why the us team lost

10 letters spell out why U.S. team lost
Monday, August 16, 2004
The Oregonian

Canzano: Puerto Rico's easy victory was no fluke ATHENS T hey played for their country Sunday. They turned pride into baskets. They transformed honor into rebounds. And when they were through flattening this U.S. Dream Team in front of the world, one of Puerto Rico's players answered anyone who questioned how something so unthinkable could ever happen by reaching out and clutching at those 10 letters stitched to the front of his jersey.


He held the letters high.

Then, he held them higher.

He held "P-U-E-R-T-O R-I-C-O" all the way off the hardwood floor. He lifted it while a team of pampered NBA players sulked across the way. He held it while fans in the arena stood and shouted. He thrust those letters toward the ceiling, toward a sea of waving flags and broken dreams and nobody -- not in a million years -- should really ever wonder how this outcome happened.

Puerto Rico 92, USA 73.

Yes, in men's basketball.

The biggest surprise wasn't that Puerto Rico beat a team of NBA players. The biggest shock wasn't that the United States' 25-game Olympic winning streak, dating to that first Dream Team in Barcelona in 1992, was snapped. Or that a U.S. men's basketball team lost for only the third time in 112 Olympic games, and for the first time to a non-Soviet team, but rather how convincingly it happened.

Puerto Rico didn't need to come from behind. It didn't need a free throw at the end of regulation. It didn't need a buzzer-beating three-pointer. It didn't need a miracle steal, or a final defensive stop, or even an offensive rebound.

Puerto Rico won by 19, so all it needed was for time to run out.

This was basketball's version of a back-alley whipping. It was as one-sided as sandpaper. It was crisp. It was convincing. Trust me, it was no fluke. And if you got secret joy in seeing this happen to an overconfident team that had it coming, you probably weren't alone.

Go ahead, have a chuckle. It doesn't make you unpatriotic. It makes you human.

The better team won.

Carlos Arroyo scored 24 points. Eddie Casiano had 18. The United States took 20 more shots than Puerto Rico but had five fewer field goals. And after the game, here was 40-year-old Puerto Rican center Jose Ortiz, his black hair slicked back with sweat after playing almost 26 minutes, being asked by someone if he ever thought he'd live to see an international team beat a Dream Team.

And you know what?

Ortiz, who will retire after these Olympics, wouldn't answer. He couldn't answer. His eyes were welling with tears. His throat was closing around itself. He just stopped and stared up toward the arena rafters.

Ortiz didn't have to answer. You just knew.

When the former Oregon State star finally did speak, he said this: "You don't take teams lightly. That's my advice to them."

You get all that, LeBron? How about you 'Melo? And should Greece also slam the Dream Team on Tuesday night, will it then mean that Larry Brown is coaching the international version of the Los Angeles Clippers?

Against Puerto Rico, The United States shot 34.7 percent from the field. It had 22 turnovers. And missed 11 of 29 free throws. Let the players try to blame that last one on their lack of familiarity with international rules.

"They played so much harder than we did," Brown said. "On the first day we talked about respecting our opponents and trying to understand how important it is to play for your country."

And on Sunday, the U.S. team got a stiff lesson in what happens when you don't.

Allen Iverson, Stephon Marbury, Richard Jefferson, Tim Duncan and Carmelo Anthony combined to shoot 13 for 48 from the field. Twice, Jefferson, who was 3 for 16, missed badly on three-point attempts, failing to hit the rim. A third time, he hit the side of the backboard on a two-point try.

"We couldn't hit anything," Jefferson said.

Still, they kept trying from long range, attempting 24 three-pointers in the game.

"They was giving it to us," Anthony said. "If it was open, why not shoot the ball?"

Three for 24, that's why, kid.

Of course, this embarrassing U.S. loss will be blamed by some on the absence of star power. Kevin Garnett, Tracy McGrady, Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant aren't here. Seven of the first nine NBA players who were invited to play in Athens declined the offer. As if any or all of them could have made up 19 points against a team that was playing together -- and with fire in its eyes.

Said Puerto Rico's Daniel Santiago: "Those guys have the best athletes in the world. To beat them by 20 points says something."

It says: You take talent, I'll take team.

"They play the game the way it's supposed to be played," Iverson said.

Remember the Puerto Rican player who clutched the letters on his jersey and proudly held his country's name high?

By contrast, Anthony ripped his jersey off -- the one with "USA" on its chest -- while he was on the court after the game. He walked off the court and remained shirtless for at least the next 45 minutes, conducting interviews as if he were disassociated with the losing team. By the way, Anthony also complained about playing only 3:39, failing to the bitter end to see the sad lesson he was trying to teach himself.

"I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I'm busting my (rear) in practice everyday and doing everything right."

Nobody in a U.S. uniform should ever forget this one. Nobody should forget the final score. Or the jeering crowd.

But most of all, nobody should ever forget what Arroyo said before leaving the arena Sunday.

"We're here playing for country, not ourselves."