Kevin Durant scored 13 points to go with 10 rebounds and five assists as the U.S. had no trouble taking down Tunisia.

Team USA shot 61.4 percent from the field compared to 35.4 percent for Tunisia. The U.S. had 27 assists on the night while Tunisia struggled a lot from the free throw line going just 8-for-21.

LeBron James scored only five points and had four assists in the game. Kevin Love and Carmelo Anthony each scored 16 points to lead the U.S.

Tunisia was not a team that was going to challenge the United States in any way. But Tunisia did come out strong and led in the game after a few minutes of action.

Head coach Mike Krzyzewski subbed in an entire new five midway through the first quarter prompting the U.S. to get their act together. The United States would go on to outscore Tunisia 64-30 in the second half alone.

Russell Westbrook scored 11 points to go with two assists, three rebounds and two steals in the game. James Harden had 10 points and made a couple of treys for the U.S.

Team USA will play Nigeria Thursday at 5:15 p.m. EST. Nigeria beat Tunisia in their Olympic opener then lost to Lithuania today.

Tunisia lost its first game against Nigeria and now is looking like they may not win a game in these Olympics. Tunisia is playing in its first Olympics ever and fell behind 29-10 to Nigeria early in the game. They rallied back to down 49-47 with 5:14 left in the game but was not able to finish the comeback.

Team USA was not really challenged by France. France has some NBA players on its roster led by Tony Parker and Nicolas Batum but they were no match for the United States’ depth.

“We played a very good game against an outstanding team,” head coach Mike Krzyzewski told USA Basketball.com after the game. “France is so well-coached and in (Tony) Parker, they have as good of a guard as there is in the tournament. I thought we did a good job defensively. We share the ball. We assisted on 27 of our 31 buckets and we rebounded the ball very well. Overall, it was a good first step or us, beating an outstanding French team.”

Kevin Durant led the U.S. with 22 points in that game and made three 3-pointers as well. Durant looked good but his coaches and teammates are actually calling for him to shoot more on this team.

LeBron James played the role of facilitator against France scoring only nine points but dishing out eight assists.

Kevin Love played well for really the first time with this team. He played 14 minutes and scored 14 points to go with three boards. With this team’s lack of size possible being an issue down the road, Love stepping up will be of great benefit. Love should be able to play a lot again against Tunisia today.

Listen to Andrew Kennedy talk USA Basketball on The John Ackeren Show

Russell Westbrook had nine points, four rebounds and three assists against France. James Harden scored five points in 14 minutes of action.

Westbrook hasn’t really found his rhythm yet on this team. The entire team though is a little hesitant playing how they usually do in the NBA and are being more passive. That doesn’t vibe with Westbrook and he needs to be more assertive to contribute more for this team.

Harden should see more time again today. He hasn’t really gotten it going from three yet in any game and we’ll see if he can find his shooting touch today.

Amine Rzig played the best game for Tunisia scoring 18 points in 24 minutes and making 4-of-5 threes.

Tunisia turned the ball over 19 times against Nigeria which is a high number that will only go up when they play the U.S. today. One of the great strengths of the U.S. is the pressure they can apply on opposing backcourts with Chris Paul, Deron Williams and Russell Westbrook.

Look forward to a lot of fast break opportunities for the United States today as they should easily cruise past Tunisia.

Tunisia is pretty reliant on shooting from the outside too and went 8-for-23 from three against Nigeria while only shooting five free throws. Don’t expect the Tunisians to get the same looks from three they did in their first game and we may see their number of made threes go down against the U.S.

The game will tip at 5:15 p.m. EST and will air on the NBC Sports Channel.

Kevin Durant led the team scoring 22 points and making three 3-pointers. That number easily led the team as Durant is surely the favorite to lead this team in scoring.

But Durant’s teammates and coaches want the 3-time scoring champion to shoot the ball more.

“I told KD (Durant) to just be himself,” LeBron James told the Charlotte Observer. “On a team like this you can kind of shy away because there are so many great players here. But KD’s on this team for a reason. He’s one of the best players the world has and he’s a three-time scoring champ. So we don’t want the KD that defers. We want the KD that he is in Oklahoma City.”

LeBron is absolutely right about this. There’s no point in Durant playing on this team with a different mentality than the one that has earned him three straight scoring championships.

It is understandable for Durant to not immediately want to get on the floor and start gunning. It’s not really his personality to be that way especially with all of the great players around him. Durant needs to realize though that he should stop thinking and just start playing for this team to win gold.

Team USA has some flaws. They are small and will be at a disadvantage against a few teams that could beat them, mainly Spain and Brazil. Team USA’s greatest strength against those teams is Durant and his ability to score so easily against them.

Durant is seeing defense that isn’t even close to what he has to deal with in the NBA. Watching him against these countries you see him with so much more room to operate when he has the ball. It has resulted in him shooting a very high percentage from three so far as he is given a ton of room right on the catch.

Durant has been passive though at other times. When driving to the rim he has often kicked out and looked to make a pass instead of to score. Durant’s strength is scoring though and from anywhere on the floor. Team USA will live with him overshooting instead of him trying to play nice and get other players touches.

“Sometimes coach was screaming at me,” Durant said. “And Chris Paul was screaming at me more than anybody, ‘Shoot the ball!’ I guess I’ve got to be aggressive.”

We can expect to see an even more aggressive Durant now for the rest of the Olympics which has to be scary for every team the U.S. will play. No one has a player they can put on Durant to slow him down.

Team USA will play Tunisia in their next game tomorrow at 5:15 p.m. EST.

Team USA didn’t get off to the best start missing their first six 3-point attempts as France hung around early down just one after the first quarter.

The United States got their act together after that finishing the first half off strong and led 52-36 at the break.

The U.S. went just 8-for-26 on threes in the game but France was much worse hitting just 2-of-23 threes.

LeBron James played the role of facilitator perfectly leading the team with eight assists to go along with nine points.

Tony Parker was held to just 10 points in the game and was 4-for-11 from the field.

Russell Westbrook scored nine points off the bench and James Harden chipped in with five.

France is a team with some potential to go far in these Olympics but really has no chance against the U.S. They are more of an athletic team than the usual international teams you see that have a lot of good shooters on the floor at all times.

The formula for beating Team USA is hitting a lot of threes and beating them on the glass too. France was able to do neither and therefore the U.S. walked away with a pretty easy victory.

There will be no games tomorrow then Team USA will play Tunisia on Tuesday who lost their opening game to Nigeria earlier this morning.

Bob Donnan-US PRESSWIRE

The 2012 London Olympics are upon us with the opening ceremonies going on today. Olympic basketball will start Sunday, July 29.

The United States are coming in as the favorites to win the gold but the competition keeps getting tougher for them every four years. Team USA won gold back in the 2008 Beijing Olympics but did not in 2004 in Athens when Argentina won.

Team USA is full of NBA stars just like in 2008 but this time around they have a noticeable weakness that has the potential to be exploited by other countries. Team USA is small with only three true big men in Tyson Chandler, Kevin Love and Anthony Davis.

This has forced LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Carmelo Anthony to essentially play a lot of minutes at power forward and even center. Mismatches are a two-way street but given the way these international games are played, the U.S. could be in some trouble with this roster.

Twelve teams make it to the Olympics and they are split into two pools of six. Then each team in each pool plays each other once with the top four from each pool advancing to play in an 8-team, single-elimination tournament.

Team USA is in Pool A along with Argentina, Lithuania, France, Nigeria and Tunisia. Pool B consists of Spain, Brazil, Russia, Australia, China and Great Britain.

Pool Play

In pool play, expect the United States to pretty much dominate. France, Argentina and Lithuania all are considered to have a chance to possibly upset the U.S. but it is unlikely to happen before the medal round. Team USA should cruise winning every game in their pool and come out the 1-seed.

France, Argentina and Lithuania all have a legitimate shot at becoming the 2-seed. There is even a chance they could all finish with a 3-2 record in pool play to make things very interesting. France and Argentina are getting the most attention while Lithuania may have the better team of the three.

I think Lithuania emerges as the 2-seed in this pool followed by Argentina as the 3-seed and then France as the 4-seed.

Nigeria and Tunisia will battle it out for the irrelevant 5- and 6-seeds while neither should be able to beat any of the top four teams in this group. I predict Tunisia doesn’t win a game.

Spain is considered the heavy favorite to make it to the gold medal game against the United States. They should come out of this pool as the 1-seed but Brazil and Russia have an outside chance to finish ahead of them.

Ultimately Spain should come out as the 1-seed although there is some pressure to win every game in the pool and they definitely don’t want to finish as the 2-seed and be forced to play the United States before the gold medal game.

Brazil and Russia should be battling for the 2-seed or actually, the 3-seed. No one wants to get the 2-seed in this pool because then they would have to play the U.S. before the gold medal game. If Spain emerges as the definite 1-seed early in pool play, expect to see some interesting game plans from Russia and Brazil in an attempt to avoid Team USA.

I think that Brazil will finish as the 2-seed though as the final game of pool play will be between them and Spain. The winner of that game will determine who wins the pool as I think both will be undefeated up until that point.

Russia should get the 3-seed followed by Australia who I think narrowly edges out China for the 4-seed. Great Britain may not win a game except possibly against China.

Quarterfinals

Team USA should easily handle Australia and move on to the semifinal. They will play the winner of Brazil and Argentina which should be a very close game. I give Brazil the edge here but it really could go either way.

Spain should have no problem with France in their quarterfinal but it may be closer than people think. Lithuania and Russia should make for a very good game but I think Lithuania pulls it out.

Semifinal

Team USA was played very closely by Brazil in their exhibition game and I think this game will be possibly the closest one they play all Olympics. Brazil didn’t play any zone against the U.S. in that exhibition and still had a chance to win the game. They are much bigger too and have a great point guard in Marcelinho Huertas who gave the U.S. fits in the exhibition. It will be a close one but I’m not picking against the U.S. here.

Spain and Lithuania should be a good game too but Spain should definitely win. They are such a balanced team and may even win this game and have a 7-0 record in the Olympics after it. There will be a lot of talk about Spain having a real good chance of upsetting the U.S. after this point.

Gold Medal Game

It will come down to the two teams we all wanted to see play: USA vs. Spain. In their exhibition earlier this week Team USA won by 22 but Spain did not show all of their cards. Marc Gasol didn’t play at all and Pau Gasol and some of their other better players didn’t log heavy minutes.

This game will be as close as any in the Olympics and I truly believe it could go either way. Maybe what happens up to this point in the Olympics will change that feeling for me but from what I’ve seen from Team USA and Spain so far make me think this is a very even matchup.

I’m picking Team USA because of one man: Kevin Durant. For everything that is wrong with this Team USA roster, Durant fixes it by being the most unfair player in the tournament. It will be easy for him to rise to the challenge with the great talent around him especially aided by LeBron James.

The 2008 gold medal game was remembered as one of the best international basketball games ever played and I think the 2012 gold medal game will end up being right there with it. It will be another reminder that the world is catching up to the U.S. in hoops but that we are still the best because we have the very best, Durant and LeBron.

Jerry Lai-US PRESSWIRE

USA Basketball has finished its exhibition play in preparation for the London Olympics which will begin Friday, July 27. Team USA went 5-0 in their exhibition games beating the Dominican Republic, Brazil, Great Britain, Argentina and Spain.

Team USA will be in Pool A in the Olympics along with Argentina, France, Lithuania, Nigeria and Tunisia. The United States is the favorite to win gold in London but it won’t be a cakewalk.

“All I’m concerned about is how we’re going to get better,” Kevin Durant said when asked who was the favorite in the Olympics. “How we’re going to approach these Games, that’s all I’m worried about. We’ll see what happens at the end.”

The team has been modest at times but also knows there is only one acceptable outcome for them.

The United States will play each team in their pool once before the medal round begins. The top four teams from each pool after the round robin will advance to an 8-team tournament.

Pool B is considered the better all-around pool but there will be some competition in Pool A for Team USA. Here is a preview of each team in the pool:

United States

Team USA is ranked first in the world and rightfully so. They won gold in the 2008 Beijing Olympics then won the World Championships two years later. LeBron James has averaged 18.6 points per game to lead the team in its five exhibition games while Durant is averaging 17.6 points per game and went 16-for-29 from beyond the shorter 3-point line.

The weakness for the United States is no secret. They aren’t a big team and have played LeBron, Durant and Carmelo Anthony a lot at the four and five positions. Some teams will have a pretty decent advantage against them inside but it shouldn’t be enough to take them down.

France

France is always a team you expect to be a little better because they have quite a few NBA players. Unfortunately for them they will be without Joakim Noah who would have been huge for them. Tony Parker is playing some of the best basketball of his life though and will be a tough cover for anyone. They also have a few decent athletes at the wing positions led by Nicolas Batum to try and match up with the U.S. Boris Diaw is coming off a great year for the Spurs and has a game made for the international style. Spurs fans will also get a look at Nando De Colo who will be joining the team next year.

France should advance to the medal round and is one of the few teams with a chance to upset the United States but it is pretty unlikely.

Argentina

This is not the same Argentina team that won a gold medal in 2004 and beat the United States. Actually, it pretty much is and that’s the problem. They’ve gotten older and aren’t the heavyweight they used to be. They’re still led by Manu Ginobili, Luis Scola and Carlos Delfino who can all fill it up on any given night, just not as consistently as they used to.

Argentina and France will battle it out for the second seed in Pool A, a spot each will really want to get because then they would avoid the United States until a potential gold medal game.

Lithuania

Lithuania is a small country that absolutely loves hoops and produces some fine NBA-caliber talent. They’ve had some success in the past and have the potential to come out of Pool A as possibly the 2-seed. They have NBA talent in Sarunas Jasikevicius, Linas Kleiza, Darius Songaila and Jonas Valanciunas. They have a lot of size too and could give the U.S. a very good game.

This Lithuania team is the kind that would have probably beaten Team USA in 2004 but this year it should be a different story. Raptors fans will love getting their first look at their 2011 first round lottery pick, Valanciunas.

Nigeria

Nigeria was the last team to qualify for the Olympics making a pretty improbable run to get in. They are led by two NBA talents in Al-Farouq Aminu and Ike Diogu. This is another team with a lot of size but simply not enough talent to be taken seriously. They have an outside chance of advancing to the medal round as the 4-seed but it is pretty unlikely.

Tunisia

Tunisia qualified for the Olympics by winning the African tournament. They aren’t to be feared by anyone though. They are the new Angola and should get blown out in every game in this pool aside from Nigeria.

Tomorrow we will have a preview of Pool B.