2011 FIBA Americas Tournament Enters Quarterfinal Round

After a rest day, quarterfinal round action in the 2011 FIBA Americas tournament being conducted in Mar del Plata, Argentina continues this week toward its Sunday finish. .  

The preliminary round got cranked up back on August 31 and in Group A the Dominican Republic and Brazil tied for the group lead with 3-1 records.  The Dominican Republic finished atop the group due to their 79-74 win on September 2 over the Brazilians.  Venezuela and Canada also advanced to the quarterfinals with 2-2 records. 

In Group B it was the Argentines who finished atop the group with a spotless 4-0 record in front of the home folks with Puerto Rico second at 3-1 after their 81-74 showdown loss to Argentina on September 2. 

Uruguay finished third in Group B play at 2-2 and Panama was 1-3, but advanced to the quarters due to their narrow 89-86 September 1 win over Paraguay.

Cuba and Paraguay finished winless in their respective groups and were eliminated.

In the FIBA Americas championship quarterfinal round which runs through September 8 and can be seen on ESPN3, the remaining eight teams are combined into a single group with their preliminary round records carrying over. 

Robin robin play will start with the Group A leader (Dominican Republic) playing the fourth place team from Group B (Panama), the Group A second place team (Brazil) will play the Group B third place squad (Uruguay)

Group B leader Argentina will face off against Canada and Group B runner up Puerto Rico will play Venezuela.   Top four teams left after this round will head to the knockout round semifinals that start on September 10.  

The teams that reach the September 11 title game will automatically qualify for the London Games as the reps from the FIBA Americas zone.   The third, fourth and fifth place teams will have one final shot to qualify at next July's FIBA Olympics World Qualifying Tournament at a site to be determined. 

As for Team Canada, they have a tough few days ahead of them if they want to make it to the knockout round and stay in contention for that 2012 Olympic berth.  In addition to starting off quarterfinal round play with the homestanding Argentines, they play Jose Barea and Puerto Rico tomorrow before finishing up with Uruguay on September 7 and Panama on September 8.    

The 'Road Warriors' have three NBA ballers of their own on this FIBA Americas squad in the Heat's Joel Anthony, Andy Rautins of the Knicks and Spurs draftee Cory Joseph but have had some up and down games in this FIBA Americas tournament. 

Canada jumped out to a 17-12 lead in their opening round robin game with Brazil and was trailing by only a point headed into the fourth quarter until a Brazilian 14-0 run broke it open and led to a 69-57 loss

They had a 12 point lead in the fourth quarter against the Dominican Republic and held a 10 point bulge with two minutes to go until the John Calipari coached Dominican squad made the Canadians sweat down the stretch.

It took clutch free throws late from Aaron Doornekamp with 2.9 seconds left to build a four point lead for Canada which they needed because a buzzer beating three pointer swished in to make the final margin 73-72.

Team Canada then blew out the Cubans 84-62 before falling in overtime to the Grievis Vazquez led Venezuelan squad 103-98.   

They may want to step it up because with all the strong European squads that will not qualify via the FIBA Eurobasket tournament currently being contested in Lithuania,  you'd rather handle your basketball business now rather than have to do it in the much deeper talent pool of the last chance tournament later.

We'll see if Team Canada can make a successful run to Olympic qualification and if the host 'Golden Generation' Argentine ballers run the table and walk off the court with the FIBA Americas title and a ticket to London in hand.

2011 FIBA Americas Tournament Gets Underway

We are less than a year away from the start of the 2012 London Olympic Games, and the qualifying to see who gets those coveted spots in the Olympic basketball tournament next summer is happening as I compile this.   

Since the USA men won the 2010 FIBA world title in Turkey last summer and qualified for the Games in the process, they and Coach K get the luxury of watching everybody else on the planet play as they take their time deciding who will be on the USA Olympic roster when the tournament tips off on July 28.

But everyone else who wants to be in London besides the defending Olympic champion and FIBA world number one ranked USA and host nation Great Britain will have to play their way into one of those nine remaining tournament spots. 

FIBA Africa Champion Tunisia pulled off a huge upset against perennial African champ Angola 67-58 on Sunday to punch their first ever Olympic basketball ticket. The silver medalist Angolans and bronze medalist Nigerians will get a final opportunity just before the Games commence to qualify at the FIBA World Olympic Qualifying Tournament July 2-8 in which the final three spots in the men's tournament will be up for grabs.

Speaking of spots up for grabs, the FIBA Europe Championship gets started in basketball mad Lithuania today and runs until September 18 with two Olympic berths for the taking and their third, fourth, fifth and sixth place finishers heading to the Qualifying tournament.    

The USA handling its basketball business also meant we didn't have to play in the FIBA Americas Championship like we had to do in 2003 and 2007 to qualify for the Athens and Beijing Olympics.  That ten team tournament started yesterday and will run through September 11 in Mar del Plata, Argentina.

The 2004 Olympic champion and 2008 bronze medalist Argentinians have every intention of making the home folks happy by taking one of those spots for themselves..

So why am I'm paying attention to this tournament if the USA isn't involved in it?   I'm paying attention because I want to see who will be playing in London next summer. Like the FIBA European Championship, there will be NBA players participating with their national teams. 

Sixteen NBA ballers will play for seven of the ten national teams participating in this tournament.  The way the NBA lockout negotiations are going, this might end up being one of those rare opportunities to see NBA players dribbling on somebody's court.


The tournament draw was held back on January 27 and in Group A we have the Dominican Republic, Brazil, Venezuela, Cuba and Canada.  Group B is comprised of FIBA number three world ranked Argentina, Puerto Rico, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Panama    

In case you're wondering Canadian readers, Team Canada starts FIBA Americas Group A play in a few hours with a game against the Tiago Splitter led Brazilians, then on September 1 faces the Dominican Republic and its trio of NBA players in Al Horford, Charlie Villanueva and Francisco Garcia.   Canada then plays Cuba on September 2 and finishes up group play September 3 with the Grievis Vazquez led Venezuelans

But one thing that puzzled me was why isn't Tristan Thompson, Corey Joseph or Dwight Powell playing on this squad?


The group play phase will run through September 3 with top four teams in each group going to the quarterfinal round and playing against each other which will run from September 5-8.  

After the quarterfinal round the top four teams will proceed to the knockout round on September 10-11 to determine who gets the two Olympic berths alloted to the Americas    The third, fourth and fifth place teams in the FIBA Americas Championship will play in the Olympic Qualifying tourney next summer

Should be interesting to watch.

TransGriot Note: Corey Joseph is playing on the Canadian FIBA Americas squad.

LeBron Addresses Haters-Makes More

Hey LeBron don't get mad at us.  You were the one who took your talents to South Beach and left them there.   The NBA champion Dallas Mavericks and their fans in the 214 thank you for doing so.

Oh yeah, sure was funny that a man y'all claimed was faking an illness lit y'all up with an MVP level performance that made the Heat and the city of Miami sick.

Sprechen sie Deutsch, LeBron?    The NBA Finals MVP does.

All the people that were rooting on me to fail, at the end of the day they have to wake up tomorrow and have the same life that they had before they woke up today. They have the same personal problems they had today. I'm going to continue to live the way I want to live and continue to do the things that I want to do with me and my family and be happy with that. So they can get a few days or a few months or whatever the case may be on being happy about not only myself, but the Miami Heat not accomplishing their goal. But they got to get back to the real world at some point."

Hey LeBron, as a resident of the real world, I'd like to point out I have the same number of NBA championship rings you do:  zero.

When you flap your gums and claim you're going to win X amount of championships, you better deliver on that boasting or you'll leave yourself open to jokes such as this.

Q. Why did LeBron skip the college ranks and go directly to the NBA?
A.  Because he never shows up for the Finals.


But seriously, if you're going to get any love from basketball fans besides the times you put on the Team USA jersey, you're damned sure going to need a good media consultant that will work on those communication skills.   At the rate you're going you're making haters at the same clip as Florida GOP governor Rick Scott.