Spain's triumph over Greece in the world championship final has shown that the galaxy of the US National Basketball Association is not all that glitters in the international game.
The Iberians, playing without top-scoring center Pau Gasol of the NBA Memphis Grizzlies due to injury, ran away to a 70-47 win on Sunday over the European champions, who had no NBA player on their roster.
European pride had already been ablaze after Greece shamed the US "Dream Team" of NBA stars, including Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony, in the semi-finals, a feat widely attributed to a difference in styles.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The NBA emphasizes one-on-one play while rules of the international basketball association FIBA put a greater premium on teamwork and ball movement, allowing zone defense which is restricted in the professional US game.
But the premier professional organization embraces some 90 players from outside the US and is still luring big names of the Euroleague, basketball's answer to the soccer European Champions League.
Jorge Garbajosa, a Unicaja Malaga power forward who scored a game-high 20 points in the final, will join his Spain teammate and point guard Jose Caledron at the Toronto Raptors.
Sergio Rodruguez, a 19-year-old Madrid guard, is bound for the Portland Trail Blazers after helping Spain, the 1984 Olympic silver medalist, to their first ever world championship podium.
Garbajosa, 29, said that Gasol and Rodriguez were his friends and that "To play against them in the best league in the world is going to be a very important moment."
Greece guard Vasilis Spanoulis of the Panathinaikos will join Chinese center Yao Ming at the Houston Rockets the next season.
Sofoklis Schortsianitis, a 2.06m Greek center nicknamed "Baby Shaq" after NBA superstar Shaquille O'Neal, is reportedly being pursued by the Cleveland Clippers.
When Greece overwhelmed Asian champions China 95-64 in the last-16 round, Yao paid respect to Schortsianitis by saying: "I hope good luck for him the rest of his career, especially when he comes over to play in the NBA."
Greece boast NBA center Jake Tsakalidis, the Memphis Grizzlies veteran, but he was not on this Greek team, which was driven by six players from the Euroleague.
Greek playmaker Theodoros Papaloukas of CSKA Moscow, the Euroleague's Most Valuable Player last season, said he talked with NBA teams this summer.
"But I don't think they were very interested by the offers they made," he said.
The NBA's foreign legionnaires dominated the scoring at the championship with Yao averaging 25.3 points a game, followed by German one-man dynamo Dirk Nowitzki of the Dallas Mavericks at 23.2 and Gasol at 21.3.
But the NBA connection had its downside as Turkey coach Bogdan Tanjevic called on the NBA to stop plundering global talent.
The world championship gives NBA clubs a chance to see the top young players from around the world. But he said they were reluctant to release their players to play for their countries for fear of injuries.
The NBA's two top Turkish players, Hedo Turkoglu of the Orlando Magic and Mehmet Okur of the Utah Jazz, did not join their national teams here.
"The NBA, they do not care about us. They treat us like a colony," Tanjevic said after his team lost to France 64-56 in the fifth-place playoff.
"They don't make nothing for us. They always send the condors to us, always watching," said the coach for the country which will host the next world championship in 2010.
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