Charley Rosen: Team USA improves, but Carmelo Anthony is a disgrace

[Evilmav2]

USA improves, but Anthony is embarrassing

Charley Rosen / Special to FOXSports.com
Posted: 1 hour ago


Team USA was expected to rock and roll Thursday against Australia, one of the weaker teams in the Olympic tournament. But until the fourth quarter, the only rhythm they could manage was a stumble-footed waltz.

All in all, Team USA did show some improvement. Yet, to beat their next opponent (a talented Lithuania team), the Americans will need to improve their energy, awareness, and execution by quantum leaps.
Let's review the plusses and minuses of the U.S. squad's latest ugly win:

Against Australia's 2-3 zone that doubled Tim Duncan's every touch, the Americans still relied too heavily on dribble penetration. As ever, this tactic had limited benefits until late in the game when USA's superior depth wore the Aussies down. For the most part, however, the interior passing was much improved.

The proper way to help on defense is to show and recover — assume a wide, arms-active stance in the appropriate help spot, and yet retain the capability of quickly returning to the original defensive matchup or else rotating to another preordained spot. Time and again, though, the USA players were overcommitting to the initial help position and weren't able to recover.

Too often, in the immediate aftermath of being forced to switch on defense, the Americans actually left the ball unattended while they scurried to relocate the player they'd started out defending. The result was several wide-open shots, most of which the Aussies converted. Also, Dwyane Wade was so intent on defending his man face-to-face that he often had his back to the ball and was unable to help when an Aussie guard dribbled to the hoop unattended. (These were the only occasions in which the Americans were not mesmerized by the ball.)

Another basic defensive principle is to stop the ball. Yet Shane Heal was frequently permitted to carry the ball to the basket from the outskirts without being stopped or at least turned.

The U.S. still had difficulties dealing with screen-and-rolls and Australia's perpetual weakside screens.

Bad shooting is definitely contagious as each shooter tries to compensate for this team-wide shortcoming by over-touching his shot. Allen Iverson is the only player who seems to be comfortable (hit or miss) shooting 3-pointers.

The atrocious defense-offense transition continues. When one guard penetrates, the other guard must retreat. When both guards penetrate, the player (or better yet, players) farthest away from the basket must retreat (even if they're bigs).

Carmelo Anthony is a disgrace. After complaining about not playing, he's forced shots and passes, and played only imaginary defense when he took the court against both Greece and Australia. He belongs right where Larry Brown has put him — on the bench. But even when he's glued to the pines, Anthony is embarrassing himself and his country. AI was taking a blow when the U.S. was trailing Australia by double-digits, and he showed his competitive intensity and his fiery disappointment by cursing after the Aussies scored again.
Meanwhile, two seats away, Anthony was laughing. Also, after the final horn, Anthony had to be forcefully summoned by Stephon Marbury to join the traditional postgame camaraderie between the two teams.

OK, what did Team USA do right this time? Play with intensity even when they were behind. Unselfishly share the ball. Ball-hawk without an inordinate amount of foolish gambling. Make several mid-range jumpers. Control both backboards. Take full advantage of the Australians' late-game fatigue.

And beat a less-than-mediocre team by playing 10 minutes of alert basketball.

Bill Russell led the Celtics to 11 NBA titles in 13 seasons, thereby proving that defense can generate all the offense a championship team requires. It's a lesson that Team USA is slowly comprehending. Let's hope that their learning curve is acute enough for them to cop the gold.

Charley Rosen, former CBA coach, author of 12 books about hoops, the next one being A PIVOTAL SEASON -- HOW THE 1971-72 LA LAKERS CHANGED THE NBA, is a frequent contributor to FOXSports.com.