that was painfull to watch ... :( I don´t think i´ve ever seen a german team that bad (and we´ve had our share of terrible games), there really wasn´t anything that worked. At times every pass, move or shot was "shaky", missed unbelievably easy shots and layups.

Australia played good, but on a somewhat normal day it would have been maybe a 10-15 point loss ...

Quite likely this means Germany will finish 4th despite (hopefully) winning 3 games (unless Serbia looses to Australia and Argentina), meaning a game against the US.

Still, the first 2 games were better than anything they´ve ever played without Nowitzki, definitely sth to build on.

However, the young "stars" are getting exposed badly. Benzing just doesn´t have the athleticism and bulk to make his moves at this level, Pleiß also struggles with that (but plays good defense at least), Harris lacks all arround skills to go with his athleticism.

The first 2 games it was the veteran like Hamann, Greene and Jagla carrying the load.

Frankly, I have no idea why he didn't rotate more. They play every day in this kind of tournament. Being fresh is key to keep winning.

then again they have an off-day today and then play Tunisia and Iran where they´ll likely have the game decided by halftime, i doubt that´s an issue for NBA players (who are used to play a ton of games in a short period)

I see the problem more within a game, the US allways had the advantage in terms of being able to sustain intensity due to their deep rotation.

Day 4 :

France stays unbeaten with a 68-63 win against Canada (0-3), best player was Batum with stud defense and 24 points on offense.

China looses to PR 76-84, Yi very good again with 24/7

Spain looses to Lithuania after being up 11 at the start of the 4th ...

Turkey beats Greece 76-65 and seems to be a legit contender at home. Ilyasova at times went into Nowitzki-Mode and hit one ridiculous shot after another for some stretches, step back threes et all ... 26 points, 6-6 from 3.
Asik/Erden is a really, really potent combination at Center on both ends, both very agile and active on defense and attack the basket with authority on offense.

Turkoglu couldn´t hit anything, another terrible shooting game ... (now 8-34 FG, 4-20 from 3)

Turkey also showed a very convincing zone defense, although admittedly Greece just flat out missed quite a few open shots. But also played very lazy, taking 32 shots from deep and just 21 inside the arc, just inexcusable for a team that has the inside threats that they have ...

Greece shot chart :




That´s ridiculous even against a good zone defense ...

Spain is being just ridiculous, it's a shame how they lost a game they were winning by 21 in the 3rd quarter.

The whole press here is being really hard on them, hope it will hurt their ego and they will put more effort like the soccer team did in the world cup after the first and unexpected loss vs Swiss.

That shot chart is interesting

SI

Germany looses to Angola (88-92) and is out of the tournament, embarassing game ...
Angola with a spirited game (Cipriano especially, who was amazing), but come on now ...
German Team took 40 (!!) 3s (hit 18) against a team that is extremely undersized, no way ...

Benzing very, very disapointing, same goes for Harris and somewhat for Pleiss. Not ready to give up (they are young still), but those 3 (biggest german talents) were clearly not ready for the level of play you encounter at this stage.

Up 10 with less than 3 minutes to go and then the same old "let´s hold the ball for 20 seconds and see what happens when we just run a pick and roll that everyone knows is coming" routine late in the game ...

I imagine most people have seen this photo by now, but just in case:



Thats (l-r): Kareem Rush, the Denver Nuggets owner's son, Richard Jefferson, Luke Walton, ?, ?.

dola

And I gained some new respect for Mitch Richmond after reading this:

Basketbawful

1/8 finals :

Serbien- Kroatien
Spanien- Griechenland

Türkei- Frankreich
Slowenien- Australien

-----------------

USA-Angola
Russland- Neuseeland

Litauen-China
Argentinien- Brasilien


holy shit... 2 super intense local rivalries and the 2 supposedly biggest contenders next to the US playing each other.

Greece basically lost of purposed so that they wouldn´t play spain, but later tonight New Zealand (who are tons of fun to watch, Kirk Penney is awesome) beats France by 12. They needed to win by 11 to move to 3rd (and avoid Turkey) and did just that by hitting a 4 point play (Penney) and another 3 in the last 15 seconds :eek:

France fucked up on the last group day once more, they are good at that.

China advances because Ivory Coast wins by just 9 when they needed to win by 11 (that they beat PR in the first place was a maginificent feat), PR hit a 3 with 1 second to go ...

Scoloa just scored 37 in a classic, Argentina beats Brazil 93-89. Not even bad defense, just ridiculously good offense.
Huertas with 32 and an awesome game again.

Scola literally couldn´t miss, up 2 with 1,5 seconds he hit the first FT (up3) and then tried to miss the 2nd on purpose, went in off the glass regardless :lol:

I didn't catch the game but will be tracking down a replay of it tonight. Scola is amazing at this level. Every game I've seen him play, he has been the best guy on the court.

He is, isn´t he ? :) 30 PPG on 62% shooting, plus the first 2,3 games h missed a ton of "easy" shots :D If he can lead Argentina past Lithuania he´ll be the MVP hands down (allready is in my book), especially considering the argentina team really isn´t all that talented individually. His usage stats must by sky high (takes 30% of his teams shots, 42% of the teams FTs and scorers 35% of the teams points)
It´s really Scola and Delfino with Prigioni as the playmaker (40 assists to 38 points in 6 games) and then a bunch of role players in the truest sense of the word.
Seeing guys like him, Manu, Yao or Nowitzki at the FIBA level is truly amazing at times, combining their amazing NBA level talent with a skill set that really works under FIBA rules.

Diamantidis retired from the Greek NT btw after their loss to spain (which was a great game as well), too bad for the neutral fan as that guy still is really special on both ends.

Serbia eliminates Spain in an equally awesome game, 92-89. Teodosic with a crap game shooting the ball (but great as a playmaker) and after going 1-7 prior (and having a crap game in the best of 16 game) he takes and makes 3 with 3 seconds on the clock. Sized up Garbajosa on the switch and then fired a bomb from like 2 metres (6-7 feet ;) ) behind the 3 point line.

Amazing game from start to finish with multiple players contributing big time for both teams and tons of clutch plays in the last 5 minutes.

The game winner :

Wow. Wish I'd stayed up for that game now. Got a hard drive full of every game of the tourney so far, need to catch up. :D

...and now he suffers a stress fracture to his foot during a workout, and gets waived by the Nets.

Not so much that Sean May is injury prone, it's that he is really fat.

USA comfortably beat Lithuania to make it into the final. Whether they play Serbia or Turkey tomorrow it should be interesting. Serbia looked pretty good in their win over Spain and if Turkey make the final the arena will be rocking tomorrow.

Kevin Durant is good at basketball.

Kevin Durant is insanely good at basketball. Is it safe to say he is just behind Lebron for best in the NBA?

It's pretty safe to say that Durant is a mortal lock for MVP next season, barring some kind of injury, a brutal regression(improbable), or he Roethlisburgers a chick.

Durant is definitely the star player most suited for FIBA games (next to Bryant propably) the US could find, really amazing performances especially in the games it was needed (Brasil, russia and now lithuania)
Westbrook also kind of impressed me, the guy really is an absolute freak athletically and will make another jump next year imo.

I don´t see them having many problems should they face Serbia because they don´t run a very efficient offense, especially lacking in Pick and Roll situations where the US struggles (if anywhere) on defense, also have no one that can guard Durant.
Turkey with Asik/Erden has better weapons there, but their guards have over-achieved so much this tournament, i´m not sure if they can do that against the pressure of the US athletes in the backcourt.
But maybe Turkoglu can have one of his night and Ilyasova has been Nowitzki-like in some games with his ability to score and shoot ridiculous shots. Plus he could play competent defense against Durant on paper.

The US : i was hardly impressed by their play technically and tactically, save for insane athletic ability and Kevin Durant they could have been in trouble against both russia and lithuania who both over-achieved a bit prior to the US game.

That being said, of course they are deservedly in the final ;) It´s not their fault that spain and greece self-destructed and that Argentina ran out of gas (playing with 3 guys up for this level basically all tournament). Also not their fault that most other teams missed big pieces (before anyone gets this the wrong way : I know the US missed like 9-11 guys that would have made the team next to Durant, no ones questioning they have the deepest talent pool really)

It´s just frustrating as a basketball fan to see them get by with what is basically 1:1 basketball again offensively, because i think that in a way them struggling internationally with that type of play was good for the NBA as it forced coaches and GMs to check out what´s being done across that ocean and adapt a few of those concepts.

Looking forward to Turkey-Serbia starting any minute, the atmosphere should be insane for that one. Tedosic allready at it getting the crowd to hate him, the guy is absolutely insane while still being ice-cold.

Turkey wins the 2nd semi final, an amazing game ends 83-82, Semih Erden blocks a last second alley-oop layup by Velickovic (timeout, throw in at center court with 0,5 to go)
Serbia allows a 1:0 layup by Tunceri with said 0,5 to go ...

Serbia basically led all game (not by much, only by 3-6 points) until 3 minutes to go, then it was back and forth.

wow, sounds like an amazing game.

2 minutes into the 2nd half the US leads 48-32 after Durant just hit 2 3s in a row. He allready has 26 points including 7-11 from 3. Rest of the team is 6-28 from the field ...

USA cruising to the gold medal now :)

edit: haha, booing the alley-oop