About 10 days ago, the South Sudan basketball team was only one point away from a historic victory over the US team.
Although it was just a friendly match, the reigning Olympic champion needed an explosive half from NBA stars, especially LeBron James’ game-winning basket, to bring home a 101-100 victory. .
But it was a showdown before the Olympics. So what about the official encounter at the 2024 Olympics?
Now the US team has learned from its mistakes and brought a completely different face.
With a tightened defense and lessons learned from the 100-point match 10 days ago, plus a “tremendous” depth of attack, the US basketball team can no longer let South Sudan surprise them.
A 30-9 run in the first half of the match helped the defending Olympic champion completely take the initiative, then calmly blocked all of the opponent’s upstream efforts to win with a score of 103-86.
The number 1 star of the US team in this match is Bam Adebayo, owner of 18 points with 8-10 FGs. Kevin Durant continued to come off the bench and left an impression, scoring 14 points (8-9 FT). LeBron James contributed 12 points, 7 rebounds and 5 assists to the victory.
Stephen Curry had a forgettable match with only 3 points and 1-8 FG (started the match 0-7 FG), but this is not important because the depth of the US team is too great.
All American players on the field have scores. The only exception is Joel Embiid, who was placed on the bench by coach Steve Kerr and did not play in this match.
One statistic that shows how smoothly the US team operates is that they have 29 assists out of 37 successful shots (the peak is 17 assists for 19 FGM through the first two rounds). And of the 13 3-pointers made in the entire game (13-30 3PT, 43%), 11 shots were assisted with only 2 exceptions being the “solo” shot by Anthony Edwards.
Although coach Steve Kerr’s team still has some aspects that need to be tightened, notably the team’s 15 turnovers (led by LeBron James’ 6 TOs), this was still an impressive performance.
With 2 victories in the group stage, the US team has secured a place in the quarterfinals of the 5×5 men’s basketball event at the 2024 Olympics. Their next team in the final group stage match is Puerto Rico, the match will take place at 10:15 p.m. on August 3.
