, learn to play team basketball, learn the interantional rullebook, not just add Kobe and Amare to mix and stop there... I realy don't see problems with US roster, in fact i think that the main problem, that u ppl think that roster is not right and it has to be changed, you could add Shaq,Duncan,KG,Amare,Kobe,Kidd to the mix, but i doubt that outcome this time would of been diferent. Team USA had all the talent in the world as it is now, just need shape it into team.
USA played good, but not good enough. But it looks like the rest of the world is catching up which means U.S. needs to step their game up. Its ok if they lose, everyone loses once in a while. You cant expect them to win all the times. Also, like all others said, U.S. did a bad job on picking up their pick & rolls. That is what cost them a lot. U.S. will bounce back from this loss.
USA is still lacking some experience the ages of the tri-captains goes like this: 21,22,24. Those are some really young team captains give it another couple years and all those guys including the howards and bosh's will be near their prime and more experienced.
<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> Has the world caught up from a talent perspective? I don't think so. I think that international ball focuses on team basketball as opposed to individual statistics. LeBron was labeled the disciple of Christ before he even led his team to the playoffs. Chris Bosh signed a 80 million dollar contract when his team won 27 games last season. Financial security in the US is predicated on stats where in Europe true recognition comes with winning. Do you think that Coach K started scouting international opponents when he found out that he was named the coach of this team? If he would have he would have known not to play the pick and roll the same way the entire game against Greece. </div> Very good points in that portion and an excellent post overall. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> But it looks like the rest of the world is catching up </div> The world has already caught up. The fact that the U.S has not won gold since 2000 kind of says something. That's 2 FIBA competitions without a gold and a summer olympic without one. 4 years already and looks like 2008 will be a struggle for them as well. American players have absolutely nothing to be arrogant about at this point and time. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> Its ok if they lose, everyone loses once in a while. You cant expect them to win all the times </div> What? This is for world competition, pride and a medal. It's not even guaranteed they'll win bronze...the U.S.A team came in this competition to win gold, anything less is considered by them and thier fans, a disappointment. In fact, the whole reason why USa is covered in the whole "arrogance" light is because everyone considers them favourites. The fact that they have failed to win since 2000 says to me that they have nothing to be cocky about at all.
30 min left to the bronze match... this will be interesting. What conclusion have Argentine drawn from USA vs Greece? Even more interesting... have coach K watched the game again and drawn some conclusions?
it doesn't matter what Arenas thinks, this team didn't win without him, and wouldn't have won with him.
We would've won had we utilized our big men. I don't want to put all the blame on Coach K, but playing your bigs for only 30 minutes (Brad Miller didn't even play) is a bit disturbing to me. At least we beat Argentina for the Bronze.
This is of course a disaster for USA basketball, but don't forget that this team is designed to win a gold medal at the olympics, not the FIBA World Chapionship.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting kobe4life:</div><div class="quote_post">USA needs Kobe, end of story</div> Well if someone as knowledgeable and experienced in coaching as you says it, then it must be true.
It's just mathematics dude. Cobe going one on five against a good team defence in international play will finish with 45-50% shooting. Five really good team players will get more open looks and easier shots and will finish with 50-60% shooting.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Dudikowski:</div><div class="quote_post">It's just mathematics dude. Cobe going one on five against a good team defence in international play will finish with 45-50% shooting. Five really good team players will get more open looks and easier shots and will finish with 50-60% shooting.</div> What are you talking about? This is far from math. Hilarious.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Dudikowski:</div><div class="quote_post">It's just mathematics dude. Cobe going one on five against a good team defence in international play will finish with 45-50% shooting. Five really good team players will get more open looks and easier shots and will finish with 50-60% shooting.</div> This has to be one of the funniest posts I've read here in a long time.
Kobe is the only last star caliber player that hadn't wear a USA jersey yet. Maybe when he actually wears them, hopefully it will changes the fate of team USA and bring back the gold. Maybe it's a curse, when Kobe didn't play, we lost?
Did you guys see the stats that I posted on the 1st page? Despite Brad Miller only playing in half of the games, I still added his shots in as if he played in all 8 games and we shot 25 3's and our 5 big guys combined for 21 shots. YOU WILL NOT WIN LIKE THAT. I know Dwight Howard isn't that great offensively yet, but you still have the Chris Bosh's and Elton Brand's and Antawn Jamison's that will score and the Brad Miller's that will be able to find the open man and get better ball movement. I don't know if I'm the only one that thinks about this, since I am a fan of Dwight Howard and not one of the "Big 3", so I want to see him do as good as he possibly can. You have a huge advantage having guys as big and as talented as our team has, and we never utilized it. Also the majoirty of Dwight's shots were because of offensive rebounds and I'm sure it was the same for Brand, Bosh, Jamison, and Miller too. We really need to learn how to get better ball movement, because one of the the first things you learn when you play basketball is that ball movement beats zones.
