A wise man once said “Ain’t no need to watch where I’m going, just need to know where I’ve been.” Okay, maybe it wasn’t Newton or Aristotle or Einstein. Maybe it wasn’t even Paul the Octopus or the inside of a fortune cookie. Maybe it was just Mater (voiced by Larry the Cable Guy), the rusted tow truck from Cars. If I’ve learned one thing in life it’s to never get involved in a land war in Asia. But number two on that list would be that Pixar knows their shit. So, in the spirit of heeding all things Pixar, it might be wise to look back at the (very busy) summer of 2010 before jumping into the NBA season. Lost amidst LeBron’s decision, the return of the National Football League, a fantastic season of Mad Men and my burgeoning love affair with Arian Foster were the 2010 FIBA World Championships. That’s right, summer basketball. Very important summer basketball. Summer basketball at the end of which they gave out these fancy things called gold medals. Fortunately for this fine country, Kevin Durant and Team USA were not so easily distracted by Arian’s excellent vision and powerful, decisive cuts and restored order to the (basketball) universe in Turkey last week. Team USA won the world championships for the first time since 1994 by defeating Turkey in the gold medal game 81-64. The Americans won their elimination games by an average of nearly 25 points per game and played only one close game (against Brazil) in the entire tournament. They did all of this without a true center, prolific outside shooting or a creative force at point guard. It was the exact sort of lineup composition that failed in previous incarnations of Team USA. Why did it work this year? And can anything be learned from a tournament that features Kirk Penney and Hamed Haddadi as 20ppg scorers?
If ESPN commentator Fran Fraschilla told me once then he told me a thousand times, the international game is different than the NBA game. <RANT> Seriously, a thousand times. Not a whole lot of dexterity to Fran’s announcing game. It’s conceivable that he wasn’t even watching the games and ESPN recorded his clichés and “expert” analysis pre-tournament and played them according to the flow of the game Madden video game style. Thank goodness international basketball only comes around once every two years. </RANT> Since FIBA allows zone defenses, good shooters are at a premium in the international game because of the defense’s ability to clog the paint against big men and guards slashing to the basket. Skilled, mobile, versatile big men are similarly valued. Of all the players on the American roster, it seemed like Kevin Love was best suited to the international game and, more specifically, for the 2010 roster of Team USA. He was the best rebounder on an undersized team, an excellent outlet passer on a team that wanted to run in transition and a player who could play the center position but also stretch the floor on offense with his jump-shooting. Despite fitting the FIBA game perfectly and being the second most productive player on the American roster, Kevin Love played the tenth most minutes for Team USA. Coach Mike Krzyzewski would have been roundly criticized for his rotation decisions if the USA did not come home with the gold. But they did. And despite my general hatred for Duke and Krzyzewski, perhaps Love’s limited time did not showcase coaching incompetence but revealed an actual game plan from Team USA. Maybe Krzyzewski and Jerry Colangelo stopped focusing on the differences in the FIBA game and remembered that FIBA basketball is still basketball. Even the American B-Team will have the most talent in any international tournament and should be able to dictate to opponents if properly coached and organized.
“You had to give it to him, he had a plan. And it started to make sense, in a Tyler sort of way. No fear. No distractions. The ability to let that which does not matter truly slide.” Narrator from Fight Club
No matter the level of basketball, defense wins championships. The Lakers and Celtics slugged their way to the NBA Finals last year behind excellent defensive efforts throughout the playoffs. Specifically, the Lakers are NBA champions despite finishing 24th in the NBA in three-point field goal percentage during the regular season. The Lakers strength was their length on defense, clogging up the paint with interior size and contesting opposing three point shooters on the perimeter. Team USA had no interior presence like Andrew Bynum or Pau Gasol but Krzyzewski used similar tactics. The Americans used their biggest asset, length and athleticism on the wings, to clog passing lanes, force turnovers and shut down their opponents’ three point shooting threats. If the other team is not shooting well it matters less that only Kevin Durant can be relied on to consistently knock down jump shots (his teammates went 4-20 from three in the gold medal game). Instead of more minutes for Kevin Love, Krzyzewski leaned heavily on (Laker) Lamar Odom, whose interior defense far surpasses Love’s best effort and was an integral part in stabilizing the team’s defensive rotations. Eric Gordon and Stephen Curry saw less time as the tournament went on despite being normally reliable shooters because Russell Westbrook changed games with his defensive intensity off the bench. Andre Iguodala, he of the 5.7 ppg, was one of the ten best players in the tournament because of his excellent defensive effort. Without the services of the Redeem Teamers, Colangelo and Krzyzewski crafted an actual team with defined roles. This was not a repeat of 2004 when a USA team featuring Iverson, Marbury, Boozer and a very young LeBron, Carmelo, D-Wade trio (unsurprisingly) struggled defensively and underachieved. The powers that be finally figured out that putting together a team of nine scorers and a couple of big men is not the right way to go, that balance is essential even on an international All-Star team. Even considering this improved decision-making of USA basketball, one player made this team work. Being a student of the game, Coach Kzryzewski surely knows that one superstar can significantly alter the outcome of a game. It's true in high school, college, NBA and FIBA basketball. Pick-up games every day are swung because of the difference of one elite player. Kevin Durant was the difference at the 2010 Worlds.
The USA brought one of its’ top fifteen players to Turkey. LeBron, Kobe and Wade are still better than Durant. Dwight Howard’s skills are more unique. Chris Paul and Deron Williams would have been perfect fits at the point guard position. But of any of the top fifteen players, Kevin Durant was the ideal player to lead this team. He fit in with the other young players on the squad and was undoubtedly hungrier than his fellow superstars (who already won Olympic gold in 2008). He added the requisite shooting to render zone defenses ineffective and was long enough to play power forward and contribute to Team USA’s unofficial philosophy of speed and length at every position. Much has been written about the Next Great Hope and Anti-LeBron, and more will be said before the year begins (here among other places). But it might be prudent to remember that LeBron led an ordinary Cavaliers team to the NBA Finals around the same age as Durant is now. He demolished a Pistons team that had won an NBA championship the same way Durant demolished…ummm…Hedo Turkoglu, Ersan Ilyasova and Omer Asik? Yeah, slow the KD gravy train down. That said; if one thing can be taken away from a tournament that saw Luis Scola post stat lines straight from an NBA Jam game, it’s that Kevin Durant will win the 2011 NBA MVP. And that the Lakers better watch out. I see a Thunderstorm on the horizon.
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