USA hoops: what do we think of this?

I don't necessarily mean UNI, but the concept...

UNI Men’s Basketball Team To Represent United States At 2007 World University Games

Cedar Falls, Iowa – The University of Northern Iowa men’s basketball team has been chosen to represent the United States of America at the World University Games, Aug. 7-18, in Bangkok, Thailand.

In past World University Games (also known as “Universiade”), USA Basketball (the sport of basketball’s governing body) has selected teams comprised of collegiate players to compete in the event, which is held every two years. However, USA Basketball elected not to organize a team this year, and worked with Basketball Travelers, Inc., to find a team to compete in this summer’s World University Games.

UNI will take an 11-member squad to Thailand: Seniors Eric Coleman, Jared Josten and Adam Viet; juniors Travis Brown and Carlton Reed; sophomores Kwadzo Ahelegbe, Jordan Eglseder, Brian Haak and Adam Koch; and redshirt freshmen Kerwin Dunham and Josh Molstead. Only players who were enrolled at UNI during the 2006-07 academic year are eligible to participate.

 

I think last year's Florida team would have represented us better. Horford could technically play for the U.S.

 

Losing by 40 points per game. How inspirational. How patriotic.

 

It seems to convey how little interest we have in the World University Games, which other countries will probably find insulting.

 

I'm not so sure about that. We'll see, I guess. USA won gold at this event in 2005, so it will be interesting to see what happens this time.

 

The 2005 roster:
Greg Brunner
Randy Foye
Mike Gansey
Vincent Grier
Matt Haryasz
Chris Hernandez
Eric Hicks
Bobby Jones
Gerry McNamara
Craig Smith
Patrick Sparks
Shelden Williams

Not exactly an NCAA All-Star team, but probably a team that would contend for most major BCS conference titles.

But the US went 8-0, averaged 93.5 ppg and gave up 63.6, so BAD BAD BAD.

 

Well, that was kind of my point in couching the choice of UNI. I'm more interested in the opinions of sending a *team* rather than a group of "all-stars."

Let's say UNI wins gold, even if not as convincingly as the 2005 group. Does it tip us off that maybe sending a superior *team* is the way for USA Basketball to go rather than these conglomerations?

 

The problem with this theory is... which good NBA team is comprised of Americans only?

 

Wasn't last year's NBA champ?

Even when that's not the case, you can always fill a few spots.

 

GUIDING PHILOSOPHY OF USA BASKETBALL:

It's good to win, but not by very many points, because that hurts the other teams' feelings.

Let's figure out some way to send a team that can win, only not by very many points -- we can send pros who half-ass it, who don't want to try hard, we can send pro coaches who are obsesssed with controlling game pace and whose ideal of a perfect game is winning 53-51, we can send "hardworking" college "amateurs" (har-de-har har) instead of pros, we can send mediocre college teams instead of collections of stars -- we can figure something out.

If UNI, a slightly-above-average (19-13) team in a slightly-below-average D-I conference, ends up winning the tournament, undoubtedly we can dig up some 8-25 Div. II team that can "represent the U.S." more accurately next time. Maybe a 3-28 junior college team?

Of course, three-quarters of the time, these brilliant strategies backfire and we end up getting fed shit sandwiches, but at least we're not hurting anybody's feelings by winning games 122-82 very often.

 

Is it Grinnell that runs the old Loyola Marymount "run and shoot until somebody dies" offense?

Shoulda sent them.

 

Another guiding principle of USA Hoops:

"If your top guys can't win against the world anyways, don't make your national pro product look weaker than it already does. Just send the JV squad, and save everyone - especially David Stern - the hassle"