The Gold Medal Game against Spain lived up to the hype expected, but Team USA had their hands full once again. But behind 30 points from Kevin Durant and some late fourth quarter clutch play from Chris Paul and LeBron James, Team USA captured the gold by defeating Spain 107-100.

The battle for the gold was back-and-forth the entire contest as Team USA had problems pulling away from Spain the entire game.

In addition to the 30 from Durant, LeBron had 19 and Kobe Bryant chipped in 17 for Team USA, who led Spain by only one after three quarters.

However as good as Durant, James and Bryant were, it was point guard Chris Paul who was the ultimate difference.

Paul took the game over in the second half and played as well as he has possibly ever played. His stats say he scored only 11 points and dished out a pair of assists, but Paul was so much better than that would suggest. He controlled the pace of the game and knocked down a few huge shots to give Team USA some breathing room and as usual, Paul was outstanding on the defensive end of the floor.

The Los Angeles Clippers guard knocked down a three at the beginning of the fourth quarter and followed that up with a drive to the basket and a layup. Those five points put Team USA up by six and they never looked back.

While Paul was outstanding, it was Durant ho carried Team USA through three quarters. With his 30 points, he became the all-time American Olympic scorer in one Olympics.

Pau Gasol scored 24 and Juan-Carlos Navarro had 21 for Spain, which had to settle for silver in the second straight Olympics. That may not have been the case if Gasol’s brother Marc didn’t pick up four fouls in the first half as the younger Gasol was having his way down low with the Americans. He finished with 17 points, but only played 17 minutes for Spain due to the foul trouble.

This win was the swan song for Team USA head coach Mike Krzyzewski, who coached in his final international game, finishing with an amazing 61-1 record.

As for the New York Knicks involved, Carmelo Anthony scored eight points, grabbed five rebounds and dished out three assists in 21 minutes, and Tyson Chandler finished with two points in nine minutes of playing time.

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Derrick Rose helped the US escape today's game against Brazil with a win. What concerns lie ahead though? (Source: Yardbarker.com)

With the FIBA World Championship Tournament in Turkey now completing its third day, the US squad squeaked past Brazil to now be 3-0.  During the run-up to the tournament, the team had looked better and better as they scrimmaged against other countries.  The pitiful looking team that only barely scraped by against a seriously undermanned French team, managed to not only come out strong against co-favorite Spain, but to even maintain their cool and snatch the one-point win when things got tight in the end.  Before that game, although bookmakers had the US listed as the favorites, everyone in the know (including many big-time USA supporters) had Spain as the true team to beat.  So things look more hopeful now, but there are still 3 big issues to overcome.

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