FIBA WORLD CUP 2019 | SPAIN are new WORLD CHAMPIONS

[mcmurphy]

As for Belineli...in all these years you would think Italy could find a better wing than him. He's been absolute trash with their national team for years and years now. It's really sad that a country that used to be so strong in basketball can't find someone to replace him.

ehhhh, if Belinelli is absolute trash, have you seen Vitali?

[jinxed]

Wow Serbia is scary good.

[jinxed]

I'm Spanish and this Spain team is not impressive. 4-0 yes, but they've had 3 tough games, two of them against weak PR and Iran.

[Trundle]

Jokic has 80-80-80 shooting splits (!) with 13.5 PPG - 3rd best on Serbia team.

[Maf]

Man can you believe that?!? We **** beat Turkey and advanced!!! Man I am gonna get really drunk today.

never met a czech who needed an excuse to get ****

Nah, we don't need excuses. We just need to use a reason to get drunk. Otherwise we might be considered as alcoholics. But if you have a good reason to get drunk you are good to go. Any good reason will do. Like We won in basketball championships! Or... it's 157 days till my birthdays. Or... it's Tuesday! You know, good reasons.

[Catchall]

Not really, sure the size is there, but talent isn't. Batum has been washed for a while, Ntilikina is flat out bad and De Colo has fallen off a cliff. Serbia pretty clearly has more talent and they can get scorching from 3 so Gobert is not much of an issue.

I'm not sold on Serbia, based on what little I've seen. They're not great athletes and they look slow defensively. They played two of the weakest teams in the tournament in Philippines and Angola in their group, and then they were tied with Italy in the 3rd quarter of their other match (before that became a free-throw fest). I think teams can run on them. They can shoot and they can rebound, but I'd like to see how they do against a more athletic and defensive-minded team, before I'd call them the favorites.

If Serbia meets up with USA, USA will be more talented at 4 of 5 starting positions.

4 or 5? So Myles Turner in your eyes = Jokic? I also easily take Bogdan over Tatum or Barnes, 0 question.

I'm saying Jokic is the one position where the Serbs are more talented than USA. Sacramento has both Bogdanovic and Barnes on their roster, and chooses to start Barnes. If the two match up, it will be Barnes playing against his back-up on the Kings, although admittedly, Bogdanovic plays close to starter minutes for the Kings. Bjelica is a terrible defender. Bogdanovic is mediocre. Two of Serbia's centers can barely run the floor. If USA can spread the floor, play fast and defend well, Serbia will likely struggle. Serbia will probably try to slow the game down by playing physical and staying in a zone defense. They can't guard USA one on one.

[Mickey8]

Lets first have both teams advance to the finals then we can talk about the strategy and match ups, both teams will have tough games in the semi finals. Jokic always owns Turner by the way. He's not the competition to Jokic in any way. Jokic and Milutinov can run the floor, I dont know what the hell are you watching.

[stoo]

I'm not sold on Serbia, based on what little I've seen. They're not great athletes and they look slow defensively. They played two of the weakest teams in the tournament in Philippines and Angola in their group, and then they were tied with Italy in the 3rd quarter of their other match (before that became a free-throw fest). I think teams can run on them. They can shoot and they can rebound, but I'd like to see how they do against a more athletic and defensive-minded team, before I'd call them the favorites.

If Serbia meets up with USA, USA will be more talented at 4 of 5 starting positions.

4 or 5? So Myles Turner in your eyes = Jokic? I also easily take Bogdan over Tatum or Barnes, 0 question.

I'm saying Jokic is the one position where the Serbs are more talented than USA. Sacramento has both Bogdanovic and Barnes on their roster, and chooses to start Barnes. If the two match up, it will be Barnes playing against his back-up on the Kings, although admittedly, Bogdanovic plays close to starter minutes for the Kings. Bjelica is a terrible defender. Bogdanovic is mediocre. Two of Serbia's centers can barely run the floor. If USA can spread the floor, play fast and defend well, Serbia will likely struggle. Serbia will probably try to slow the game down by playing physical and staying in a zone defense. They can't guard USA one on one.

Barnes and Bogi don't play the same position. Bjelica is fantastic in defense. Can u elaborate on that? 3 out of 4 serbian centers can run the floor, but that doesn't mean anything.. it is not their job.. USA will have a big problem scoring 90 and win, I am telling u... Only if they shoot 50% from the 3 pt line and shoot a lot, and at the same time Serbia has problem with their own efficiency.. But Serbia is the team that shoots 50% from 3 and spreads the floor and plays fast and defend well, not usa.. or we are watching different competition

[Bob8]

I'm not sold on Serbia, based on what little I've seen. They're not great athletes and they look slow defensively. They played two of the weakest teams in the tournament in Philippines and Angola in their group, and then they were tied with Italy in the 3rd quarter of their other match (before that became a free-throw fest). I think teams can run on them. They can shoot and they can rebound, but I'd like to see how they do against a more athletic and defensive-minded team, before I'd call them the favorites.

If Serbia meets up with USA, USA will be more talented at 4 of 5 starting positions.

4 or 5? So Myles Turner in your eyes = Jokic? I also easily take Bogdan over Tatum or Barnes, 0 question.

I'm saying Jokic is the one position where the Serbs are more talented than USA. Sacramento has both Bogdanovic and Barnes on their roster, and chooses to start Barnes. If the two match up, it will be Barnes playing against his back-up on the Kings, although admittedly, Bogdanovic plays close to starter minutes for the Kings. Bjelica is a terrible defender. Bogdanovic is mediocre. Two of Serbia's centers can barely run the floor. If USA can spread the floor, play fast and defend well, Serbia will likely struggle. Serbia will probably try to slow the game down by playing physical and staying in a zone defense. They can't guard USA one on one.

Did you watch USA:Turkey? It’s difficult to have worse and slower Cs. And they have practically beaten them. There is no 3 second violation, C will just camp in the paint. Nobody will defend USA individually.

[leper-con]

It's funny how the narrative has gone from Europeans are soft and they will need time to adjust to the more physical NBA style of Basketball, to the NBA players aren't used to the physicality of Euro ball.

[Archx]

I'm not sold on Serbia, based on what little I've seen. They're not great athletes and they look slow defensively. They played two of the weakest teams in the tournament in Philippines and Angola in their group, and then they were tied with Italy in the 3rd quarter of their other match (before that became a free-throw fest). I think teams can run on them. They can shoot and they can rebound, but I'd like to see how they do against a more athletic and defensive-minded team, before I'd call them the favorites.

If Serbia meets up with USA, USA will be more talented at 4 of 5 starting positions.

4 or 5? So Myles Turner in your eyes = Jokic? I also easily take Bogdan over Tatum or Barnes, 0 question.

I'm saying Jokic is the one position where the Serbs are more talented than USA. Sacramento has both Bogdanovic and Barnes on their roster, and chooses to start Barnes. If the two match up, it will be Barnes playing against his back-up on the Kings, although admittedly, Bogdanovic plays close to starter minutes for the Kings. Bjelica is a terrible defender. Bogdanovic is mediocre. Two of Serbia's centers can barely run the floor. If USA can spread the floor, play fast and defend well, Serbia will likely struggle. Serbia will probably try to slow the game down by playing physical and staying in a zone defense. They can't guard USA one on one.

Can't believe you typed this with a straight face. Bogdanovic, so far, is the MVP of the tournament, he is playing better than anyone on the US team. Barnes has been nothing special so far, like expected. His only agenda is to shoot everything that comes into his hands, just like it was when he played in Dallas.
No one on the US team can stop Boban and Jokic, there is hardly anyone in the entire NBA who can stop them 1v1. Bjelica is a perfect floor spacer for them and a great shooter, so he won't be any liability either.

I don't know if you noticed but 1v1 defense in FIBA is useless, no one is being praised for being a top 1v1 defender, it's all about team defense and how well centers can move their feet under the rim. And when it comes to defense, US team so far, hasn't done such a brilliant job either, if we are comparing them vs better teams.

Unless something really drastic happens, like Serbia missing every shot, i think Serbs will win by 10-15 points. Coach Pop has been outcoached by lesser coaches so far and Serbia has one of the best FIBA coaches in the world.

[draftnightsuit]

It's funny how the narrative has gone from Europeans are soft and they will need time to adjust to the more physical NBA style of Basketball, to the NBA players aren't used to the physicality of Euro ball.

This narrative only exists because of the constant barrage of the ex-NBA players that call the modern NBA “soft” and overhyping the physicality of their own era. Eventually it managed to stick even though it’s not true.

This was more true in the early 2000s when Team USA was getting repeatedly embarrassed in international play.

[limbo]

To me, as an observer, the style of basketball played in Europe/FIBA hasn't really changed all that much in the last two decades or so. The game is still largely being played and officiated the same way. The biggest differences is just that the players have gotten more skilled and started taking fitness and weight lifting more seriously from the days guys like Divac used to smoke a pack of cigarettes pre and post match.

NBA basketball on the other hand, has changed quite drastically multiple times. It went from high tempo fastbreak basketball in the 80's, to emphasis on post play in the 90's, to heavy iso basketball post MJ, to pace and space smallball with emphasis on the three point shot where we are now. I'm suspecting that because of FIBA rules and the court being smaller, European teams were basically forced to tailor their game and rely on passing, ball-movement and outside shooting because there was so little space inside the arc to do much of anything off the dribble. In the NBA there's a lot more room to create on the ball, that's why it's easier for individual players to do damage by themselves without relying on teammates as much.

Also, selling contact has seen a huge emergence in the NBA. This was always seen as a FIBA/European trait, stuff like exaggerating and selling contact, head flops, jumping into the defender, kicking your legs out on jumpers, rip throughs, tangling your arms into the defender,verbal flops... If you go watch games from the 90's, nobody is doing that in the NBA. Even in the 00's it was pretty rare. Now it's everywhere. NBA players have realized how to manipulate the whistle, especially stars who abuse the so called star power. While this also happens in FIBA, they're usually much stricter at not blowing the whistle and just letting them play on. Meanwhile, it's a bad look for the NBA if you see Harden flopping and selling contact every possession and then whining afterwards if there's no whistle.

If the NBA would actually tailor the officiating towards favoring the defensive player as oppose to the offensive player, the league would definitely not be seen as soft because players would be forced to actually play through some contact... But we know that's not going to happen because NBA needs to maximize their product and the fact of reality is that most people who watch basketball aren't doing so because of defense. They wanna see buckets, they wanna see Westbrook put up 40 point triple doubles, not grindfests ending with 76-81...

[GordanFreeman]

Man, the USA-Turkey and Brazil-Greece games were wild. Group K (the group that these 4 teams will compete in if Turkey and Greece win their last games) is going to be an absolute bloodbath.

First of all, allow me to give huge props to Brazil. They really played an excellent game and they deserved to beat us. I talked about Varejão in one of my previous posts. He was amazing and the best player on the floor in this game. Alex Garcia and Marquinhos also had amazing games. Garcia doesn't look 39 years old at all. He was great on both ends. Those 3 and Barbosa are what gave Brazil this victory. Their old guard carried them.

Now, let's talk about Greece.

Look, I realize that Sloukas missed that final FT that could have tied the game up. But I can't blame him for this loss. He was our main offensive cog in the second half and we wouldn't be in a position to tie the game up and send it to OT without him. If we're being honest, we should never have been in that position to begin with. Louzada's foul was mind-boggling.

Giannis was good. No, he wasn't the NBA MVP-type that most of you know. Giannis can't be that kind of player under FIBA rules unless he becomes a great shooter. I think that one of our mistakes was that we underutilized Giannis in the 4th quarter. He rarely got the ball in a position that would allow him to initiate offense. We didn't utilize him as a ball-handler. We should have given him the ball more at the top of the key and then have Sloukas screen for him and flare back out for a 3. The one time we tried it, it worked well and Giannis drove to the rim and got fouled.

Printezis was great. He was the one that was hitting the big shots to keep us in the game (Sloukas was mainly creating those shots) and he hit that big 3 that tied the game up.

Calathes had a great stat-line. He had an amazing first half. But in the second half, he was the main reason why we lost. He screwed up. A lot. He missed his open 3s, he turned the ball over and he even fumbled two rebounds away from Papagiannis (which gave the possession back to Brazil). He is a significantly better player than he showed in that second half but that half was just brutal for us. That performance in the second half is one of the reasons why we lost.

Bourousis was bad. He didn't manage to impact the game at all. It's why he wasn't used at all in the 4th. In my opinion, that was a good decision since he was clearly outmatched in this game.

Papapetrou was below average. He missed some shots that he should have hit and he wasn't very good on the defensive end. We need more from him.

Papanikolaou was above average. He helped defensively and on the board. He also hit two crucial FTs at the end. We do need a bit more from him on the offensive end, though.

Papagiannis was a bit above average. He was much better than Bourousis and he basically did his job. He didn't finish particularly well at the rim but he did protect the rim on the defensive end.

Thanasis only played 4 minutes so I can't really grade him.

So, yeah, basically I believe that Calathes in the second half and Bourousis throughout the game were the players that deserve the vast majority of the blame tonight. But it's not just the players who deserve blame. The coach deserves a lot of blame as well. Aco Petrović outcoached him hard. Petrović made adjustments to his defensive plan at the end of the first half and Skourtopoulos was never able to make adjustments of his own. We didn't have an answer to these adjustments and they are a big reason why we lost. That and the pitiful transition defense. This one also cost us.

Greece is in a very tough spot now. We have to play a do or die game against New Zealand in two days and then we're facing off against Turkey and the US. If we beat both Turkey and the US then yeah, we will advance to the quarter-finals, but that's a very, very tall task, especially after today's lackluster performance. If we can't beat the US then this is how we can advance to the quarter-finals:

Step 1) We need to beat Turkey. Lose to both Turkey and the US and you're out, playing for spots 13-16.

Step 2) We need Brazil to lose to both the US and Turkey.

If that happened then we'd have a triple tie-breaker between Brazil, Greece and Turkey. All 3 teams would have a 1-2 record and all 3 teams would have a 1-1 record against each other. So, point differential in the games between these 3 teams would be the deciding factor and since we only lost by 1 point today, it would be possible to come out on top and advance.

How was Brazilian KD?

[picc]

I'm almost looking forward to Serbia serving the US team.

Almost.

[Taikuri]

Wow Serbia is scary good.

Teodosic isn't even playing in the tournament right? What happened to him?

[Showdown]

Wow Serbia is scary good.

Teodosic isn't even playing in the tournament right? What happened to him?

Basura

[rale93lfc]

It's funny how the narrative has gone from Europeans are soft and they will need time to adjust to the more physical NBA style of Basketball, to the NBA players aren't used to the physicality of Euro ball.

[Nuntius]

Man, the USA-Turkey and Brazil-Greece games were wild. Group K (the group that these 4 teams will compete in if Turkey and Greece win their last games) is going to be an absolute bloodbath.

First of all, allow me to give huge props to Brazil. They really played an excellent game and they deserved to beat us. I talked about Varejão in one of my previous posts. He was amazing and the best player on the floor in this game. Alex Garcia and Marquinhos also had amazing games. Garcia doesn't look 39 years old at all. He was great on both ends. Those 3 and Barbosa are what gave Brazil this victory. Their old guard carried them.

Now, let's talk about Greece.

Look, I realize that Sloukas missed that final FT that could have tied the game up. But I can't blame him for this loss. He was our main offensive cog in the second half and we wouldn't be in a position to tie the game up and send it to OT without him. If we're being honest, we should never have been in that position to begin with. Louzada's foul was mind-boggling.

Giannis was good. No, he wasn't the NBA MVP-type that most of you know. Giannis can't be that kind of player under FIBA rules unless he becomes a great shooter. I think that one of our mistakes was that we underutilized Giannis in the 4th quarter. He rarely got the ball in a position that would allow him to initiate offense. We didn't utilize him as a ball-handler. We should have given him the ball more at the top of the key and then have Sloukas screen for him and flare back out for a 3. The one time we tried it, it worked well and Giannis drove to the rim and got fouled.

Printezis was great. He was the one that was hitting the big shots to keep us in the game (Sloukas was mainly creating those shots) and he hit that big 3 that tied the game up.

Calathes had a great stat-line. He had an amazing first half. But in the second half, he was the main reason why we lost. He screwed up. A lot. He missed his open 3s, he turned the ball over and he even fumbled two rebounds away from Papagiannis (which gave the possession back to Brazil). He is a significantly better player than he showed in that second half but that half was just brutal for us. That performance in the second half is one of the reasons why we lost.

Bourousis was bad. He didn't manage to impact the game at all. It's why he wasn't used at all in the 4th. In my opinion, that was a good decision since he was clearly outmatched in this game.

Papapetrou was below average. He missed some shots that he should have hit and he wasn't very good on the defensive end. We need more from him.

Papanikolaou was above average. He helped defensively and on the board. He also hit two crucial FTs at the end. We do need a bit more from him on the offensive end, though.

Papagiannis was a bit above average. He was much better than Bourousis and he basically did his job. He didn't finish particularly well at the rim but he did protect the rim on the defensive end.

Thanasis only played 4 minutes so I can't really grade him.

So, yeah, basically I believe that Calathes in the second half and Bourousis throughout the game were the players that deserve the vast majority of the blame tonight. But it's not just the players who deserve blame. The coach deserves a lot of blame as well. Aco Petrović outcoached him hard. Petrović made adjustments to his defensive plan at the end of the first half and Skourtopoulos was never able to make adjustments of his own. We didn't have an answer to these adjustments and they are a big reason why we lost. That and the pitiful transition defense. This one also cost us.

Greece is in a very tough spot now. We have to play a do or die game against New Zealand in two days and then we're facing off against Turkey and the US. If we beat both Turkey and the US then yeah, we will advance to the quarter-finals, but that's a very, very tall task, especially after today's lackluster performance. If we can't beat the US then this is how we can advance to the quarter-finals:

Step 1) We need to beat Turkey. Lose to both Turkey and the US and you're out, playing for spots 13-16.

Step 2) We need Brazil to lose to both the US and Turkey.

If that happened then we'd have a triple tie-breaker between Brazil, Greece and Turkey. All 3 teams would have a 1-2 record and all 3 teams would have a 1-1 record against each other. So, point differential in the games between these 3 teams would be the deciding factor and since we only lost by 1 point today, it would be possible to come out on top and advance.

How was Brazilian KD?

He did his job. 8 points, 10 boards, 2 assists, 2 steals and 1 block. His athleticism blocked off passing lanes inside and he did tip the ball away from the rim in the final FT which led Brazil to victory.

[rale93lfc]

He did his job. 8 points, 10 boards, 2 assists, 2 steals and 1 block. His athleticism blocked off passing lanes inside and he did tip the ball away from the rim in the final FT which led Brazil to victory.

Bruno looks like nice def. matchup agains Giannis.


Imagine the pain if that tip was goaltending and Greece wins the game...