Team USA vs Team Argentina.

huevonkiller · Aug 23, 2008

Halftime:

We're only up by 9 points, and Manu Ginobili has missed most of the game. I believe 20 of USA's 33 fieldgoals have been Three pointers. Kind of annoying to watch, I wanted a blowout. We'll have to see what happens.

huevonkiller · Aug 22, 2008

US beats Argentina, shoots for gold Sunday

By BRIAN MAHONEY, AP Basketball Writer 18 minutes ago

BEIJING (AP)—The Olympic title is vacant once again. The climb back to the top of world basketball is almost over for the U.S. men’s team.

Friday night’s 101-81 U.S. victory over defending gold medalist Argentina was a last bit of sweet revenge for the U.S. men, who will face Spain in Sunday’s gold-medal game.

“We still have one more test to go, but I think our team is extremely confident,” point guard Chris Paul said.

It’s been a long march: eight years since their last gold medal in an international event; six years since their embarrassing loss at the world championships in Indianapolis—of all places; four years since the agony of Athens.

Now it’s down to one game, just 40 more minutes, against a Spanish team that holds the world championship title but was clobbered by the Americans by 37 points in pool play. Win again, and the U.S. will have its first gold in a major international event since the 2000 Olympics.

“We had a great game against them in pool play, but pool play does not win a gold medal,” U.S. coach Mike Krzyzewski said. “It just gets you into the medal round. We expect the same type of heart of a champion that we played against tonight in Argentina.”

The United States scored 21 of the first 25 points, and got a big break when Argentina star Manu Ginobili reinjured his left ankle. They pulled away in the second half of their toughest test yet.

Luis Scola scored 28 points for Argentina, which didn’t relinquish its title without a fight. Even without Ginobili for the final 31/2 quarters, the Argentines cut a 21-point lead into single digits and frustrated the Americans with their physical play. But they didn’t have enough depth or firepower without their best player.

“They were better than us, there’s nothing more to say,” Scola said. “They’ve been playing better than us the whole tournament. We have to say congratulations to them.”

Lithuania and Argentina will meet Sunday for the bronze. Spain beat Lithuania 91-86 in the first semifinal.

What followed the United States’ last gold was a frustrating and embarrassing stretch in which the Americans couldn’t even make the podium in the 2002 world championships, then managed only bronze medals after losing in the semis of the 2004 Athens Games and ‘06 worlds.

Carmelo Anthony and LeBron James were part of those bronze busts, and vowed they’d leave China with gold. Anthony scored 21 points against Argentina, and James added 15, 13 in the second half.

“It’s a great feeling right now,” Anthony said. “I’m going to try to sleep the rest of these couple of hours that we have and get ready for that game on Sunday. I can’t wait.”

When the Americans fell from the top of world basketball, it was Argentina as much as anyone who took their place—and hastened their fall. The Argentines, with Ginobili’s flair and Scola’s force, won gold in 2004 and silver in the 2002 world championships, beating the United States in both tournaments. The victory in Indianapolis was the first time a U.S. team lost with NBA players.

They knocked off the Americans again four years ago in the semis, and Kobe Bryant said two nights ago he wanted to face Argentina in this round.

Now Argentina’s time has passed. The Americans want their spot back.

The U.S. lead was already 10 points when Ginobili, who came in leading the tournament with 20.3 points per game, went down in a play away from the ball. He limped to the sideline and took off his left sneaker after reinjuring the same ankle that slowed him so badly in the NBA Western Conference finals.
BEIJING - AUGUST 22: LeBron James #6 of the U.S. Men's Senior National team drives against Argentina during the men's semifinals basketball game at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics on August 22, 2008 at the Olympic Basketball Gymnasium in Beijing, China. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and/or using this Photograph, user is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. Mandatory Copyright Notice: Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE via Getty Images)
BEIJING - AUGUST 22: LeBron Ja…
Getty Images - Aug 22, 12:17 pm EDT

He soon retreated to the back, a crushing blow for a team that already had to deal with an injury that kept Andres Nocioni from being at full speed.

“It’s hard,” Scola said of Ginobili’s injury. “You want to play, you want to win, all of a sudden you find out all of the hard work you did is going into the trash.”

The Americans extended the lead to 21-4 and were up by 21 early in the second quarter. But they went ice cold against Argentina’s zone, committed some silly fouls that gave away free points at the line, and saw the lead trimmed all the way down to 46-40 on a basket by Scola in the final minute of the half.

“We had an amazing first quarter, and then second quarter we started fouling too much,” Paul said. “They slowed the game down by free throws and that was our own fault.”

James wasn’t with his teammates when the starting lineups were announced, having to sprint out from the back after his name was called. Then he was curiously absent in the first half, managing only two points.

He scored five quick ones in the third quarter, teaming with Dwight Howard to help the Americans break it open again. Anthony got mixed up in some chippy play with Scola and Nocioni, but kept his poise and scored eight points in the period.

“They wanted to play physical, we played physical with them and I think we beat them at their own game tonight,” Anthony said.

James hit two quick 3-pointers in the fourth to extend the lead to 84-66, and it wasn’t in doubt again.

And for the most part, this Olympic tournament hasn’t, either.

Bryant, Dwyane Wade and Paul each had 12 points for the Americans. Carlos Delfino scored 17 for Argentina.
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Source: Associated Press

That was the more horrific second quarter I've seen the whole tournament. Thankfully we only took about half as many three-pointers in the second half.

huevonkiller · Aug 23, 2008

Behind the box score, where they slayed the powder blue dragon

By Kelly Dwyer

Team USA 101, Argentina 81

As someone with a rather large version of Old Glory hanging in his living room, this was a satisfying win.

As a basketball freak with a rather large stash of Manu Ginobili's greatest hits on disc not too far from where the flag hangs, this game left me wanting.

And, as someone who knows that Team USA's defense was going to be the biggest key entering the Olympics, this game left me pretty confident.

Whether you can't stand Coach Mike Krzyzewski, or can't stand him (really, there's no other choice. Name me one person outside of Durham that can stand him), you can't tell me that this team hasn't been prepped properly. It's an incredibly sharp contrast to 2006, when Coach K couldn't even tell you the names of the players that he failed to scout.

Team USA held Argentina at Kevin Willis' arm's length for most of the game, with "most of the game" being played without Manu Ginobili, and in the face of an Argentinean zone that - let's call it - more or less flummoxed Team USA's offense over the last three quarters.

This matters, you kind of need to score at an efficient rate to be good at winnin' all the basketball, but it should be a passable mitigating factor if Team USA continues its newfound defensive streak. Sure, Coach K didn't really have his team ready for that zone, not surprising because Argentina hadn't played a minute of it during Olympic play thus far, but he did have his team stoic and measured and ready when it came to keeping tabs on the five on the floor on and off the ball.

Seven assists on 30 field goals for Argentina, coming off a 2002 and 2004 Olympic effort that, if memory serves, saw them garnering assists on 99 percent of the team's made baskets. The spacing and passing and eventual finishing in those runs ... it was that good. And it wasn't there, today.

Ginobili limped to the bench in the first quarter, which hurt (and if he's not ready by October, this will be a depressing autumn, even by autumnal standards), inefficient chuckers like Carlos Delfino and Andres Nocioni (though he only took four shots, it felt like twice as much) had to try and fill his shoes, and the result was an 81-point outing.

Offensively, I'm not going to give you the usual, "you can't bank on shooting contested threes, even if half of them go in"-rant, because I've more or less given up with this generation and their iPods and Mandarin tattoos and their love of the three-pointer.

Team USA pulled away by moving the ball and going inside (Chris Bosh had a double-double with 11 and 11, Dwight Howard nearly had one as well, getting early position and lording over the smallish Argentina front line), and any time the ball went up from long range, you knew it was a bum play even if the multicolored rock swished through. 10-31 from behind the arc, 30 points on 31 possessions, not good.

Kobe Bryant was the main culprit, missing seven of nine from behind the arc on his way to only 12 points on 14 shots. And though LeBron James wasn't as trigger-happy (six attempts, three makes), his choices from behind the arc left a little to be desired. Even if half the looks went in. James hit on 6-11 overall, which dwarves Carmelo Anthony's 3-14 mark until you remember all that time Anthony spent at the free throw line. 13 attempts (making all 13)! What is this, the NBA?

It isn't. There was a decidedly international bent to this game, which was the reason Argentina stormed back after taking an early deficit, and it's probably why Kobe was so annoyed at Carlos Delfino. But it was NBA'ish enough for Team USA to pull away, and it should be NBA'ish enough for Team USA to down Spain on Sunday morning in the gold medal round.

This wasn't exactly a triumphant, uh, triumph. Beating Argentina without its best player, having no real consistent answer for the zone, being annoyed with Carlos Delfino, things could have been tidier. But it was a win. And it's late August, Team USA just beat its toughest opponent, and it's probably time to count blessings. For all the talent, all-star teams should not play this well, but somehow Team USA pulled it off.

I am getting ahead of myself. Spain is the most talented team in the Olympic bracket outside of the US, and it is replete with players who have been playing alongside each other for over a decade. Throw in the familiarity factor, and Team USA is going to have a tough time grabbing that gold on Sunday, even if they win by 30.

But for now, this was satisfying enough. Maybe these players learned how to defend this sort of international style on the NBA stage, the game is leaning in that direction after years of screen and roll orthodoxy, and maybe Coach K had nothing to do with it. Maybe this is a pointless bit of analysis because Manu missed most of the game. Maybe it was a one-game sample size, hardly worth banking on, and Argentina would fare much better with a zone that lasted an entire game. Maybe we've learned nothing.

Those are questions worth going over. Until then, we do have an answer when it comes to a more pressing query.

Team USA won. Team USA beat Argentina. Jingoism aside, and I'm being completely honest, this was satisfying just knowing that the most talented team in the land is starting to rely on something beyond pure skill. The effort has always been there, even in the losses from 2002, 2004, and 2006. It was the mindset that was off. And you can't be surprised or upset at that, because the international game is decidedly different from what you see on League Pass from October until June.

And for those of us who died a little inside when Argentina left a group of NBA All-Stars looking like remedial cases back in 2002, this helps. Roll over, George Karl, tell Paul Pierce the news.
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Source: Yahoo! Sports

DennisRodman · Aug 23, 2008

The US basketball team has so few good 3 point shooters, Chris Paul, JKidd, Wade, and Melo aren't very good 3 point shooters. Lebron is ok, Kobe is ok. It seems they need to add a Ray Allen, Vince Carter, Steve Nash (if he wasn`t Canadian).

As well obviously, they could use another center, whether it be Tim Duncan or Shaq.

A Manu Ginobli-less Argentina team shouldn't be able to give the US team fits.

I mean if the Houston Rockets traded away Yao and Tmac and got Nocioni and Delfino, you would expect the Cavs with Chris Paul, Lebron, Kobe, Bosh, and Dwight to be in a league above a team with it's best players: Nocioni, Delfino, and Luis Scola.

#1_War_Poet_ForLife · Aug 23, 2008

Melo isn't a very good shooter, but LeBron is okay?

Timmy and Shaq wouldn't do as well in the FIBA game, compared to their NBA games.

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