Not exactly "Hoosiers", I take it.
Posted on 08/15/2004 12:50:40 PM PDT by wagglebee
ATHENS, Greece (AP) - In an upset as historic as it was inevitable, Tim Duncan, Allen Iverson and the rest of the U.S. basketball team lost 92-73 to Puerto Rico on Sunday, only the third Olympic defeat ever for the Americans.
It was also the most lopsided loss in the games for the U.S. team, alarming not only for its significance but also for its decisiveness.
Puerto Rico, which had lost to the Americans five times in the past 13 months, took control in the first half, led by 22 at halftime and gamely held off a fourth-quarter comeback for one of the biggest sports achievements in the island territory's history.
The loss was a blow to the Americans' confidence, but it did little to hurt their gold medal chances. They need only to finish in the top four of their six-team group to reach the quarterfinals.
Still, the defeat will go a long way toward giving the competition the bold idea that it's someone else's turn to move to the top of a sport that's been dominated by one country for nearly three-quarters of a century.
As Carlos Arroyo left the court with just over a minute left, he defiantly pulled at the words "Puerto Rico" on his jersey. He led his team with 24 points.
Anyone in America who didn't see this coming hadn't been paying attention to the way international basketball has been changing. The U.S. nearly lost in the semifinals at Sydney on a last-second miss by Lithuania, then dropped three games on its home turf at the 2002 World Championships in Indianapolis - the first losses ever by a U.S. team of NBA professionals.
This year's team, weakened by the defections and rejections of 12 top players, opened its pre-Olympic tour of Europe with a 17-point loss to Italy and a last-second victory over Germany - a pair of games in which their vulnerability to a tight zone defense was clearly exposed.
Puerto Rico used that defensive strategy, too, and the Americans could do next to nothing against it.
After Lamar Odom made their first 3-pointer, the Americans missed 16 straight. They tried to get the ball inside, but Puerto Rico collapsed several defenders into the paint and took the U.S. team's best player, Duncan, out of the offensive equation.
American teams had been 24-0 since the professional Olympic era began with the 1992 Dream Team, but now there is a blemish on their record to go with their two losses to the Soviet Union in the 1972 gold medal game and the 1988 semifinals.
They handled the loss to Puerto Rico with grace, congratulating their opponents and joining them in a huddle at center court before both teams exited to a standing ovation.
The U.S Olympic team's record now stands at 109-3.
The loss reconfirms my not bothering to watch the NBA for the past many years. They lost me long ago. Once was a team sport, now it is gangsters and hotdoggers.
What are you? Some kind of trouble maker? (grin,wink)
They are not a dream team.
Who knows about the shooting though. Why USA Basketball did not bring a balanced team to this games is a real mystery. Most of the guys on the team are post up players who play with their back to the basket. Why there are not 3 or 4 shooters on this team who can hit the outside jump shot is beside me. One would probably have to look at the endorsement contracts to figure that one out.
I suggest there are two things to wonder about here. Is the NBA not good enough anymore to win consistently in niternational competition? Can our athletes be coached into a sufficiently coherent team in the limited time they have together?
Sadly, it seems the only place you can see basketball played as it should be, as a team sport, is in college ball. And even then, it's mostly at the mid-major conference level.
Equally as sad, this won't bother the players on the team at all. They'll come home, hop in their Escalades, throw on their $1200 sunglasses, put on a DVD and turn up the gangsta rap tunes, and laugh about it. After all, winning the Olympics doesn't factor in to their contracts, and taking pride in representing your country might harm their "street cred".
This is disgusting, but as the article said, also inevitable. At least now I feel a tad better about never again watching the NBA.
Not exactly "Hoosiers", I take it.
This is the 1980 Hocket miracle in reverse. It reinforces the idea that a collection of stars is not a team. Our olympic basketball team is not a team. At this point, I would like to see a college dream team that actually practices and plays together to become a dream team. The NBA stars can't/won't dedicate the time to it.
It's still a team game. Looks like a group of superstars can't just mail it in like they used to. Then again, Bird, Magic etc. knew how to play team ball, even if they were not use to playing with each other. Not having to face any real zone in the pro game, the US did not have an answer. Where are the role playing zone busters like a Steve Kerr? At home, no name recognition. Not superstars.
Dream Team??????? More like Nightmare Team.
There are the professionals who, through endorsements and sponsorships and the like, train for the purpose of competing on the world stage. For example, swimming phenom Michael Phelps is making a seven figure income. And frankly, while he certainly doesn't need that much money to compete, but he does need some---hence he is, by definition, a professional athelete.
Then there are, of course, those who play in professional leagues like the NBA or NHL. To them, world competition serves only as a distraction from their primary focus.
I for one am not willing to forbid the first kind of pro athelete if that's the only way to forbid the second. Is there, perhaps, a way to differentiate?
Team USA isn't anywhere near being an "allstar team".
As to your suggestion, did you know that the point guard for PR is an NBA player? He is the point guard for the Jazz. The guy who hit the buzzer shot this morning for Argentina is also in the NBA, he is a guard for the Spurs.
Team USA has not been playing together very long and it shows. A number of real NBA allstars were asked to play for the USA and said no. Younger and more inexperienced players were then chosen in the place of players like Shaq, Kobe, Malone, and Kidd. <<<( BTW some of these guys were on the US olympic qualifying team)
Kudos to Tim Duncan and Allen Iverson who are true allstars and decided that representing their country was more important than vacation. If they can pull this young team together and win the gold, it will be every bit as exciting as the 1980 hockey win.
Last week, bored with nothing on the tube, I watched StreetBall, I couldn't find any rules for the players.
I would agree--if we NEVER, EVER, EVER, EVER let John Thompson or another idiot college coach run the team again.
Dumb dumb dumb dumb. The man can't even comment on college basketball on TV, he's so stupid.
As to your question, "Can someone tell me the benefits of having PR be in the US?" that's an easy answer:
We have thousands of Puerto Rican urban renewal and election reform specialists in New York and Florida, to ensure that those states become more like the paradise that is Puerto Rico.
Also, zone defense is not an issue in the pro's, so they our dream teams are not chosen with that in mind.
Kind of funny seeing these "second-rate" NBA pro's getting their tails beat ...
... Because the "first-rate" NBA "stars" chose to sit on their expnsive high-falutin' tails doing nothing.
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