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Thread: It's Gold

  1. #61
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Quote Originally Posted by VaDukie View Post
    I hate to burst everyone's bubble, but the prophets that grace the holy land that is Inside Carolina have determined that we were terribly coached and in general out executed tonight.

    Well sorry guys but when I hear that this stuff is going on I defend Coach K and Duke. Sounds like some people believe we are all winners and will get a juice box and a snack when the game is over.

    I only compared Coach K to UNC coaches because many UNC fans hold out the 5 > 3 thing and that Roy > K, so they think.

    RIDukie you missed Georgia Tech: Bosh

  2. #62
    Quote Originally Posted by Olympic Fan View Post
    Bobby Knight also has three NCAA titles and an Olympic Gold. He won in 1984, when the USSR and most of the tough Eastern European teams boycotted.
    I've often wondered how that 1984 team would've done in a non-boycotted Olympics. Yes, they were collegians, but that might've been the most impressive collection of college basketball talent ever assembled. That was the team with Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, Chris Mullin, et al. That team was so loaded that future Dream Teamers Charles Barkley and John Stockton were cut during the trials. All of their games were pretty much blowouts, and I have to think they'd have handled themselves well against the Soviets, too.

    Trivia question -- outside of the U.S. team, who are the only two basketball players who received a medal at the 1984 Olympics who later played in the NBA?

    Hint: One of the players won two more medals in subsequent Olympic games, one of which he won while playing for a different country. His name is one you'll likely recognize, while the other is pretty obscure. The two players also share an unfortunate common bond. Answers are below in hidden text.












    Drazen Petrovic -- won bronze with Yugoslavia in 1984, then won silver with Yugoslavia in 1988 and another silver with Croatia in 1992; played four seasons in the NBA with the Portland Trailblazers and New Jersey Nets from 1989-1993.

    Fernando Martin -- won silver with Spain in 1984; played in 24 games for the Portland Trailblazers in the 1986-87 season.

    Both men died in car accidents before they turned 30.

  3. #63
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    Feb 2008
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    Lewisville, NC
    Quote Originally Posted by Tom B. View Post
    I've often wondered how that 1984 team would've done in a non-boycotted Olympics. Yes, they were collegians, but that might've been the most impressive collection of college basketball talent ever assembled. That was the team with Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, Chris Mullin, et al. That team was so loaded that future Dream Teamers Charles Barkley and John Stockton were cut during the trials.




    So loaded that Johnny Dawkins didn't make the team, but was an alternate.

  4. #64
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    Feb 2007
    Location
    Washington, D.C.
    This was a three-year (summers at least) effort to provide an environment where experts in one game could learn another sufficiently such that those who are expert in that other game will not be able to use that advantage to beat the US at what is supposed to be our game but as played in the Olympics is not.

    Creating an environment in which super star millionaires could grow and learn in this fashion is unprecedented.

    Had K not been up to that task, the US in all likelihood would not have one gold. Bobby and El Deano, great as they were, were fungible. There was no blueprint to follow for this adventure. K, Colangelo (much as I do not like the guy), and the other coaches, deserve great respect for a job well done.

    Two other things. I think that the Duke assistants probably deserve much more props than anyone is giving them. If I asked all you guys to lie down and put your right hand "over your head", we'd have right hands all over the place--in front of faces, extending to the ceiling, extending to the wall behind, over the head in halo fashion. The Duke assistants were available to make sure that players "got" what K said to them. Communication: don't underestimate the difficulty when it comes to transferring words into specific action.

    Lastly, people ask if this experiment will change the NBA. My guess, definitely. The best of the best got oh so much smarter, learned a new game, and had a terrific time playing it as a team and enjoying the experience of a lifetime. How can this not impact on the league dramatically.

    K continues to impress. Someone else probably could have done the job also. K stepped up and got it done. Hats off to him!

  5. #65
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    Feb 2007
    Location
    Raleigh, NC
    "That team was so loaded that future Dream Teamers Charles Barkley and John Stockton were cut during the trials."

    Barkley wasn't cut because he wasn't good enough. Knight couldn't stand him. The U.S. kept Jeff Turner instead. Yes, that Jeff Turner.

    Knight also kept his Steve Alford over Stockton and Dawkins. So, as good as that '84 team was, it could have been better.

  6. #66
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    Feb 2008
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    Lewisville, NC
    Quote Originally Posted by jimsumner View Post
    "That team was so loaded that future Dream Teamers Charles Barkley and John Stockton were cut during the trials."

    Barkley wasn't cut because he wasn't good enough. Knight couldn't stand him. The U.S. kept Jeff Turner instead. Yes, that Jeff Turner.

    Knight also kept his Steve Alford over Stockton and Dawkins. So, as good as that '84 team was, it could have been better.
    Well, Barkley turned out to be a great player, but I don't necessarily criticize Knight for his choice, or for choosing Alford either. Team chemistry is very important. A coach does, and should, have considerable discretion in making some of those personnel choices. The best 12 players does not necessarily make the best team.

  7. #67
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    Feb 2007
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    Washington, D.C.

    Next Time

    Quote Originally Posted by greybeard View Post
    This was a three-year (summers at least) effort to provide an environment where experts in one game could learn another sufficiently such that those who are expert in that other game will not be able to use that advantage to beat the US at what is supposed to be our game but as played in the Olympics is not.
    As I understand it, international rules are changing to use a lane and three-point line very similar or the same as those used in the NBA. Personally, I'd rather see the NBA change.

    Either way, in four years the games will be much more similar.

  8. #68
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    Feb 2007
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    Washington, D.C.
    Quote Originally Posted by MChambers View Post
    As I understand it, international rules are changing to use a lane and three-point line very similar or the same as those used in the NBA. Personally, I'd rather see the NBA change.

    Either way, in four years the games will be much more similar.
    Interesting. Thanks. I avoided mentioning above my favorite topic, the soccer influence on the sport. As I've mentioned (you think), D'A built the Suns offense around soccer concepts and those steeped in soccer culture (notice his first pick for the Knicks), and K daringly changed his entire offensive scheme last year to take what he had learned from D'A and had Duke creating inside-out play, soccer style.

    Kobe was a natural for that style, but the other guys not so much. What you will see much more of around the NBA as a consequence of these stars' experience is quick one-two passing combinations, penetration to the lane as a means of creating inside-out play as opposed to passing it inside to do so, and, the use of the pass out and away from the basket as an offensive weapon rather than just a reset.

    These features, in my opinion, will make the US game much less star-laddened, and much more interesting to play and watch.

    Again, this undertaking by K and the others was a smashing success that I believe will equip the leaders of the NBA game to improve the product, perhaps significantly.

  9. #69
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Wake Forest
    Great article on the front page of today's Raleigh News & Observer.
    Coach Mike Krzyzewski led the U.S. men's Olympic basketball team back to the mountaintop Sunday in China. Team USA survived a scare from Spain and won the gold medal.

    After its 118-107 victory on the final day of the Olympics, you would have thought this band of NBA superstars was a college team. They teased. They hugged. They danced. At the suggestion of LeBron James, all 12 players came to the postgame news conference instead of just one.

    And so we finally had the answer to the question of whether a college coach at Duke could manage a team of multimillionaire pros to Olympic gold. He could -- by turning them into kids again.

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