07-28-2024, 02:57 PM
(07-28-2024, 02:22 PM)SleepingHero Wrote: Pretty much
The game vs. South Sudan, the US couldn't hit a shot to save their life. And there was barely any cohesion offensively which led to your-turn-my-turn stuff.
That let South Sudan almost pull off a miraculous upset, but Lebron just took over at the end. That was the closest game out of all the friendlies and one could also argue that team USA really didn't give their best against them.
Every other game the US has just overcome all deficiencies with pure star power for the entire game. Serbia consistently overloaded Lebron's side and sent 2 with Curry but in doing that you leave Kevin freaking Durant wide open.
The amount of sheer talent on the court at any given time is too much for most teams to overcome. Only France really has a shot just because they have 2 top 30 NBA players on top of a slew of good role players in the NBA.
US would definitely win a seven game series against any given team in the tournament but with single elimination there is a small chance that France or Germany catch them on a bad day. Ignoring the US France has by far the most talented roster. Germany is probably the best "team" in the bigger than the sum of its parts sense and looked really good in the last few matchups against the US (including the friendly last week).
Today they went on big runs whenever Jokic was on the bench (they actually lost the minutes with Embiid on the floor). With incredible 3-point shooting (18/32 56%). Not sure if that is sustainable but they are certainly creating enough wide open looks for elite shooters to stay in the 40-45% range.