Serbia Day 14

Well day 14 is in the books. Unlucky day 14. I wish I could have that one back.

Breakfast was at 9 and the same old stuff. Getting a bit boring but hey, eating in any cafeteria for every meal for 2 straight weeks is bound to drive you nuts. We came back from breakfast and I finished the Turkey video. We met at 1PM as coaches to review the video and then the players met with us at 1:30. During the session there were a few observations from the players about the video that made me wary. They said that it would be simple to beat Turkey if we were patient and moved the ball a little and that their defense was horrible. They felt the game would be easier. Not a good omen.

After the session we headed off to lunch which was pretty crappy to be honest. I even broke down and ate some curried stuff because it seemed to be one of the better options. We headed back to the village to get ready for the game. The temperature was high this morning but the dark clouds were rolling in. Another omen perhaps.

We departed for the gym at 4pm and arrived to watch France finish with a victory over Mozambique. We took the court at 5:30 with a game plan of taking away their easy shots and pushing the tempo in our favor. We also wanted to get the ball inside as it was a strength for us at least on paper. The game started out as all of our games have. We were slow and sloppy and couldn’t convert. Within minutes the game was over. We never stood a chance. Turkey laid down an old fashioned ass whooping. They were up 57-41 at the half. We were absolutely atrocious on defense and we played with no passion whatsoever. The best part of the first half was that the lights went out with 46 seconds left due to the major lightning storm happening for the bazillionth time this week.

What do we say at halftime that hasn’t already been said. We made a few adjustments and then Linda let me speak to the team. I told them I thought that they already had one foot on the place. They were ready to get out of here. I told them to stop feeling sorry for themselves and put away the NCAA and CIS egos. We were playing for Canada. I also told them that I never had the talent to be at that level. They should be so thankful to be given the chance. I then told them that I would have absolutely nothing left in me if somebody was whooping my ass that bad. Turkey just had too many easy buckets.

Well nothing we had to say made any impact. The Turkish team kept their foot on the gas and we didn’t really respond. They made a pile of 3’s and basically ran us off the floor. The final score was 104-81

Kelsey didn’t score today as I think she has more than hit the wall. She is trying to stay with it but I believe her body has said “that’s enough”. I am hopeful that she can pull it out with one more good game. We play on Friday vs. Mozambique which is a game for last place. Yep. Last place. This has been an embarrassing and extremely frustrating basketball experience but we knew it would be tough coming in. We have had some ego issues and that has soured things a little. Outside of our own games it has been very fun for the most part. I thought our team was turning the corner a few days ago but it seems as though the road has disappeared. One thing in the losses though is that the opponents have shown me a lot of good things. There is lots of good basketball here just not being played by us.

Our players think that we should just be good because we have talent. This is not the case. Most of the teams have very effective guards. Australia, who is in the semi final, has AVERAGE guards at best but they never turn it over, they run the offense and they play hard on defense. Our guards don’t handle the ball exceptionally well but the skill that our guards and basically all of our players are poor at is how to pass and catch the ball. More importantly than how to do it is when to do it and at this we are horrible. Another huge difference here is the skill level and mobility of the 4’s and 5’s. Our big kids are taught to sit under the basket and post up hard. Not on these teams. Tonight, Turkeys post player hit a bunch of 3’s and finished with 32 points and 9 rebounds and not one of our players put her on her ass with a hard contact. We are too nice and too soft. But back to the skill set of the big people, most can move well, shoot the ball well from the perimeter and handle it well. We have a LOT of work to do to catch up to the international game. Good athletes aren’t the answer, good, smart, fundamentally sound players are.

So we jump on the bus and return home from the game and it was pretty quiet. I hate losing but losing without playing hard is another story. I was wishing we had somebody like Karmen Brown to get out there and give a million percent and sacrifice their body to win. We just have a number of pudding pops. That’s just the way it is.

We have an off day tomorrow so the staff decided to take our attaché Ivana out for a meal. She picked the spot and what a magnificent spot it was. I can’t recall the name of it right now but it was basically a floating restaurant on the Danube River. The windows opened up almost at water level and the cool breeze was beautiful. The atmosphere was unique and our waiter was funny with a little bit of English. The only knock against the place was that people were smoking everywhere.

We ordered a Serbian breaded cheese for an appetizer and it was outstanding. Moriah had the perch, Ivana and Deb had Calimari and Linda had smoked trout. They all enjoyed it. I asked about meat and potatoes and the waiter ordered something for me. When it came it was basically the largest frickin hamburger I have ever seen perhaps. It didn’t quite taste like hamburger but it was good. Top it off with cheesecake for dessert (which was different but INCREDIBLE) and we had a good meal with a few good stories and a few good laughs.

Off day tomorrow. I am going to watch the semi finals with the USA vs. Australia and Czech Republic vs. Russia. Should be fun to watch. We play Mozambique again on Friday at 5:30. Hopefully we have some kind of good result to finish a very disappointing tourney.