FIBA U19 World Championship -- USA Defeats Poland, Plays for Fifth Place

USA 84 Poland 47
Team USA built an eight point lead in the first period and never trailed as they beat Team Poland by 27, 84-47 to advance to the Fifth Place game today in Riga, Latvia. Returning to the form that carried the team handily through the U19 Tournament's first four games, the team had a different lead scorer today. Doug McDermott from Creighton shot 8-13 (2-4, 6-9) from the floor to go with a perfect day (1-1) from the line to pace all scorers with 19 points. Three other American, Patric Young (13 points), Meyers Leonard (12 points) and Jeremy Lamb (12 points) also logged double-digit points. Michal Michalak paced the Poles with 13 points scored on 5-13 (2-6, 3-7) shooting from the floor and 1-1 from the free throw line. Piotr Niedzwiedzki chipped in 10 points.

Picking over the game boxscore to develop some possession-based stats for the game...

						FTA
	Poss.	Eff.	eFG%	OR%	TO%	FGA
USA	81.8	1.03	52.0	41.0	19.6	11.8
Poland		0.57	26.9	24.1	18.3	9.0

The Defense Was There Today...
Team USA's offense was less efficient that it was versus Russia, but the Poles could not capitalize. Team Poland has had problems with shot conversion in several games in this tournament, but 26.9% (eFG%) is the poorest outing of the Poles' eight games. Though Team USA's turnover rate and free throw rate were well off their average for this tournament, it did not, given Poland's offensive problems, hurt Team USA's chances for a win.

Bell Tones
Villanova's rising sophomore James Bell scored two points on 1-3 (0-1, 1-2) shooting from the floor. Bell did not get to the free throw line. He grabbed one rebound and was credited with a steal and blocked shot in 11 minutes of play.

FIBA U19 2011 World Championship -- A Pause Before the Medal Rounds (part 2)

Sorting Out Group F Action
Having exacted revenge for their 33 point drubbing at the hands of Lithuania in a pre-tournament exhibition game, Team USA seemed to sleep walk through three periods of play versus Croatia to close out Group F play. Supporters might rationalize the loss as a meaningless game at the end of the preliminary phase, after all, the USA won the F1 seed the day before, a side benefit of their win over Lithuania. Were the Americans showing their vulnerability, simply exhaling or perhaps exacting a bit more revenge on the Lithuanians complements of FIBA's ranking system? Beating Team USA moved Croatia into a tie with Lithuania for the F2 seed. The Croatians held the tie-breaker, due to their 13 point win, 88-75, over Lithuania on June 30. Serbia earned the last seed in Group F with a decisive 21 point win over Canada. The Group F standings when the buzzer on the USA-Croatia signaled the end of group play...

Group F
	Record				Pts/Poss
	W	L	Pts	Seed	Off	Def	Diff
USA	5	1	11	F1	1.12	0.91	+0.21
Croatia	4	2	10	F2	1.01	0.99	+0.03
Lithuania	4	2	10	F3	1.12	0.89	+0.23
Serbia	4	2	10	F4	1.02	0.96	+0.07
Canada	2	4	8	F5	0.96	1.07	-0.12
Egypt	1	5	7	F6	0.87	1.09	-0.22

What the Possession-Based Metrics Tell Us
The four teams that will advance out of Group F are listed above as "F1" through "F4". The ranking of the six teams that advanced out of Group C & D play to Group F wer well defined (see "...Eighth Final Round Preview") -- unlike the Group E pool, it was clear that several teams performed well in Group C (or D) play (USA, Lithuania, Serbia), while others struggled even with some modest success (Egypt). Many of the same characteristics exhibited in initial group play continued through the Group F cross over games. And again, note the ranking of Croatia and Lithuania (and Serbia). Croatia appears to have benefited from timely wins (versus Lithuania and USA), but not been especially dominant across the board in their play in Group C and Group F. The USA and Lithuania continue to dominate group play, piling up large efficiency margins, comparable to Australia's over in Group E. Though Group F has it's own imbalance, it is less pronounced than Group E's, and there was no single dominant Group F team at the end of Eighth Final Round play. Though like Group E, there seems to be a gap between the teams at the top (USA/Lithuania at >+0.20) and those at the bottom (Egypt/Canada at <-0.10).

How Good is the USA? Lithuania? Croatia?
I compared only the games the four Group F teams played with each other. Granted six games is a small sample, but the games were played over a relatively short period of time, played on (generally...) neutral courts and in a round robin fashion -- every team played every other team in the sample. I came up with these results...

Group E Quarter Final Teams
	Record			Pts/Poss
	W	L	Pts	Off	Def	Diff
Croatia	2	1	5	1.06	1.02	+0.04
Lithuania	2	1	5	1.02	1.01	+0.01
USA	2	1	5	1.08	1.08	+0.01
Serbia	0	3	3	0.95	1.01	-0.06

The competitive gap among the four teams advancing out of Group F is much smaller than the one separating the teams out of Group E. Note the efficiency margin separating Croatia and Serbia (about 0.10) is less than half the margin separating Australia and Poland (0.24), and less than the margin separating Poland from the bottom two advancing teams out of Group E (0.11). I realized Team USA's three games within the mini-conference were all decided by two points, I did not realize the other three teams had somewhat similar results against each other (Croatia's win over Lithuana the exception). I had suggested earlier that Team USA and Team Lithuania may well play a rubber game to decide the match (up). If the four Group F teams are better than their Group E counterparts, that may well come to pass.

Quarter Final Games of Interest
All of them actually, the schedule...

Opponents (seed)		Start
Group E	Group E	Time (EDST)
Poland (E2)	Lithuania (F3)	7:30am
Russia (E4)	USA (F1)	9:45am
Australia (E1)	Serbia (F4)	noon
Argentina (E3)	Croatia (F2)	2:15pm

If the draw was indeed random, then the distribution should have placed (at least) one quality team on each side of the bracket. The barometer game will be the first of the round -- Poland-Lithuania. The Lithuanians have been able to pack the Latvian arenas in Liepaja and Riga with fans as loud as they are partisan. The Poles, however, ought to be able to bring a few fans for this game too, one of two other Eastern European countries still competing close enough to bring enough fans to neutralize the Lithuanian fan-base. Though backup Doyydas Redikas, starting in place of regular Vytenis Cizauska acquitted himself in both the USA and Egyptian games, getting a fully recovered (rolled ankle in the Serbia game July 5) Cizauska back will insure the Lithuanian team is at full strength. A big win by Poland would signal a long day for Group F teams. A big American win in the USA-Russia game (9:45am EDST) will prove little. Comparing Oliver's four factors for each team, the Russians can score, but have problems defending opponents' field goal attempts. And they foul way too often. The American team should be able to hold the Russian conversion rate down, negating Russia's strongest asset. A quick and aggressive-to-the-basket American team should have Team Russia back on their heels early. Though the Americans foul often, almost as much as the Russians, the Russians do not play aggressively enough to capitalize on that vulnerability.

Like the Russian-American game, the Australia-Serbia game will only be significant if it is close (or if it goes badly against the Aussies). The Croatia-Argentina game should go to the Croatians. The Argentine offense is limited, against the better teams in Group E they failed to convert field goals consistently, nor rebound enough to get themselves second chance opportunities. The Croatians concentrate on the defensive boards, so the Argentines will get few second chances. Croatia converts field goals proficiently and values the ball. Argentina does defend the three point line well, so if the Croatians go inside (they tend to favor the three point attempt), they should score often enough to put this one out of reach early. A Lithuanian loss early however, will focus my attention on this game to get a better sense of how weak the "F side" of the bracket actually was.

FIBA U19 2011 World Championship -- A Pause Before the Medal Rounds (part 1)

Sorting Out Group E & F Action
When the Argentines tagged the Brazilians with their second consecutive loss to close the last day of Preliminary Round 2 action, they had sprung the last surprise in group round games that seemed to have more surprises than "usual" outcomes. Team USA beat the powerful Lithuanian squad one day only to lose to Croatia the next. The Russian squad, once the powerhouse of Europe had to back into the Quarter final round by beating host Latvia and then hope (and pray?) that Argentina could beat Brazil, the only team they could tie with at the end of Group E play that would give them a spot in the medal rounds. Australia recovered from a Group A (first preliminary round) loss to host Latvia to sweep their next four opponents, and match Team USA's single loss performance through the two preliminary rounds. With both preliminary rounds (Group A & B play and Group E play) in the books, this is how the Group E side of the bracket sorted out...

Group E
	Record				Pts/Poss
	W	L	Pts	Seed	Off	Def	Diff
Australia	5	1	11	E1	1.08	0.86	+0.22
Poland	4	2	9	E2	1.00	0.94	+0.06
Argentina	4	2	9	E3	0.96	0.96	-0.01
Russia	3	3	7	E4	1.09	1.01	+0.07
Brazil	3	3	7	E5	1.04	0.92	+0.12
Latvia	2	4	8	E6	0.91	0.96	-0.05

A Few Adjustments to the Metrics
The four teams that will advance out of Group E are listed above as "E1" through "E4". The FIBA site is rife with basic and per capita stats. Standings through most of group play has ranked the teams by points, and when two or more are tied, the site ranks by the margin between "Points For" and "Points Against" -- a misleading stat as readers here know. I decided to control for possessions and compute an efficiency margin, much as I (and many others) have done for the NCAA's Division 1 conferences over the past several seasons, and a different picture emerges for Groups E & F. Though the six Group E teams were tied going into the second preliminary round, the cross over play between Group A and Group B teams has sorted the field out...with a few wrinkles.

The Mighty Emus
Tabbed here and elsewhere as a dark horse going into the tournament, Australia recovered from an early stumble to dominate the competition in Groups A and E. In taking the #1 seed out of Group E, they have managed to draw some attention in FIBA and in the MSM. Those who have followed Division 1 basketball, and especially those at St. Mary's, Vanderbilt and Saint Louis are already familiar with the talent pool Australia has developed over the past decade. Brazil's collapse, loss to Argentina (who managed to jump Russia in the standings in the process) and consignment to the #9 - #12 Classification Rounds is the yang to Australia's ying in Group E. Losing to Russia on Tuesday meant that Wednesday's game with Argentina would determine who earned the last spot in the Quarter final round. The difference column at far right emphasizes how well the Brazilians have performed throughout group play. Badly timed losses coupled with misfortune of losing to the one team Brazil would lose a tie-breaker suggests how well-intentioned procedures can have unintended consequences. As I put the efficiency differences and the four factors together for Groups E & F it was very clear there is a great disparity between the teams bound for the medal rounds and those consigned to the #13 - #16 Classification Rounds. If we assume the two brackets (Groups E & F) will produce a pool of reasonably competitive teams, how would the four Group E teams compare to each other if I only considered the games they played with each other? Treating the four teams as a mini-conference, I came up with these results...

Group E Quarter Final Teams
	Record			Pts/Poss
	W	L	Pts	Off	Def	Diff
Australia	3	0	6	1.08	0.84	+0.24
Poland	2	1	5	0.99	0.99	+0.00
Argentina	1	2	3	0.96	1.07	-0.11
Russia	0	3	3	1.03	1.15	-0.13

The results suggest that Argentina and Russia were not as competitive with the top two teams in the group, Australia and Poland, as the overall results would suggest. The mini-conference results reenforce Wednesday post game impressions that going into the Quarter Final round Australia is indeed the team to beat. How does Group E compare to Group F? I will take a similar look at Group F shortly. The standings are different from Group E.