Post-Gold Comments From Anthony, Coach Boeheim
8/13/2012 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
The gold-medal winning USA Basketball team included former Syracuse All-American and current New York Knick Carmelo Anthony and Coach Jim Boeheim, who was an assistant for head coach Mike Krzyzewski. They added Sunday's accomplishment to the gold-medal performance they were both a part of at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
The following are post-game quotes from Coach Boeheim and Anthony:
Jim Boeheim
On winning another gold medal:
I don't think people realize how good Spain is when they play well; and they played better this time than they played in 08. They played great. Look at their team, every guy on their team played well. Guys coming off the bench played well. They took the lead, which shows just how tough our guys are; they were able to just shrug it off. Kevin Durant hit a big shot. LeBron hit a big shot. Chris hit a big shot. So, three different guys hit big shots. Kevin Love made two big defensive plays and that's why you win close games, because guys are committed. It's almost better to win a game like this and take a gold medal home than win by 30. This was something they had to earn. I don't think people realize just how good Spain is; they beat everybody else. When they play well and they are healthy, they are really good; and they all played well tonight. So, it's a great win and it was fun to be part of it. It's not that easy to win an Olympic gold medal; and these guys helped us win two.
On where this one ranks in terms of winning:
I think the difference is you are playing for your country here, and it's a great honor to do that, and everybody knows you are playing for your country. You talk about the Olympic spirit, everybody has that here. You watch all these other athletes, they are all here playing for their country and, especially when you see all these NBA players who make millions and millions of dollars coming over here to play it obviously means something to them. The work they put in, the effort they put in, it means a lot. I think people should really be appreciative of what these players have done and how much pride that we all take in bringing our basketball program back up to where we think it should be. It's not that easy. We are where we should be.
Carmelo Anthony (New York Knicks)
On Winning the Gold:
For us to persevere the way we did, it's a just a special moment for myself, for the guys that were on this team, for all the work that we put in and the commitment that we made to get where we are at right now.
On whether it was harder than he thought it was going to be:
We knew it was going to be a tough game coming in tonight. Spain, they didn't quit; very, very physical game. It came down to us making plays. When you have a group of guys that is use to making plays like we have on this team you never know who is going to make those plays. There were times where Chris Paul stepped up big for us; LeBron stepped up; KD was outstanding from the three-point line. It took a couple of little things – rebounding, just buckling down for about four or five minutes out there in the fourth quarter for us to break the game open.
On how he is physically:
I'm in a great place.
On several of the players going over and shaking Doug Collins' hand:
We know what he did for our country when he played in the Olympics and what he had to go through, so for us to honor him, that was an easy thing to do for us. It felt good to see him over there, commentating the game and him standing up. He always gets emotional around this time
