Yahoo Sports senior NBA Vincent Goodwill reports from Las Vegas on the men’s national team’s performance in Thursday night’s exhibition – its final stateside game before continuing its preparations for Paris.
Video Transcript
The biggest takeaway from the United States exhibition game against Canada Sloppiness.
Very sloppy the turnovers, the five man units, Joel and B getting in foul trouble.
You got to see some of the problems they could encounter as they head to Abu Dhabi and then to the Olympic Games in Paris.
But you also got to see some of the blinding athleticism, the shooting getting up and down floor.
There was a moment where Steph Curry dished it off to lebron back to step back to lebron.
Everybody got on their feet here at T Mobile Arena.
Another reason people got on their feet, the presence of President Barack Obama who was sitting courtside and on the night before he got to spend private time with this year’s team taking pictures and talking with Jason Tatum and the Edwards Grant Hill told me it was a very moving and intimate dinner, but back on the floor, Steve Kerr said he’s going to mix up the lineups.
He’s not going to go maybe to the five man units as much, but you’re going to see mixing and matching for the next couple of weeks because so many teams are like Canada Dylan Brooks and Shay Gilds, Alexander NBA talent or international rosters with plenty of continuity.
The US has plenty of work to do between now and Paris, which is one of the reasons why they could not afford to keep Kawhi Leonard on the roster as he begins his slow ramp up to play Derek White from the Celtics will replace him and he will join the team as soon as he possibly can as another wing defender and shooter on a roster that needs a little bit more of it.
