Team USA Defeats China 101-70

Step 1, complete.

Team USA has to take it one game at a time in order to re-establish their dominance in Olympic basketball, and that's what they did Sunday morning, US time, crushing China 101-70. Behind Dwyane Wade's 19 points on 7-7 shooting, and LeBron James' 18 points, 6 points, 4 rebounds, 3 blocks stat-stuffing, the US broke the game open late, and never looked back.

Yao Ming led the Chinese squad with 13 points and 9 rebounds, but was just 3 of 9 from the field. The New Jersey Nets' Yi Jianlian had 9 points on 4 of 13 shooting, but did have a few flashes of offensive brilliance with some powerful swooping jams. Other than that ....

Kobe Bryant gets 13, Dwight Howard gets 13? Hard to come back from that. The US shot 54% from the field, and led the entire way. China fought the whole way, though, with Yao Ming even coming back off the bench to try and get his team back into it after taking a fall that seemed to hurt his foot in the third. Put the whiskey down, Rockets fans, he looked fine by the end of it, and the Chinese did pull him at the end, when it became clear the US wasn't letting China anywhere near them.

Wade may be the explosive factor the US needs to turn to, he's playing the best ball on Team USA, with Deron Williams and James right there as well. But the commitment to defense by Wade is wreaking havoc on opposing ballhandlers, and as expected, China had no answer for the US forwards.

Step two is Tuesday versus Angola, before our big fat Greek revenge game on Thursday.