FIBA World Championships
 

I watched the USA's game with Finland yesterday and I am know watching their game with Turkey right now.

AND, the officials' game shirts are UGGLAAY!

MTD, Sr.

CAN Official Selected as CC for World Final
 

Congratulations to long-time CAN FIBA official Steve Seibel on being selected as the CC for today's Gold Medal final between SRB and USA. This is a tremendous and well deserved honour.:D

Anyone think that the USA bigs got some really cheap fouls to start the game? Davis, Cousins, and Faried all had 2-3 fouls in the first half.

No.

Excellent analysis. Well let's go to the tape shall we?

Some of you may be able to browse to the plays here: ESPN3 -- Serbia vs. USA

Foul 1, Anthony Davis, 7:42 1st quarter -- Davis gets to the spot first, establishes his space and absorbs contact from Raduljica who is trying to post up. Raduljica initiates contact and even extends his forearm into Davis which draws the whistle. Not a foul at this level, defender has done nothing wrong. Additionally this foul comes from Lead who is quite far away (contact occurs on the FT line where Slot has best look).

Foul 2, Kenneth Faried, 6:44 1st quarter -- Faried is is defending Raduljica's post up from the side. Raduljica bumps Faried and slides right to open space. Faried slides with him and is whistled for a foul. Not a foul at this level.

Foul 3, Kenneth Faried, 9:33 2nd quarter -- Bircevic extends his arm into Faried's throat during rebounding action. Faried pushes his arm away. After the made 3 pointer Bircevic runs into Faried and pushes him off by extending his forearm, drawing a whistle for a double foul. Not a foul on Faried, either call first foul on Bircevic or second foul on Bircevic.

Foul 4, DeMarcus Cousins, 9:18 2nd quarter -- Cousins is defending Krstic. Krstic grabs Cousin's arms as he goes around a screen which makes it look like Cousins is holding him. Foul is called on Cousins.

Foul 5, Kenneth Faried, 6:26 2nd quarter -- Faried gets stuck underneath the basket and gets his shot blocked. As Raduljica tries to grab the ball Faried both have their hands on opposite sides of the ball. Faried pulls the ball towards him, causing Raduljica to reach behind his head for the ball, which causes Raduljica to stumble. Replay shows Faried made no contact with Raduljica. Lead called the play going away from him, slot had the best look at the play and passed.

Foul 6, Anthony Davis, 5:57 2nd quarter -- Davis is defending Teodosic on a pick and roll. Davis has legal guarding position, his arms are extended to the side but he does not touch Teodosic. Teodosic reaches out with his right arms and contacts Davis' arm, drawing the foul. Not a foul, even if Davis touched him it would be incidental considering it 1) would be Davis' third and 2) in the double bonus.

Three USA bigs (Davis, Faried, Cousins) picked up 8 combined fouls in the first half, six of which are questionable/not fouls.

#1 Not a lot there. Called from a bad spot definitely not seeing a lot there.

#2 Not an aggressive foul but not a technically incorrect call. Based on this an other calls the officials seem sensitive to contact between players and it not getting excessive. Maybe ticky tack to the fans and coach but not an incorrect call.

#3 Rough play by both. No idea what is caught and what isn't by officials but eventually clean it up with double foul. Most purist would prefer you just get the first right foul but this is pretty standard way used to resolve this series/type of actions by officials.

#4 Kicked call? though its hard to tell what Cousins reponse or involvement is once the hold is intitated by someone else.

#5 Official called what he thought he saw from a bad spot. Replay shows us its wrong, officials in game don't get replay.

#6 Davis can't occupy space with his arms. Defining incidental has nothign to with how many fouls that player has. THere is no double bonus in FIBA, always two shots.

Officials were clearly sensitive to any rough play between bigs and were calling it tight. I've got 2/3 of the 8 being missed or tough calls.

Decent analysis, completely invalidated by this fanboyesque comment.

That explanation to me = kicked called

Perhaps, but not entirely inaccurate. Modern game management tells us to be aware of both a players fouls (especially bigs) and the game situation (time, score, bonus, etc.) in order to avoid calling cheap touch fouls, which this was.