Men's Game #2 vs Ukraine

USA Cruises Against Ukraine

Written By Colin Whited

When the matchup between the United States and Ukraine Mens basketball loomed, U.S. head coach Keith Westhoelter told his team not to take the Ukrainians lightly and preached poise.

"You must play within yourselves", he told the team before the game.

At the end of the game, he had a reason to smile, for the Americans routed Ukraine 96-58 to go 2-0 in pool play.

For the second day in a row, the Americans used a balanced scoring attack and a stingy team defense to overwhelm the opposition.

USA held the Ukrainians to 19/64 shooting, had 23 steals while forcing 29 turnovers and limiting them to nine assists. They also won the battle on the boards 40-32 and blocked 10 shots.

Coming into today's game, we didn't want to take [the Ukrainians] lightly, said forward Greg White (Centerville, Ohio), who led all scorers with 17 points to go along with six rebounds. We just went out and played our game.

Joshua Sisco (Spartanburg, S.C.) and Raymond Nelson (Riverside, Calif.) each scored 16 and Gabriel Paulone (Fishers, Ind.) added 10 to lead the U.S. charge on the offensive end. Sisco also pulled down nine boards to lead the Americans.

The bench for the U.S. was excellent once again, scoring 43 points and grabbing 28 rebounds.

Westhoelter's emphasis of a team mentality has apparently begun to sink in. After the game, when the stat sheet was available, White shrugged off mention of his scoring output. When asked what he meant by the gesture, White's answer was as straight as an arrow.

"I couldn't care less about statistics", he said. "I want to do whatever I can to help us win and by winning I mean going all the way and winning gold. Thats all I want to do."

Forward Alfred Wigley (Wichita, Kan.), who scored 10 points and pulled down five rebounds while coming off the bench, said afterwards that he thought everyone played well.

"It was great to see all the guys put in a lot of minutes", he said. "We've gotten lot better since day one, and the bad news for our opponents is that we can be a hell of a lot better than we are now."

The fact that the U.S. has the deepest roster in the competition is something that puts the American coaches at ease.

"I can't emphasize enough how pleased I've been with the play of our bench", Westhoelter said. "It is always comforting for a coach to see everyone contribute."

Tomorrow the U.S. will take on Estonia, who lost to Venezuela today 106-80.

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