Or for those with foxtel can watch it on ESPN.

Anyone got a link to follow the scores/stats in real time? Can't really watch the footage at work.

ESPN website may have the stats...
As its an exhibition game it is unlikely to be on the FIBA website.

Come on Aussies!!!! If we get within 15 - 20 I'll be happy, we may have a few players that surprise them a bit i.e Barlow

Wow, CJ tottaly crossed up JKidd.

Can't seem to find any live scores on line and am unable to watch the feed, would hugely appreciate any score updates or any info people can post, I need something to get me through this afternoon and I'm not going to find it in spreadsheets.

5:26 left in 1st, Aus up 10 - 9.

Newley playing well, Bogut out injured.
Mills just blew by everyone to the hoop and got fouled.

Cant stop the little fella!!!

Sweet move by Mills. Went past CP3

Mills is sparking it up early...he could be a real x factor if they can't stop him getting to the lane.

Anstey with a dunk??

OMFG!


Maybe he will be on a poster after all...

Hahahah!

Mark Worthington checks into the game, and his first contribution - a slap foul on CB4 and he complains to the ref. Good on ya mate, get the elbows out for ya country.

Mills is smoking CP3

Aussies getting sloppy...they were really doing well at getting shots off earlier, can't start giving up the ball that easy..

OMFG...Glen Saville you 'tard...no time left in the quarter and fouls Wade at the 3pt line!

Saville............. $#@%ing retard.........

Millsy.

that tv feed works pretty well if anyone is interested.

Sa - Ville, that was a disgrace..

Fouls Wade on the buzzer after the 3 point attempt.

USA up at the 1/4.

End of First, USA up 22-19.

boomes doing really well - surprising the commentators!
No bogut either....

billo, where are you?

Sigh...not a good start to the quarter there Wortho...

Hahahaha even the Yanks are getting pissed off at Worthington...hilarious.

After what Sav did at the end of the first, why is he still on the court? Just missed a layup.

Saville...you are really not doing yourself any favours here mate. Turnovers, fouls and missed layups? get Newley the F back in...

Saville needs to retire.... tard.....

and hit the side of the backboard on another. *SIGH*

Saville and Worthington looking extremely shabby out there..

DB5, London.

Patty Mills is looking the goods......this kid can play in the NBA for sure

Yeah!

Nice pass from Bruton and Newley got the finish...they're really showing the trying to force turnovers and misses and get the points from the transition.

we gotta stop fouling them on the 3 pt line, i havent seen them hit one in a while!!!
no ball movement for the USA tho which is a good sign for us.

what with all the fouls on the outside jumpshot?

Yeah Goorj would be steamed right now...and now another f*** turnover! as soon as they let these guys get a run, it's gonna be very hard to get back..

USA pressing, we are having problems bringing the ball up, Mills checks in.

and the lead goes from 6 to 9...come on lads, stop making silly mistakes.

starting to get sloppy.

Sigh...they came out looking mean and keen...but starting to look amateurish now.

ahh thought so with the afternoon comment..
Barlow just thought he was back in '04 on consecutive plays.

USA heating up, Aussies sticking with them though.

Commentators keep refering to the "Ostalian spirit, and never back down attitude. They are known for this" comments again and again.

Mills, Newley, Andersen to an extent all looking solid. Anstey okay, although he had to take a 3 attempt.

USA on 10 - 0 run. Up 37 - 25.

Lebron just blocked Worthington about 8 rows back!

Get him off boy goorj!

Sloppy plays, missed shots, Andersen in foul trouble. They're giving USA a real opening here.

44 - 29 at the half.

Lebron with 14 or 15 already...

Boomers doing really well. Missing Bogut a bit but really fording USa into tough contested jump shots. Some TO's alowed them to get a couple of fast break chances that helped them open up a buffer.

The referees have been really bad. And I mean BAD.
Aussies getting hacked and no call, yet you breath on Lebron and a foul gets called.
Go Boomers!

shame its blown out a bit, as stated we started good and mills really looks like he belongs, He needs to look after it a little better though. We really look bad when werthington or barlow has to bring the ball up though. shame we could not have seen bogut out there as well.

He blew past Deron as well.

where was the travel call on lebron?

Fair to say that a team that makes their shots and limits turnovers could have a real crack at knocking the USA off?

Russia and now Aus have shown that the compacted zone limits the USA scoring.

Good updates people, keep them coming.

Sounds like the usual story, we can stick with for a while but soon enough the dam breaks and they unleash a barrage of quick points and blow the thing out. 2nd half will be a great test of our resolve, if we can keep it around 15 and maybe even close the gap a little then that bodes very well for 3 days time, if we drop our heads and cop a hiding then we'll know that things haven't changed enough.

Kent Brockman, yeah....Australia started really well with capitalising off turnovers. Nevermind the blowout games leading up to this game; This USA team is good, but is definitely beatable.

And woot! big run by the Boomers to get it back to 40-46...

If the US continue to play this way Spain is walking away with the gold

44 - 48

Why would you call a time out for them???

6 mins to go in the 3rd, USA 48 Australia 44

good comeback maybe a win?

if they won i would shout the whole bloody bar

I'd have to agree with that TR. America is stacked talent wise, no doubt. But as a team, currently they really aren't coping with the pressure Australia is applying. The commentators have even made numerous references to how much of a competitive nature the Boomers have.

When the Boomers were making some sloppy plays, America just waltzed in for easy buckets. When Australia is hitting their shots and applying defensive pressure, the USA's productivity takes a big slide.

Commentary is pretty good. A lot of people blindly have a go at them, being seppos and all, but Fran Fraschilla is quite knowledgeable.

Our commentary on here good, theres is poor. Very biased.

USA take their first time out of the tournament.

bully, you jinxed us with that 'w' word...

The commentary is very good. They seem to have a real good knowledge of the Australian players, even those who aren't playing in Europe or college.

hahaha...

they were surprised Anstey hit a 3. Obviously never seen a Melbourne Tigers game =D

my bad peeps lol

Newley showing a lot of effort...Barlow is making some good plays in the second half aswell (even if he is criminally slow)

Mills, Barlow and Anstey playing well in 2nd half.
Boomers within 9 point late in 3rd

ingles in

Good to see that D-Whistle already has the refs on his side

Been a good effort from the Boomers so far. The refs seem determined to bail out the NBA stars though - Kobe earlier in the 3rd and D-Wade just then. I don't see our guys getting any of those soft calls!

Commentators just talking about how Kidd and Kobe have never lost in intl play again. I have to say that streak will come to a grinding halt pretty soon if this is all the USA got! Nothing impressive about their performance tonight!

Anstey hammered under the rim first play in the 4th - no call! Aaargh!

It's Anstey...... hard fouls are allowed by opposition players.

I think the most overrated player Ive seen is Melo. Dont rate his game at all.

Don't leave the Melo-man, or he'll build you a house!

Melo brick...
Howard brick...
Kobe brick...
Lebron brick...

Can anyone on Team USA shoot the ball? If it wasn't for D-Wade in the past few minutes, they wouldn't have got close to scoring!

Foul throws are going to haunt us here.

We should run Mills, CJ, Newley, Nielsen, Andersen from now.

massive 3 form ingles

What the F happened with the Anderson tip in and 1? Call goes against us again

There goes D.Andersen. Solid game from him despite foul trouble.

Score?

84-68 USA.

its a commercial atm

Team OVER-RATED lead by 16 with about a minute to go...

Is this the closest score wise we have ever got to the US?

saville should not be in the team

70 vs 84

Yeah, this American team is beatable, no doubt. Spain and Greece will give them a run for their money.

Mills has been very good...13 pts, and has been too quick for the defense.

74 vs 86

D-Whistle again..... dude is a charity case

Mills perfect step back, and perfect flop.

NBA contract awaits.


In all seriosness, he has played awesome.

It's all over. 87-76, good show by the Boomers.

they won by 11

76 vs 87. end

DB5 - agreed. If he keeps improving, I can see him entering the draft before his college career is done, easily.

Really proud of the guys, again.



Ah, Millsy :D

really happy with that game, for the most part we held our own and it was good that we did not drop our heads when we were getting blown out. Mills belongs, anderson was good and was surprised with CJ. shame bogut could not have played, it would have been to help the team mesh. bring on the games.

If Mills has a good upcoming season he will probably nominate for the draft. He could even end up a lottery pick in 09 at this rate!

I'm so proud of the Boomers tonight - and to do it without Bogut as well

An honourable 11-point loss.

Mills was awesome. He repeatedly schooled CP3 and Kidd on his way to 11 points on 5/7 shooting. He got it done by taking it to the rack.

Barlow was very god in the second half, and Newley was great the entire game.

Ando and Neilson played well and CJ was solid.

We are a real medal chance in Beijing, but it won't be easy. We just have to beat Croatia in the first game.

I think you guys have it wrong. USA is legit, they are stil the best team in the world. The fact of the matter is that we have a strong team and Goorj has done a great job preparing them.

We were beating Argentina (Ranked #2) by 19, lost by 4. We lost to USA (Ranked #1) by 11.

Chin up people. Real medal hopes!

shocking refs

but yeah i am so suprised at how well we played, considering there was no Bogut!. An olympic medal is very realistic.

Fantastic game Boomers!!! So proud of them. With Bogut playing Andersons minutes we would have been in it.

Everyone played well I thought except Anderson who was very very average, Saville, and Redhage but only because he didnt get much of a run.

Some of the subbing totally baffled me though.

GO BOOMERS!!!

As everyone else has said, really proud of the boys, especially without Bogut. They showed their D is up to standard and with another offensive option and maybe the odd call from the refs (who were terrible), we could give them a real show!

Perhaps even more importantly... Will this result get any run in the papers or on the news back here in Aus?

Kad - who knows. It may be that USA just weren't focused; but for my money, if they play like that against the real gold medal threats, they look quite vulnerable. Even the commentators pointed out; the USA just overpowers other teams.

Skill wise, yes they are the best. But team wise at an international level? they have to prove it as far as I'm concerned. I think everyone still thinks that Team USA is as good as the original Dream Team. What people don't realise is a lot of European countries have caught up, at an international competition level anyhow.

Does anyone know if this is the closest loss we have ever had vs the USA?

As I recall it is, can anyone confirm?

Haha.. D Whistle

How annoying where those in game replays.

i think people will start uttering australia under there breathe when they talk about medal hopefuls now

Here's my take for an encouraging game without the Bogey Man:

- Good overall D except for in part there was too much ball pressure on the likes of D Whistle who we know is a very incosistent shooter, yet one of the best penetrators in the world, then we let Chris Paul hit 8 ft jump shots with no pressure!

- Turnovers by us were soft, there were only a few T/O's that came from USA's real hustle and atheletcism, the others all came from our shite passes and not protecting the ball after a rebound - hello Anstey!?

- 2nd chance points - It was brick city (as usual) from 3pt line bar Kobe and all their three balls were long, yet we only cleaned up about two of them in the 4th after they had scored about 12 points from those offensive boards.

- Refs, well I think that has been covered enough. A lot of soft stuff against us, but we rarely got the hard stuff called for us, very frustrating!

- I was really pleased to see to confidence and agression in the 3rd and 4th. When we drove hard to the hole, Barlow and Newley got there easily and also opened it up for jump shots. If Saville could hit the side of a house with his shots then it might have been closer again.

- 2nd quarter killed us when we had bad comibinations on the floor, all the confidence and strong play went out the window and we played like a bunch of awestruck, soft school girls. Take it hard and get rewarded with the foul! The couple of times the US doubled on the block and almost at half way, the Aussies showed their nouse and got people wide open.

Overall, great effort and with the help of some soft passes from us and some favourable and soft reffing, the USA limped to an 11 point win.

All very encouraging after almost taking down the mighty Argentina - c'mon though, we should have won that - who lets Luis Scoula score 28 in the 2nd half!!! Isn't that what Redhage is for? i.e. elbow to the head so he is seeing 4 Yao Ming's??? ;P

What's everyone's thoughts on Andersen?

I thought he looked a class above (more so in the first) than the rest of the aussies. The fouls he got, that kept him out were IMO soft and won't be whistled during the olympics.

I read above that people didn't rate his game, and my mates i watched the game with said the same.

I thought he would've been amongst our best

Anderson was our worst I though. He was dominated by their "bigs" and gave too many turnovers. He struggled against an athletic team. I was very happy to see him leave the floor whenever he did.

You're right on about 2nd qtr Cavolo. That was where we lost it and it was because Goorj decided to run some odd lineups. Disappointing from my point of view. I would have preferred us to play to win. But not critical of Goorj overall after tonight. The guys are really starting to play with some purpose and look like a team out there, so good work Boy Goorj!

I didn't think Anderson was too bad. He is still our second best rebounder and post defender IMO. He has been copping a lot of soft fouls though, so he clearly needs to adjust to the way the intl game is being called. I really like it when he is able to face up for mid range jumpers, because he is absolutely automatic in that situation. Like Anstey though, he has to resist being goaded into putting the ball on the floor unless it is a one on one in the post.

Despite LeBron travelling every time he touched the ball tonight, I only saw one travel called all game, and that was on us!! This is supposed to be international Basketball, so why aren't they calling the travels?

kad are you serious, team usa is legit??

USA beat Russia by 20, Spain beat Russia by over 30...nowhere near legit.

i got my money on greece to embarrass the absoloute shit out of team usa. Their defense and offense struggled tonight. Big ups to the boomers, really proud of their effort on the defensive end.

Team USA have no true power forward, the closest is boozer and he is the 11th man. they will struggle like hell against a big team like greece.

patty mills proved he is NBA material, impressed me beyond my expectations.

BTW am i the only person who believes anderson is a hack? he is a goof that holds the ball for too long at the top of the key and has a sloppy post up game. I'd have anstey and nielson over him any day.

Ando was solid but certainly had the fumles a bit int his game

Link to stats, interviews and more: http://linky.com.au/1zage

Well, end result was brilliant; another game however where poor passing and incorrect team selection cost the game.

I don't know how the likes of Glen Saville get into the national teams when they produced anything viable in the time they've been selected.

Andersen was a defensive boon only; didn't see anything that says he played in europe. Got double-teamed more often then I would have liked but he appeared to have been fumbling etc. more often than none. Hopefully he hops back to the level he normally plays.

Commentating in the game was interesting; I was actually interested the fluctuation of comments that were passing by: one minute you have Kobe getting fouled at the 3 line (followed by the usual buttering about how physical we are etc.) then an immediate "choking" as Patty Mills goes coast to coast. Probably the first game I've seen the commentary not butter up the US team and picking out every flaw of the opposition.

Despite the loss, probably one of the best performances the boomers have shown in a long time. Proof to me that even Australia can beat the US.

I thought the commentary was great , they obviously researched the Ossie team very well.

Made some comments about CJ that i had forgotten like his aborted div1 college attempt

made notes about worthington and redhage, talked up the success of the AIS programme.

Surely teams will start talking to Mills straight away. Parker has shown that small guards that get to the rim have a game in the NBA. And from this game you could argue that Mills is quicker than Parker.

de aussies did ok but y'all gotta realise dat de migty USA hav not let go der nukes yet !!! de migty USA r savin der nukes til de medal rouns so r content ta win by only 20pts or so fer now !!!!

Man... Reading a "playa" post is liking trying to interpret a Kevin Garnett post finals interview.

Kent; I agree with you mate. I think we need to get Patty Mills practicing the classic Campese Goose-step maneuver on the court. Despite his height, he overtook Paul, Kidd and Williams with no troubles at all; and his height made him deceptive when he went for the layup. Noticed Mills threw up a couple of nice teardrops too.

By all accounts, Mills would make a top notch starting guard for any team. The game last night took me back to the days of Isaih Thomas.

(Mod: Nice work re KG comment.)

honestly, I don't think USA really tried. when they decided to heat things up a little (eg. kobe stips off barlow) they'll just go off straight at you.

I definitely think Pat's got the potential to make NBA but he's got a lot of work to do. tonight really weren't that great showing of USA defense, especially in the backcourt, they hardly put their arms up!

The way Pat played tonight were more forcing point, 5-11 FG and 1 assist, you know the guy's just trying to score. especially international games are more traditional where you expect point guards to make more plays than score.

Exciting stuff. But no media about it here yet?

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/08/06/2325384.htm?site=olympics/2008

you all read about what Kobe has to say about AUS and notice how he said "they are extremely well coached", in my books Goorijian is the best coach Australia have now and perhaps ever had. so those disclaimers about him read!

I agree with S30 though, USA backcourt d didn't show.

Good coverage on the ESPN site and a couple of local news sources. Hit John Rillie's site for his thoughts and links to a couple of US blogs too.

When the US players miss shots, it can be so ugly - clunk, clunk, clunk.

Respectable performance from the Boomers and they should be proud of themselves. Take out the two quick turnovers from Barlow, silly fouls on long bombs, plus at least one travel that should've been called, and you have a very close game.

Have to step it up for the official games though. Looking forward to it.

Not gonna comment on the game other than to say I thought we played really well - everything else has been said

What I am gonna comment on is the coverage ... I think without doubt the worst coverage of basketball I have ever seen - and I watched the NBL in the early 90's on 10 ... "Turnover Time".

Everytime there was a dunk they switched to replay of the dunk - everytime. As the action was going on in the background we get to see a replay of Melo throwing it down. You would then hear the crowd go "ohhhh" and you would have no idea what they were cheering about.

In half court sets they would switch to Coach K on the sidelines for 3 or 4 seconds as the game was being played. It was doing my head in as bad as playa's terrible posts.

But then no replays for conterversial fouls/no calls (the D-Wade 3, a number of half court steals, Andersen's tip at the end) ... just more shots of Coach K looking more like Emperor Palpatine every day.

I have vented - it was just so frustrating to watch - great game though, commentary was very good.

The ref's were terrible too. Question - were they Yank refs or International refs that will call the games in the Olympics? They called it more NBA than FIBA.

Interesting reading ESPN's take on the game. Described the win as "ugly" and "exposing USA's flaws".

Chris Sheridan describes Patty Mills as "the fastest player I've seen since Allen Iverson was a roookie" - man, that's a huge wrap considering Parker, TJ Ford and Chris Paul have all come into the league since then.

Basically said that the Boomers ability to spread the floor and swing the ball led to open shots and that Team USA's defence was exposed and "awful". Credit to Goorgian.

The game was encouraging but frustrating - some painfully bad passing leading to open dunks and fouls you would drag an under 18 player for.

Still - great write up on ESPN for Mills and the Boomers. Well done.

Someone chopped the game up and threw it on the youtubes

http://www.youtube.com/user/FilmTV4

oh boooo, only part one is up :(

Those two turnovers on Barlow gave me the shits, I don't think it was his fault though. CJ was on the court and should have demanded it and taken the ball from the baseline every time. If CJ or Mills are on the court no-one else should bring the ball down.

Well coached by Boy Goorj, that stacked zone worked wonders when the US couldn't hit the side of the barn.

The only downside was Sav, he didn't have a great year for the Kings this year, and seems to have lost a little bit of athleticism, which was his key, because he has never been a great shooter. I think Ingles, Newley & Barlow will (should) take his minutes.

Everyone else who got on court did their job, and I thought we got hosed on some calls especially in the first half, it seemed to even out more in the second half.

Looks good for the Boomers for the games, lets hope we get our first ever medal. BOOMERS FOR BRONZE!

"USA hav not let go der nukes yet"

Is Playa suggesting the USA shot poorly because they have been off-loading their supply of scud missiles, or is he suggesting the Chinese security regime won't be able to protect the athletes during the Olympic Games?

The USA team are carrying nukes!!!!!!!!!!!! and I thought drug cheats were the biggest concern for the Olympic Committee....I'm so naive.

"Maybe that's what they learned Tuesday on an evening when they entered the arena feeling bold and self-assured and left it pondering why they were made to look only slightly above-average against a mediocre team missing its only NBA player."

Hahaha, what an ignorant ass comment. For multiple reason:

1: How can the 9th best team (according to the last olympics) in the world be mediocre? Mediocre would be the 20th best, 30th best etc.

2: "Slightly above average" - they didn't look above average at all. Aside from a couple of nice dunks, they were leaving our players open, throwing up bricks, missing foul shots and they couldn't even keep up with Patty Mills. Their performance was average at best.

3: "Only NBA player" - Currently, yes; but Newley got drafted, Andersen is being courted by Atlanta, Anstey played 3 seasons. Andersen plays with one of the best Euroleague teams. Patty Mills was an impressive college freshman.

yeah...Pat speed, he's full of speed definitely one of the fastest player I've seen .well I don't know about Iverson...he probably has the fastest move but Barbosa's probably fastest player as far as sprint

can anyone find a link to a box score. Espn & Foxsports don't have one.

SVD, totally agree with you about the coverage in terms of visuals. There were a lot of iffy calls I would have liked to see again on replay. And there was amateur stuff like running an extreme closeup on Mills when they were talking him up and then the director failing to cut back to the main court shot when the action started again! All we got was an out of focus Mills sprinting off camera! Nice one boys!

To The Doctor: I'd add Rajon Rondo to the players you mentioned as quick NBA guards. He, TJ Ford and Parker would be the quickest guys in the league I reckon and Mills is right there with them.

Mills isn't quite at the same skill level yet, but with good coaching and hard work I see no reason why he can't get to the same level within a couple of years.

If our core guys keep improving over the next few years, how good could we be for the next Olympics?!
Starting five of Bogut, Jawai, Barlow, Newley, Mills with Ingles, Ogilvy and Anderson key players off the bench. We may just grab our first senior mens medal in the next few years!

Flinders 24

http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/summer08/basketball/men/boxscore?gameId=729

You studying at Flinders Uni by any chance?

No - it was just the 'Random name suggestion for anonymous posters'

cheers for the link.

The umpiring was poor. Right at the start you could see it was going to be called in favour of one team, and if the US players still can't see that, then they will repeat the same mistakes as their last few campaigns.
One example that made me swear at the start.
On of our guys (Newley I think) is on the fast break, he goes to the ring and is pulled down with both arms by Jason Kidd. Us players congratulate him on a good foul etc.. 2 shots to Newley.
20 seconds later EXACT same thing at the other end and is called an unsportsmen like foul! 2 shots + side ball.

I really hope the Olympic refs call it properly and the US get what they deserve.

Cat15, I was just watching some of the 1st quarter again and that was Anderson getting fouled under the basket by Kidd. Difficult to tell exactly what contact there was because of the poor quality video, but it looked like a foul to me and its hard to imagine how Kidd could have cleanly blocked Anderson in that position.

Just before that play, Anderson was also fouled when he tried to receive the ball in the post, but because we retained possession they let it go. Never mind the fact that our offense was disrupted and Anderson was prevented from posting up the shorter Lebron!

Anderson had a shocker IMO, so many turnovers and missed shots which I'd expect a guy like that to make. Don't get me wrong, I think he's usually a very good player, just didn't have a good night.

Mills is the sh*t. Super exciting and awesome to watch. Made Paul look slow and Kidd even slower. Him and Bruton form a damn good PG combo.

Really liked Newley's game. Nice commentating as well - early in the game, "Newley doesn't have a lot of athleticism to him", then later on after he almost gets the break-away dunk and should have got the and-1, "He's showing great athleticism from his 6'6" size". Which one is it?

Did anyone hear the commentator compare Newley to Fred Hoiberg? What an insult.

How much does St Mary's love our Patty Mills???

Check it out: http://linky.com.au/zbf92

How much does St Mary's love our Patty Mills???

Check it out: http://linky.com.au/zbf92

Its almost a pity Mills is so good, means we wont get to see him in the NBL...Im sure he would look great in a sixers outfit.
I cant believe how he just ran past them all, cple of fast breaks with the ball he ended up 2 metres infront absolutely amazing guy to watch be great to see him in a few years!!

dont take those compliments "too" seriously. you guys ever hear US commentator say shits about other teams? they wouldn't to make US team sound even better when they win.