With many of their best players resting, Australia fell short against Angola. Thursday, as the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup wrapped up the Group Phase, the Australian team faced Angola in its final game. With the Aussies trailing Slovenia by one game and having lost the head-to-head matchup between the two nations, they had nothing to gain from their final appearance in Group D. Their fate was destined to be the third best team out of their
Team USA had nothing to play for, and it showed. The Americans already had clinched Group C at the FIBA World Cup by winning their first four games. While other countries jockeyed to get into the knockout stage – or avoid certain opponents – Team USA was on cruise control in Friday’s game vs. war-torn Ukraine. The United States was playing for the fifth time in six nights and had a start time four hours earlier than Thursday. The combination of apathy
In a day where all 24 teams played in the FIBA World Cup leading up to Thursday’s frenetic first round finish, it was The Manimal who again stood out in another Team USA victory. After a closely contested first quarter, Kenneth Faried helped the Americans (4-0), once again propelled by their big men, take the second and third quarters by a combined 26 points and defeat the Dominican Republic (2-2) 106-71 to advance to 4-0 and clinch the best record in
When you shoot 8-for-11 from the field, as Kenneth Faried did Wednesday in Team USA’s 106-71 victory over the Dominican Republic, and your shooting percentage for the tournament actually goes down … well, that says something about the kind of tournament you are having. Faried is unquestionably the leading candidate to be MVP of the 2014 FIBA World Cup after four games of pool play. The question is whether he will be able to keep it up over Team USA’s next
I hate to say I told you so, but after the first day of Team USA training camp in Las Vegas, I wrote that Kenny “The Manimal” Faried must be the first guy selected for the roster and everyone else should come thereafter. My reasoning was Faried’s motor, toughness and energy level with intangibles such as putbacks and garbage points would be invaluable to this team. In Sunday’s come-from-behind victory against Turkey, Faried led Team USA team with 22 points and
There he goes again, the ball miraculously still in his hands, blowing past a player that up until that very moment was a hero in his home country, and now has to settle for second place in the heart of his nation’s fans. Only the replay will tell just how in the world he found the angle to flick that layup in, with dizzy, confused defenders only finding the ball as it drops to them after falling through the net. Kyrie
You probably know by now that Kevin Durant isn’t playing for Team USA. They could have used him Sunday, when his absence exposed virtually all of the warts of this American squad. On the same day ESPN reported that Nike will match Under Armour’s offer of nearly $300 million to Durant, Team USA showed how much it really missed its true alpha dog in an unconvincing 98-77 win over Turkey, which gave every medal contender a blueprint for beating the Americans. In a
We will spare you too many of the gory details of Team USA’s massacre of Finland. Here’s all you need to know: The Finns were 0-for-17 from the field in the second quarter. If you watched the entire game, congratulations. You have proven yourself worthy of throwing away two perfectly good summertime hours from your Labor Day weekend that could have been spent doing something more enjoyable, like watching paint dry. Day One of the 2014 FIBA World Cup is in the books,