Kyrie Irving threw a phenomenal late-game alley-oop to Durant to help put the game away, but the offense continues to be an issue.
Advertisement
France came back from a 16-point second-half deficit to pressure the high-priced collection of American talent in a 100-97 game, each team’s last Olympic group-phase match-up.
This is no aberration, folks. “While you’re approaching that winning the whole thing, you’re asked a whole bunch of other things”. They then beat Serbia and France each by just three, scoring at will but also getting burned by such novelties as backdoor cuts, give-and-gos, and extra passes to open men.
It was the USA’s 50th consecutive victory in a major worldwide FIBA event and 22nd consecutive Olympic victory.
The U.S. now sits and waits to find out their opponent for Wednesday’s quarterfinal.
Talk about a bad twofer: they don’t know this league and they don’t know each other. Team USA won by three points, with Serbia almost tying the game albeit a missed shot from Serbian guard, Bogdan Bogdanovic.
Durant was the Most Valuable Player of the 2010 FIBA Basketball World Cup when the Americans won the title and a gold medal victor two years later at the London Games. That dynamic has been painfully clear on the court, where communication errors are so often leading to defensive breakdowns and chemistry is tough to come by on the offensive end.
A comment afterwards from United States swingman Paul George was telling. But this is looking like the most disappointing team since 2004, and if they do get caught, it will be considered an outright disaster. With easily the most talented roster in the field, they have -2000 betting odds to win the gold, via Bovada.lv.
“We lack physical play and transition when we face USA”.
The good news for Team USA? You have to learn how to adjust.
George thinks it’ll be more of the same.
But the USA showed in 2004 that they can be upset if they make enough mistakes, and another close call could end up being the Americans’ last.
For the third time in as many games, the United States was good enough offensively to survive shooting themselves in the foot defensively.
Tom Thibodeau can’t be sleeping too well on that cruise ship they call home.
While the team has struggled, Kevin Durant instilled confidence heading into the quarterfinals of Group A action. The Americans previously tasted defeat in the semifinals of the 2006 FIBA World Championship against Greece and launched this streak on September 2, 2006, with a 96-81 victory over Argentina in the bronze-medal game in Japan. They knew they were assured of moving on but of probably not finishing better than third, behind the United States and Australia.
This is a bumpy road in Rio, but at least the Americans know Klay Thompson is finally along for the ride. Thompson has struggled for a majority of the tournament, but the United States needed someone to step up on Sunday, and Thompson did so.
Just fix all that and more, and maybe the blowouts they anticipated coming in may transpire after all.
Advertisement
“This isn’t a tournament that we’re going to just dominate”, Paul George said, via the Associated Press. “We’ve showed the last three games we can grind it out”. “If we get the gold medal, that?s all that really matters”, said Klay, who finished 9-for-16 from the field.
