Did Australia sandbag? Is Australia, which beat medal-favorite France by 21, the second-best team in Rio?
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They battled for rebounds, fought over loose balls. However, unlike Anthony, Schmidt did not have to compete with loads of big name players for minutes on the court. This U.S. team – even without LeBron James, Steph Curry, Russell Westbrook, Chris Paul, Anthony Davis – is not more vulnerable than the 2008 or 2012 teams. “We’re not afraid of anyone”.
“We lost. We’re not going to take small moral victories”.
A masterclass late in the fourth quarter from the Americans’ most experienced player turned a two-point deficit into a scarily close 98-88 victory for the USA – their 18th straight at an Olympics.
An enraged Krzyzewski screamed at an official after Andrew Bogut’s hard foul on Irving just in front of the USA bench in the third quarter, his face looking as red as the shirts the coaching staff wore. There’s a reason why he’s been doing this for many years. “This game kind of got out of hand with the chippy, physical play”. Australia managed to reclaim the lead and were ahead in the fourth quarter before Anthony connected on two three-pointers in the space of 26 seconds, the second which gave the U.S. a 78-74 lead. The four-time Olympian finished with a game-high 31 points.
“The best thing is, we won”.
The threat to the USA basketball reign is real and it’s Australian.
Australian teams are 0-19 against the USA, but the full-game test they posed may fuel belief among other teams that the U.S. squad can be threatened and perhaps denied a third consecutive gold medal. In fact, Australia took back the lead.
“I got beat up a few times”, Aussie center David Andersen said. “One is the streak is over”.
The Americans did not shoot well in the first half and trailed for significant stretches in the game.
With 14 points in the first half of the United States’ third game of the 2016 Olympics, Carmelo Anthony became the United States’ all-time leading scorer with points 276. Afterward, nearly everyone connected to the US program tried to take a positive out of it, saying a close game will prove good for the team as it chases the gold.
Against a fiercely competitive Australian crew, Anthony had to make history in order to save Team USA.
See you in the gold medal game I guess? Ultimately, the Americans were able to keep their title as the reigning Olympic champions.
The Australians gave the US plenty to think about in its next practice session. The Australians had more turnovers than the Americans – 16 as compared to nine.
“Not tonight”, he said.
“The United States played on cruise control Wednesday, running an uninspired – often static – one-pass-at-best offense and a lazy defensive scheme that the Australians had no problem carving up with backdoor cuts”, Kurtenbach wrote.
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Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Aug 10 (efe_epa).
