While the United States men's basketball team is an overwhelming favorite to win the gold medal, their first game against France will not be an easy matchup. The French team has talent with the San Antonio Spurs guard Tony Parker and Boris Diaw who is big and can run the floor running the French offense.
They also have center Ronny Turriaf who plays for the Clippers and Nicolas Batum of the Trail Blazers; plus they have 25-year-old guard Nando de Colo who will be joining the Spurs next year. France also won the silver medal at last years European championships.
France will be a formidable opponent to begin these Olympics, and head coach Mike Krzyzewski is fine with the early challenge:
"[Boris] Diaw is a very important guy for them because he's really their best passer,'' said Krzyzewski. ``He's that point forward that they run a lot of their offense through. Batum's shooting is outstanding, and then there's their athletic ability to run up and down the court -- we're not going to be able to out-athlete them like we have with some of our opponents.''
The United States should take care of France, but they will not be able to just roll past this France team due to the talent but they will need to play team basketball.
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