USA Schedule -- Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3
I have no clue what's happening . . . but that doesn't mean I still can't write about what we see . . .
Yup . . . . no clue what's going on . . .
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Game 1: France 73 - Tunisia 69 -- Holy comeback . . . Tunisia scored 26 points to France's 13 in the fourth quarter to make this a game. And man, it was a little too close for comfort for France's liking. The box score shows Tunisia going on a crazy finish, with Salah Mejri getting dunks and layups, Makrem Ben Romdhane making shots and getting to the line, and Mohamed Hdidane hitting threes. The game end with France up, but Tunisia threatening. This has been a great tournament for them, they have learned not to fear thee top teams. France won, and that's the most important thing for them. Tony Parker had 22, Nicholas Batum has 19 and they just had enough to win. France goes to 3-1, and Tunisia is now 0-4.
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Game 2: Russia 77 - Spain 74 -- This is the headline game of the day, two 3-0 teams facing off. And history repeats itself, and Russia wins by holding Spain's offense back. Spain only shot 42.9 fg%, and went 20.0 3pt%. Spain made the most of their free throws, going 17-19, and had a +8 free throw advantage -- but after a while it's all about hitting shots. Russia went 46.8 fg%, and went 9/23 - 39.1 3pt%. Spain went nuts in the first quarter winning it 28 to 11. Russia held Spain to 12 and 13 points in the next two quarters, and the slow and steady team won the race. The hero of game 3, Vitaly Fridzon, was the hero of this game as well as he came off the bench to go 9/15 (with 2 threes and 4 FTs), and finish with 24 points. Russia needed it as Andrei Kirilenko shot 2/8 and missed all his threes, finishing with an Al Jeffersonian 8 points off of 8 shots. Alexey Shved played only 7 minutes as Anton Ponkrashov finished with 14 points and 11 assists. Viktor Khryapa nailed 4 threes, and Timofey Mozgov played big and had 12 points, 9 rebounds, and 2 blocks. Spains Starters all had a rough day shooting the basketball, Pau Gasol went 8 for 13 (which is pretty good), but Rudy Fernandez went 3/8, Marc Gasol went 4/10, Jose Calderon went 1/3, and Sergio Llull went 2/7. And their ace Juan Carlos Navarro went 3/11. Did they just miss shots or did Russia play great defense? I don't know. Aside from Pau's 20 points, everyone else kinda did not show up. Russia moves onto 4-0, and Spain down to 3-1.
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Game 3: United States 99 - Lithuania 94 -- USA! USA! After destroying Nigeria the Good guys won, but only by 5 points. Wow. Not 85 points. Not 50 points. But 5 points. Lithuania HAD THE LEAD with 5:51 left to play in the game. Maybe the game was never really "in doubt" but it wasn't a blow out at all. Linas Kleiza had 25 points, and as a team Lithuania shot 58.5 fg%, and 43.8 3pt%. The Americans only went 10/33 from deep, and shot under 50%. Lithuania turned it over 23 times, and was still in this. I don't understand what happened. Carmelo Anthony and LeBron James both had 20 points. USA is 4 and 0, and Lithuania falling to 1-3.
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Game 4: Brazil 98 - China 59 -- Brazil blasted China 25 to 9 in the first. And that was pretty much the ball game. Brazil lost that heart breaker in Game 3, and came out motivated. Tiago Splitter dominated with 12 points. Yep. That's pretty much dominating when the team you are playing against only has 59 points. Brazil did have a balanced attack besides the Spurs bigman. Leandro Barbosa had 13, Machado had 10, Giovannoni had 13, and Vieira had 14. American Larry (?) Taylor added 6 assists. Huertas had 4. Garcia had 5. Team ball, team win.
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Game 5: Australia 106 - Great Britain 75 -- Patrick Mills 39 points! 5 threes! Aussies went 57.1 fg% and 54.2 3pt%! And they were down at the half and finished with 30 points in the third quarter, and 40 in the fourth! Wow! (Insert your own boomerang joke here) Australia goes to 1-3, and Great Britain down to 0-4.
- Game 6: Argentina 93 - Nigeria 79 -- Argentina went up 37 to 19 after one and never looked back. Luis Scola and Carlos Delfino continued to do their thing, finishing with 22 and 18 points respectively. Scola went to the line 9 times and made 8, while Carlos hit 2 threes. Combined they went 14 for 23. Not too shabby. Andres Nocioni had 17 points, and Manu Ginobili took a step back and only shot 6 times. He still manged to get 13 points, so yeah, still pretty awesome. Nigeria tried hard, but they still did not get much from Al-Farouq Aminu (3/12 shooting), while Ike Diogu continues to post double doubles and be their best player. Argentina is now 3-1, while Nigeria is 1-3.
Next set of games are going to be amazing, Ps. It is really hot in dallas . . .