US Dream Team Starts Second Camp In New York

NEW YORK (FIBA World Championship) - After two weeks off, the United States team has gathered in New York to resume preparations for the FIBA World Championship.

A week’s training camp will be followed by games against France and Puerto Rico in New York before the team heads to Istanbul via Madrid and Athens.

For now, the team will take part in scrimmages with a select team formed of leading college players.

“It was good to get back together, re-familiarize yourself with the team,” said veteran Chauncey Billups. “It's good to have these good young guys (USA Select Team) here, pushing us every day and going extremely hard and just helping us out. I thought the scrimmage was pretty good; not all the way good. We had some lapses out there. But, for the most part, I thought it was a good day.”

For coach Mike Krzyzewski and his staff, the hardest task of the week will be finding the final three cuts from the 15-man roster.

“There are about five guys for two spots and I’m not going to go through who they are because that can switch around,” he said. “It’s basically how you fit in with the other group. It’s not about you being better than one other guy, it’s about the makeup of a team.

“Thank goodness we had all these guys come back. We may travel with more than 12 because we don’t have to make a final decision until we get to Turkey.”

The United States are following a very different timetable to many other teams, having taken such a long time off.

But Krzyzewski is happy with the schedule.

“Well, we’re starting to push now,” he said. “You can’t have these guys for a month and a half before you have the World Championship so you have to condense things. Having the select team here for four days helps us because while we’re doing one thing some other guys are doing another and we’ve been able to get a lot out of the practice sessions here.”

And Oklahoma Thunder star Kevin Durant said the players had no problem finding their rhythm with one another.

“Guys love playing with each other,” he said. “We love going out there and play hard. Nobody has an ego here; we're all trying to sacrifice and trying to win. That's great to be a part of. I think we're coming along very well. We still have a long way to go, but I think we'll get there.”