Back-to-back-to-back-to-back, James Wiseman, The Other Sixers and more
A Monday catch-up on American pro basketball topics.
Good morning. Quick hitter Monday! Let’s basketball.
Back to Back to Back to Back
Surprising no one, the United States women’s national team stomped their way to another World Cup championship this weekend. Team USA beat China 83-61 at a sold-out Sydney Superdome for their fourth straight FIBA world championship.
Team USA’s average scoring margin in the group stage was +46. Their average margin of victory in the knockout rounds was +32. Their closest game was a 14-point win over China in the group stage. A’ja Wilson was named the tournament MVP. She and Breanna Stewart made first team All Tourney. Alyssa Thomas was named the tournament’s top defender and made second team All Tourney.
It’s kind of crazy how stacked Team USA is for every tournament. It’s wild that Stewart, a free agent, plus five stars from the just-completed WNBA Finals, all showed up. This basically never happens on the men’s side of USA Basketball, with the exception of 2008.
All things are impermanent so someone will get Team USA at some point. But it could be a while. Team USA is in exceedingly good hands.
And now we get to refer to Jewell Loyd as “World Champion Jewell Loyd.” All is good in the world.
The Adoration of the Magi
In my opinion the biggest X-factor in the whole league this season is James Wiseman. The highly touted 21-year-old big man basically got excised from the 2020-21 edition of the Warriors as Stephen Curry and Draymond Green desperately tried to carry Golden State to the playoffs (they did not). Wiseman didn’t play a second last season. And here he is, dropping 20-9 on the Wizards in a way in which he looks totally inextricable from what the NBA champion Warriors are trying to do.
This has always been the allure of Wiseman. You take everything that makes the Curry-era Warriors great, and you add an agile vertical threat who can theoretically close off the rim to opponents, and you have an incredible team.
This is worth monitoring.
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