zatoicchi
09.08.08, 10:27
Team USA enters the Olympics as gold-medal favorites, but still trailed by a handful of questions that need answering.
1. Does Team USA know who it is playing?
In an embarrassing spectacle, Team USA lost to Greece at the 2006 World Championships, partially because it treated guard Vasileios Spanoulis as if he were the second coming of Mark Price and mainly because Spanoulis made his first three-pointer of the game.
Although Spanoulis would go on to make two more from long range (one a lucky banked-in three-pointer), Team USA’s aggressive perimeter play on the poor-shooting guard allowed for all sorts of back cuts and easy interior looks for the rest of the Greek team.
Even those with a passing knowledge of international basketball could tell you that V-Span (who missed 24 of 29 three-point attempts for the Houston Rockets in the NBA the next season) was hardly a perimeter threat. But because Team USA hadn’t bothered to read or listen to a scouting report, he was hounded at the three-point line, which allowed for layup after layup in the second half. U.S. guard Kirk Hinrich even fouled Spanoulis on one three-point attempt, handing him three cheap free throws.
Five questions for Team USA (http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/basketball/news?slug=ys-teamusaquestions080808&prov=yhoo&type=lgns)
1. Does Team USA know who it is playing?
In an embarrassing spectacle, Team USA lost to Greece at the 2006 World Championships, partially because it treated guard Vasileios Spanoulis as if he were the second coming of Mark Price and mainly because Spanoulis made his first three-pointer of the game.
Although Spanoulis would go on to make two more from long range (one a lucky banked-in three-pointer), Team USA’s aggressive perimeter play on the poor-shooting guard allowed for all sorts of back cuts and easy interior looks for the rest of the Greek team.
Even those with a passing knowledge of international basketball could tell you that V-Span (who missed 24 of 29 three-point attempts for the Houston Rockets in the NBA the next season) was hardly a perimeter threat. But because Team USA hadn’t bothered to read or listen to a scouting report, he was hounded at the three-point line, which allowed for layup after layup in the second half. U.S. guard Kirk Hinrich even fouled Spanoulis on one three-point attempt, handing him three cheap free throws.
Five questions for Team USA (http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/basketball/news?slug=ys-teamusaquestions080808&prov=yhoo&type=lgns)