Men's hoops full of intrigue

ATHENS, Greece — The American hoopsters aren't the only ones struggling at the Olympics.

The defending world champions from Serbia-Montenegro have lost two of their three games, Yao Ming's teammates on China are having trouble getting the ball past midcourt, and Angola's losing streak is at eight years and counting.

So take heart, Larry Brown. You are not the sole face of frustration at an Olympic tournament that's shaping up as the sport's most compelling since the 1988 Games.

Serbia-Montenegro's losses came in the final seconds to New Zealand and Argentina. The team sure could use NBA star Peja Stojakovic, who decided against coming to the Athens Games.

"They've got their own worries, we've got ours," New Zealand's Sean Marks said after his team beat Serbia-Montenegro 90-87.

While folks in America have been fretting over their team's failure against Puerto Rico and difficulties against Greece and Australia, the basketball-crazy brigades in Belgrade and Beijing have been scratching their heads over their home nations' shortcomings.

Both Serbia-Montenegro and China are 1-2 in the more difficult Group B, and both are in danger of failing to make it out of the preliminary round. Only a last-second miss by Italy has kept Serbia-Montenegro from being 0-3.

"Nothing has happened with the world champions. It's just that we lost two games by a point," said Serbia-Montenegro forward Dejan Bodiroga, widely considered the best pro player in Europe. "Now we turn to further games, and we will fight until the end."

Serbia-Montenegro's next game is Saturday against Spain, which is undefeated, like Lithuania.

But while Lithuania had two closer-than-expected victories over Angola and Puerto Rico, Pau Gasol and his mates from Madrid have knocked off each of their opponents impressively, defeating China by 25, Argentina by 11 and Italy by eight.

"We played against the team that proved to be the best so far in our group," Italy coach Carlo Recalcati said.

Spain coach Mario Pesquera cautioned that his team wasn't necessarily the best, despite its strong start.

"Maybe we've been able to prove so far we are a little above them," he said, "but I don't think this is anything definitive."

The top four teams from each group advance to the quarterfinals, and ties involving more than two teams are broken based upon point differential in the games between them.