Mvp all star game 2012 basketball olympics

(Sadly, the endlessly entertaining point guard Ricky Rubio is still recovering from knee surgery, Rubio's artistic and often i mprobable passes would have been a joy to witness throughout the Olympics.) Essentially this is a NBA team, and a pretty darn good one at that. In addition, the Spanish team has Serge ibaka who played valuable minutes in the NBA Finals for the Oklahoma City Thunder, and not to mention Jose Calderon from the Toronto Raptors and Victor Claver who plays for the Portland Trail Blazers. They're led by Pau Gasol of the Los Angeles Lakers, along with his brother Marc, currently with the Memphis Grizzlies. Spain will be a tough matchup however, one of two teams (along with Argentina) that were considered the biggest threats to upset Team USA on their way to the gold medal. Heck, I can't imagine Kobe content period. I can't imagine either to be content closing out their time with the national team with the silver. This is expected to be their final Olympics game. There's a lot at stake for guard Kobe Bryant and head coach Mike Krzyzewski too.

Not that LeBron's is the only legacy on the line if the unthinkable happens today and Spain defeats the USA. There's been no question throughout their Olympic run that this is LeBron's team: he runs the offense, he's been able to take over the game when Team USA has needed separation and he's looking as good as he did during the NBA playoffs. If the USA does lose, he's going to get the brunt of the criticism. The USA men's team wins here, LeBron essentially is a shoe-in for Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year. So far, he's been far and away the best player on what could very well be the second best group of basketball players ever assembled (second only to the 1992 Dream Team featuring, of course, Michael Jordan). There is a lot on the line today for LeBron James who is looking to add a gold medal to his 2012 haul of hardware that includes the NBA regular season MVP award and his first NBA Finals MVP. Now it's the men's turn to continue the dominance that America demands from its Olympic basketball teams. Then, as if they flipped a switch, they adjusted in the third quarter and blew by their opponents to an almost humiliating degree. The USA women seemed to be operating from the same script as their more celebrated counterparts on the men's side: For the first half, they were a bit shaky defensively and generally looked like they had underestimated their opponents. Only going for two consecutive gold medals? Yesterday the US women won their fifth consecutive one, blowing out France 86-50. This sounds more impressive if you don't compare the to the USA women's team. If all goes to plan, they should just be forty minutes of game time away from winning their second consecutive gold medal, their fourteenth overall. Despite a few games that were closer than expected, most notably a close game against Lithuania in pool play, Team USA has remained unbeaten while facing every country's best efforts.

Having vanquished Argentina in the semifinals, today the USA men's basketball team, as everyone expected, will be playing in the gold medal game against, as many expected, the Spanish national team. Well, we'll be following the NBA here at the Guardian when basketball season comes around. No, thank you and everyone who has been reading along as we've been following the USA men's basketball team's quest for the gold medal. I cannot wait for 2016.ДЇrom Jane Rollinson: 'From the Americans in Italy, thank you for the live updates! Yeah! And I agree with your assessment of LeBron!' Of course, the 2012 version of the Dream Team, for my money the second best group of basketball players ever assembled, had to fight harder: The other countries are catching up, and this is an awesome thing. This is partly because of America's own successes at the Olympics, particularly the 1992 Dream Team that did more to grow the game worldwide than anything else. The fact that Spain clearly could have won this game, and I wonder how much Marc Gasol's foul trouble affected them, or that a team like Lithuania could almost pull an upset on a team of NBA All-Stars proves that basketball is definitely a global game now. It's just how the script was written before the Olympics, but I think most of us were expecting it to be a somewhat easier run. So, Team USA runs through the tournament undefeated and wins the gold medal.

Mvp all star game 2012 basketball olympics