True or False: Team USA Doesn't Win The Gold Without Embiid
- Thread starter bogey_j
- Start date
Henry Orbit
Wave Gods
They don’t get out of the Serbia game w/o Embiid
True. They needed him to beat Jokic.
this.
They've won five Olympic Gold Medals in a row and we're still playing this game asking if they would have won. Yes they still win.
For folks saying they wouldn't have beaten Serbia without him, well, they actually proved they could beat Serbia without him in pool play when he only logged 11 minutes, and he played pretty damn poorly in the time that he was on the floor (he had some flu type of thang, hence why he didn't play against South Sudan in the next game because he was still unwell).
Now, dig -
They blew out Serbia by 26 points in that game.
In the 11 minutes that Embiid played, he was a -8.
Essentially, the margin they beat Serbia by without Embiid was 34.
Now, dig -
They blew out Serbia by 26 points in that game.
In the 11 minutes that Embiid played, he was a -8.
Essentially, the margin they beat Serbia by without Embiid was 34.
It’s this simple. It was worth it for that game alone.
@ supposed toDid they need him to beat Jokic when they blew out Serbia by 26 points (without him) in pool play?
skyrunner1
Superstar
Alot of those rebounds he was missing giving 2nd chance points AD woulda grabbed.. shyt would look different..
go watch gold medal game, 2nd half we kinda struggled, AD was getting blocks from 3 point line, grabbing offensive rebounds on everybody bricks and putting it back in and his defensive presence was huge
go watch gold medal game, 2nd half we kinda struggled, AD was getting blocks from 3 point line, grabbing offensive rebounds on everybody bricks and putting it back in and his defensive presence was huge
The 3rd game was clearly different from the first two encounters. And they needed Embiid to win that one.
The third game was different because Serbia got hot from 3, and because Team USA abandoned all their principles trying to catch up.
It's still the same opponent though.
And it's an opponent that they proved they could beat without Embiid, comprehensively. If they had lost to Serbia without Embiid in their previous two encounters, then the argument of them needing him would stick.
I gather the premise of this thread is based upon Embiid not being a part of the squad in the first place, so it'd mean players like AD, Bam etc would need to have a slightly bigger role, which they can easily fulfill. And who's to say that if they did play Serbia again in the semi-final that Serbia would even be that hot from 3? You can't exactly replicate the same conditions of that semi-final without Embiid. It'd be an entirely different game. Who's to say that having AD in the starting lineup instead wouldn't have been more a difference maker on defense given his ability to defend all over the floor, leading to Serbia getting worse looks from behind the arc.
Embiid's buckets were certainly needed to keep their runs ticking over in that specific game, but as the homie said above, he gave up plenty of rebounds and was generally lethargic on defense (outside of battling on the block with Jokic). Bam and/or AD wouldn't have had to produce the same efforts on offense, they'd just need to provide more on the other end to stop Serbia from getting second-chance opportunities.
VegetasHairline
Veteran
Go back into "retirement"
