Game 9 (7th Place Game)
Puerto Rico 74 – Senegal 65
The toilet bowl game was a fairly exciting contest. PR took the lead in the 2nd
quarter, but Senegal was able to come back and even led for a while at the end
of the 3rd. Unfortunately, Senegal’s poor shooting and turnovers caught up to
them and Puerto Rico won it fairly easily at the end.
Raymond Cortes was once again best for PR with 31 points and 7 rebounds, but he
did have 9 turnovers. Isaac Sosa chipped in 14 points, to go along with 5 rebounds
and 5 assists. For Senegal Moussa Keits had 13 points and 11 rebounds, while Aziz
Ndiaye finished with 12 points and 13 rebounds.
Game 10 (5th Place Game)
USA THREE 98 – Lithuania 85
The very talented USA team redeemed themselves after failing to deliver on their
high expectations. Lithuania has a very good collective team, but they just don’t
have enough firepower to stay with a team full of weapons such as this USA team.
In the 2nd and 3rd quarters USA outscored the Lithuanians by 25 and the game was
pretty much over after that.
DeShaun
Thomas played well all tourney and he capped it off with a 22 points, 6 rebound
performance. Jeremy
Tyler showed some of his potential going 7-7 from the field and finishing
with 15 points, 2 blocks and 2 steals. John
Wall had a solid game with 12 points and 7 assists. Mindaugas Kuzminskas finished
off a very strong week with a 22 point, 7 rebound outing, and Sima Buterleveviscius
added 22 points and 6 rebounds.
Game 11 (3rd Place Game)
Canada 83 – FMP (Serbia) 68
The Serbians looked deflated and there is no doubt that last night’s heart breaker
had everything to do with it. They hung around for the most part, but they just
didn’t seem to have their hearts in it and they ran out of gas at the end. Canada
has a very deep and athletic team and they did not let up, finishing off with
very solid 3rd pace and putting an exclamation on a very good tournament.
Alwayne Bigby led the Canadians with 23 points and 8 rebounds, while the young
point guard Corey Joseph had 17 points, 4 rebounds and 3 assists. For the Serbians,
Nikola Markovic continued his consistent play enroute to 19 points and 6 rebounds,
while the flashy point guard Filip Covcic had 13 points, 5 rebounds and 4 assists.
Game 12
USA TWO 117 – USA ONE 104
The finals pinned two very deep teams and the show that they gave did not disappoint.
From the start it was obvious that both teams came to win and both the intensity
and speed of the game were at a top notch level. Even though USA 1 had some firepower
of their own, USA 2 was still a pretty heavy favorite because they not only had
the great players but they seemed to grasp the team concept from the beginning.
USA 2 went up by five at the end of the 1st quarter, but USA 1 was able to keep
it close by halftime. In the 3rd quarter was where the game was won, this is when
USA 2 put the clamps down on D and they held their opponent to a game low 17 points.
In the final period it was a back and forth battle, but USA 1 just did not have
enough bullets to take down the eventual champions. For the winners, Avery
Bradley capped of an MVP tourney with a 25 point, 4 rebound, 4 assist and
3 steal performance.
Roscoe Smith
had a very efficient 22 points and 7 rebounds, on 10 for 13 shooting, while Jordan
Hamilton continued to put up impressive numbers with 16 points, 10 rebounds
and 4 assists.
USA 1 was led by DeMarcus
Cousins who in just 19 minutes finished with 29 points (12 for 17 shooting)
and 6 rebounds. Alex
Oriakhi put in a solid effort with 18 points and 11 rebounds.
*Stay tuned for the rundown of the best prospects from the Nike Global Challenge
coming in the next few days.
FINAL OVERALL STANDINGS
USA TWO
USA ONE
CANDA
FMP (SERBIA)
USA THREE
LITHUANIA
PUERTO RICO
SENEGAL
Nike Global Challenge: Day 1
Nike Global Challenge: Day 2
