The 2012 USA Basketball team was full of superstars. Carmelo was playing with the world’s best players in LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Chris Paul, and Kobe Bryant. Even with all these huge names and best scorers on the planet, New York’s Carmelo at times looked like the best pure scorer out of all these players. Who can forget Carmelo’s record breaking 37 points and 10 3-pointers made. Carmelo looked unstoppable. As Team USA’s 6th man, Melo scored 16.3 PPG, 4.8 RPG, 50% from 3-point range and 53% from the field. With all these scorers on the team, Carmelo at times showed he was the best scorer in the world.

What does this mean for this up and coming Knicks season?

Carmelo should now have the confidence that he can take over any game and that no one can guard him. Carmelo played a lot of his games in the post and played “bully ball.” Melo has a big frame and needs to use it. His body along with his speed and shooting ability, he is a post man’s worst nightmare to guard.

I also believe Carmelo learned how when a team plays together they can reach their goals. Obviously the Knicks do not have the talent that Team USA has but they do have one of the more talented and experienced teams in the East. Carmelo needs to be a leader and be the first to have the team first mindset. There is no secret that he has the reputation of being a “me first” player, so for him to show his teammates and coaches he will commit on defense and passing will change the culture for the Knicks. Team USA prided themselves on their defense and passing, so if Carmelo brings that to the Knicks, this team can make noise.

Carmelo Anthony is the Knicks best player and one of the superstars of the NBA. He showed this summer how easy it is for him to score from the post and 3-point range. If Carmelo brings that Olympic mentality of defense and passing to the New York Knicks, this team will make a run at Miami.

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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In fact, before closing on a 17-6 run that was powered by LeBron James; the Americans found themselves trailing with five minutes left in the game.

James finished with 20 points, finally deciding to take the game over late.

Carmelo Anthony didn’t explode for 37 points in 14 minutes like he did on Thursday against Nigeria, but he did finish tied with LeBron with a team-high 20 points.

Of course that number could have been much higher if he would have gotten the ball more. Anthony did make 7-of-13 shots from the floor, but Lithuania had no answer for him in the post, yet the Americans didn’t feed him the ball regularly, instead elected to continue to throw up bricks from behind the arc, something they have done during three of the four Olympic games.

Linas Kleiza led Lithuania with 25 points and kept them in the game but it wasn’t until a Chris Paul 3-pointer with 5:38 remaining that Team USA took the lead for good.

Then LeBron took over late, scoring eight of his 20 points in the final four minutes to help the Americans remain unbeaten and avoid their first loss in the Olympics since falling to Argentina in the 2004 semifinals. In addition to Anthony’s 20, Kevin Durant also had 16.

The U.S. could never gain control of the game, leading just 55-51 at halftime after a poor defensive effort and allowed Lithuania to shoot 58 percent from the floor in the game.

What nearly killed Team USA is that they chucked up 33 shots from behind the arc, only making 10. In three of their four games, the Americans are only 28-for 83 (33.7 percent) from behind the arc.

Anthony played 25 minutes but fellow New York Knick Tyson Chandler started and played only eight minutes, scoring two points, grabbing one rebound and blocking a shot.

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Had I written this yesterday, it would have been a one word article that simply read- WOW!

For those that missed it, Anthony set a U.S. men’s Olympic team record of 37 points in a 156-73 Team USA win over Nigeria.

But that wasn’t the impressive part. Anthony going 13-for-16 from the floor was impressive, but that wasn’t even the most impressive part of Melo’s performance.

The impressive part is that he scored those 37 points in 14 minutes.

That’s not a misprint or a typo. Melo nearly dropped 40 on Nigeria in a little over a quarter, leaving me to only once again say- WOW! If you are scoring at home, Melo has scored  53 points in his last two games in only 26 minutes of playing time, which means he went over 50 in slightly over a half.

But what do we make of his performance?

It is exactly what it is and that’s two good games against the likes of Tunisia and Nigeria. I certainly won’t downgrade what Melo has done the past two times he’s stepped on the floor, missing a total of three shots in two games, but don’t read too much into it.

I wrote yesterday that the Olympics are perfect for Melo and that’s proving to be true.

He can shoot the ball as much as he wants and doesn’t have to worry about being a complete player or leader for Team USA. Melo’s as good as a scorer as there is in basketball and international play allows him to show off that skill and he’s done so in a big way.

However, don’t read too much into it and think that Melo’s recent scoring binge will translate into a great 2013 season in the Big Apple.

It would be nice, but the reality is that Tunisia and Nigeria are far from being the Miami Heat and Oklahoma City Thunder. The NBA game is much tougher for Melo as his flaws can be and often are exposed.

It’s great to see Melo doing so well at the London games, but what he’s doing there won’t have any impact on how he performs in a Knicks uniform in 2013 and beyond. It would be nice to see him go nuts like that in a Knicks uniform and he certainly will have his moments during the season, however it’s more important to see him do the little things necessary to lead this team where they are capable of going.

But you certainly can’t take away from the way he’s performed in the Olympics.

Even great Olympians and NBA legends of the past have to look at Melo’s performance the past two games and simply say one word- WOW!

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Looking at the 110-63 final score, you would guess that Team USA owned Tunisia from the start, but that wasn’t the case at all, at least not until Coach K went to the bench.

After a surprisingly close first half that saw the Americans enter the locker room with only a 13-point lead, Coach K started his second unit to begin the second half. With the likes of LeBron James and Kobe Bryant on the bench, Carmelo Anthony, Deron Williams, Russell Westbrook, Kevin Love and Andre Iguodala opened the third quarter with a 21-3 run that all but ended the game.

Anthony in particular was impressive, leading Team USA with 16 points, not missing a shot on the day. Melo went 6-for-6 from the floor, including knocking down both of his shots from behind the arc and both of his attempts from the charity stripe.

Led by Anthony and Love, who scored 16 apiece, Team USA’s bench outscored the starters 80-30.

Kevin Durant was the only American starter to reach double figures (13), while Anthony, Love, Westbrook, Anthony Davis (12), Westbrook (11) and James Harden (10), all reached double figures in scoring.

Team USA led by only five late in the first half, thanks to some awful perimeter shooting. The Americans missed all eight 3-pointers in the first, even worse than their 0-for-6 start Sunday, before Anthony drained one to open the second quarter. The Americans were 17 of 22 (77 percent) on 2-pointers in the first half, but missed 10 of their 12 3-point shots. They didn’t need to worry about 3s much in the second half as after the second unit opened the game up, it turned into the dunk-fest that many expected.

The Knicks were well represented in this one as in addition to Melo’s perfect day from the floor, Tyson Chandler made all three of his attempts from the floor and finished with six points and six rebounds.

Team USA will be back at it on Thursday when they face Nigeria.

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Team USA led France only 22-21 after the first quarter, but for the final three quarters it was all team USA as they outscored the Frenchmen 76-50 the rest of the way, en route to a 98-71 win.

Three-time NBA scoring champion Kevin Durant took over and led the Americans with 22 points and nine rebounds and LeBron played the role of facilitator, dishing out nine assists as his unselfish play really got Team USA rolling.

The French featured several NBA-stars including Tony Parker, Nicolas Batum, Boris Diaw and Ronny Turiaf, but the overall talent level of the Americans eventually won out.

It started sloppy for Team USA and they didn’t shoot well early on, which if they were to lose, would be their downfall, but after missing their first six three-point attempts, they made eight of their next 19.

It wasn’t a great performance overall and Team USA showed there is room for much improvement, but they showed the potential for dominance once they started clicking.

The balance on this team is scary as only Durant, Kevin Love (14) and Kobe Bryant (10) finished the game in double figures.

Ali Traore led the French team in scoring with 12 points and Parker was the only other player to reach double-figures with 10.

As for the two New York Knicks playing for Team USA, both Carmelo Anthony and Tyson Chandler, each grabbed nine rebounds as Team USA outrebounded the French 56-40.

Melo played 17 minutes and scored nine points but struggled from the floor, making only three of 10 attempts from the floor, also missing both of his attempts from behind the arc.

Chandler played only 11 minutes, scoring eight points, dishing out three assists, and making 2-of-5 shots from the floor.

Up next for Team USA is a matchup with Tunisia on Tuesday, July 31

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Carmelo Anthony has started and came off the bench for Team USA in the exhibitions, but his best performance easily came yesterday against Spain. With Team USA struggling to find their rhythm in the first half, Coach K brought Anthony in off the bench, and he simply exploded. ‘Melo dropped in 23 of his team-high 27 points in the first half and righted the ship for the team heading into halftime. His dominant performance all but solidified his role on Team USA as the de facto sixth man, or occasional starter, depending on the opponent.

However, there are some important factors to remember when evaluating Carmelo’s performance on the international stage. For one, the international game is a completely different beast from the NBA. In all likelihood, Anthony will flex between playing small forward and power forward with the emphasis on international play moving away from dominant inside big men. For example, its not uncommon for Coach K to use Kevin Durant or LeBron James at the center position and not just get away with it, but dominate with that line-up.

Will there be scenarios next season when the Knicks play small and put ‘Melo into the power forward slot? Absolutely, especially if Amar’e Stoudemire finds himself hurt for any period of time. But, even with that being said, anything that happens at these Olympic Games for ‘Melo need to be taken with a grain of salt. The absolute best result that could come from London is Carmelo Anthony re-focusing his game mentally, as he did after the 2008 Beijing Games. That, more than anything else, is what Knicks fans should be most excited about.

As for Tyson Chandler, the Big Man in the Middle serves one purpose on Team USA: size. Especially against Spain’s towers of the Gasol brothers and Serge Ibaka. We saw the need for a healthy Chandler yesterday and how important he will be to this team. He’s the only true center on the team, and will be needed against Spain.

Chandler had to sit early in yesterday’s game after picking up two quick fouls, and Spain immediately responded by pounding the ball inside to Ibaka, who feasted on the smaller line-up Team USA was running against them. Chandler will need to stay out of foul trouble in order to protect the rim for his teammates. Coach K will never need him to score in bunches or be a major factor on offense outside of setting high picks.

Nevertheless, Tyson Chandler may be one of the most critical pieces to the hopeful gold medal Team USA has set their sights on. Either way, one thing is for sure: the two Knicks in London will be playing some of the most important roles on the team.

The now-famous words LeBron James used when asked how it feels to finally be the champion. Words commonly used when someone isn’t so much excited about winning or achieving something extraordinary, but when the pressure is finally off your shoulders and the overwhelming feeling of relief washes over.

The only moment I can compare LeBron’s words to is the moment when the game was no longer in doubt in 1994 when the San Francisco 49ers were well on the way to crushing the San Diego Chargers, and teammates jokingly ripped the proverbial monkey off of Steve Young’s back. But, even then, Young seemed overly jovial and excited. LeBron, in contrast, was relieved.

All of last year, after “The Decision” and the backlash it generated, James seemed confused and baffled that people hated him. He went from generally loved and adored by an entire country to despised in the matter of a half-hour ESPN special. In the 24-hour news cycle and the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately environment we live in, it doesn’t take long to become hated. LeBron found out the hard way, and he didn’t know how to react.

Look, he had to go through the School of Hard Knocks. Even when James wasn’t winning and seizing the big moments on the court, he was still filling up the stat sheet like few before him. However, he needed the adversity in order to truly become great.

Its corny and cliche, but everything happens for a reason, and sports are no different. Does James eventually win a ring if he didn’t go through the 2010-11 hate cycle and fail in the Finals to the Dallas Mavericks? Maybe, maybe not.

Has LeBron avenged himself? That’s up for him to decide. Will the country like him any more today than they did yesterday? Not until he brings home another gold medal in London.

Does it all matter to LeBron? Not anymore. And that’s why the world should be fearful of what he can accomplish. He isn’t doing it for us anymore.

He’s doing it in spite of us.

For Knicks fans, the London Olympics will mark the return for two of their biggest stars to competitive basketball, and both will serve big roles on Team USA. However, the player serving the more important role on the team will be Tyson Chandler.

With Dwight Howard missing the Games due to back surgery, Chandler gets the promotion from back-up center to a starting role, likely alongside the likes of Chris Paul, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant and LeBron James.

We’ve talked before here at Buckets how Chandler fits perfectly into that starting five because he won’t command a high volume of touches offensively, all while effectively protecting the rim, grabbing offensive rebounds and shutting down the lane on the defensive end.

Barring a major rash of injuries striking Team USA, they will walk into the Opening Ceremonies in August as the heavy favorites to take home another gold medal. But, the road isn’t going to be as easy as casual basketball fans may think. No team should scare the United States more than Spain.

Look, as basketball fans, we’re missing out by not having a healthy Ricky Rubio available in these Olympics. As an 18-year old, he guided a strong Spain squad through the games on the way to a medal, and proved to be the hardest test the Redeem Team had to face on their way to gold.

This time around, it won’t be the back court play of Spain that should have USA fans worried. Its the dynamic inside options the team is going to run out. A lot of people are familiar with the Gasol brothers, Pau and Marc, who can provide scoring inside along with strong defense. In 2012, Team USA will have to account for the newest addition to Spain’s roster, Oklahoma City’s Serge Ibaka. Throw in Ibaka with the inside-outside offensive game of Pau and the gritty rebounding and low-block scoring of Marc, there is significant reason to be concerned.

The pressure is going to be on Chandler to provide enough presence inside on the defensive end to not only neutralize the threats on the block from Spain, but keep them off the glass as well. Of course, he won’t be doing it alone, but without a healthy Dwight Howard on the roster, the pressure squarely falls on his shoulders.

Another key to how successful this Team USA squad can be doesn’t fall on a Knicks relation, but on the health of Kevin Love and who Coach K chooses to pick as a back-up center, with options like Roy Hibbert and Anthony Davis.

Right now, the first line of defense for Team USA sits with Tyson Chandler. If you want to pull out any story lines from the Olympics heading into next season, they should start with how well can Chandler hold on the international stage. His success there could dictate just how well the Knicks can play next season.

Turiaf looks like a leader here, don't he? Okay, well, sometimes the best leaders are the ones who look least likely (source: Yardbarker.com)

Slam Online has a nice quote from newly acquired backup Knick center Ronny Turiaf that seems to indicate that he’s ready to step up to be a leader:

“I can’t speak of the past because I wasn’t there on a regular basis so I can only speak for myself and what I know I can bring to the table. All I’m gonna tell you is that we are going to have guys that want to play hard, guys that’s definitely coming here to win, to make the necessary sacrifices to win basketball games. So I’m not here to speak about the past, but the future. We’re going to play team basketball. We are going to be playing together and everybody moving in the same direction. We are all here to win basketball games—not to lose. That’s something that people need to understand is that we will do whatever it takes, whatever we have to do to make that happen. I have talked to plenty of guys on the team already. I was on vacation with Gallo[Danillo Gallinari. I have been working out with Stoudamire every day. I have worked out with Toney Douglas. I have talked to Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton. And of course my two partners from Golden State Azubuike and Randy [Anthony Randolph]. So I’ve been in contact with a lot of those gus and I think they are excited and there is one key word: winning.”

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If we want to win Worlds, we can't get Kobe, but we can get better shots than this. (Source: Yardbarker.com)

Watching the first half of Team USA’s exhibition game against France, I had one main thought: uh-oh.  They were tied at the end of the first quarter, and only had a nine point lead at half (and when France scored the first basket of the second half, they cut the lead to 7).  Yes, eventually it turned into a blowout, with USA winning 86-55, but this game shouldn’t have been as close as it was for as long as it was.  Not only is France not one of the better international teams, but they were also missing many of their top players in Tony Parker, Roddy Beaubois, Ronny Turiaf and Mickael Pietrus.

Granted, our team hasn’t been together that long, so it’s highly likely they improve significantly during the nearly two weeks remaining before the World Championship.  The fact is, we just don’t have the talent we did in the Olympics.  Many of them Redeem Teamers visited our current crew, but none of ‘em are gonna pull a Willis Reed and surprisingly show up.  So first, two general comments, followed by four things that we can do to improve:

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