{"id":7513,"date":"2010-09-12T10:16:52","date_gmt":"2010-09-12T15:16:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=7513"},"modified":"2010-09-12T10:16:52","modified_gmt":"2010-09-12T15:16:52","slug":"fiba-world-championship-game-preview-with-free-picks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/fiba-world-championship-game-preview-with-free-picks-7513\/","title":{"rendered":"FIBA World Championship Game Preview With Free Picks"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The US managed a 15 point win against Lithuania.\u00a0 My prediction was 9, and it would have been 9 or even closer if not for the US shutting down Linas Klieza, who has had his way with everyone else.\u00a0 Durant also had a monster game with 38 points, and Odom notched a double double (13 pts, 10 rebs).\u00a0 Turkey will present a different set of problems.\u00a0 They have a great perimeter game with Turkoglu leading the offense, and can also dump it inside to Ilyasova or Asik.\u00a0 Ilyasova, a forward for the Milwaukee Bucks, is leading the Turks in scoring at 14.3 ppg, and will probably be the defensive assignment of either Durant or Iguodala.\u00a0 It would make sense for it to be Iguodala, so Durant can be saved for offensive duties.\u00a0 Coach K has been playing his bench liberally, but I would be surprised to see Durant play any less than 35 minutes in the championship game.\u00a0 He has been far and away the best player for the US and whether or not they can win the gold medal depends on how well he performs.<\/p>\n

It will be up to Odom to slow down Omer Asik, who leads the Turks in rebounding.\u00a0 Odom will have to do his best to keep Asik off the offensive glass.\u00a0\u00a0 Asik, truthfully, could thrive in the NBA because he is tough enough to battle the bigger centers inside.\u00a0 The US might end up playing Tyson Chandler a few more minutes to counter Asik\u2019s size.\u00a0 Playing Tyson Chandler doesn\u2019t bode well for the US because he is an offensive liability.\u00a0 When Chandler plays, his man often wanders on defense, as it isn\u2019t necessary to cover him on most plays.\u00a0 It will be an interesting development to see how Coach K handles the minutes at center.<\/p>\n

Turkey just survived what was only their second close game (the other being a freak occurrence in a two point victory over Puerto Rico) in beating Serbia by one point.\u00a0 So what I am getting at here is that Turkey hasn\u2019t often been tested in close games against quality opponents.\u00a0 That might work against them versus a team that is so good at closing out games.\u00a0 Who would you rather take a clutch shot for your team, Hedo Turkoglu or Kevin Durant?\u00a0 But will the game even be that close?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s really tough to gauge this one.\u00a0 I am going to say that the US wins this match by between 6 and 9 points.\u00a0 Durant will ultimately prove to be too much for Turkey (as he has for every team so far) and no one has really found a way to slow him down.\u00a0 His speed combined with his length makes him so difficult for opponents to cover, because he can get his shot off at any time.\u00a0 With Durant on the court for most of the game, the US will be at their best.\u00a0 Derrick Rose must rebound from a poor game against Lithuania.\u00a0 He played only 12 minutes, as Westbrook assumed most of the point guard duties.\u00a0 It would be surprising to see the US go with the three guard lineup that they did in previous games, due to Turkey\u2019s length.<\/p>\n

Prediction:\u00a0 US by 7<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The US managed a 15 point win against Lithuania.\u00a0 My prediction was 9, and it would have been 9 or even closer if not for the US shutting down Linas Klieza, who has had his way with everyone else.\u00a0 Durant also had a monster game with 38 points, and Odom notched a double double (13 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40250,"featured_media":6702,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[2590,2597,1976,378,1664],"class_list":["post-7513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-fiba","tag-fiba-world-championships-betting","tag-free-picks","tag-turner-gill","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7513"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7513\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7515,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7513\/revisions\/7515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}