Milwaukee Bucks: Team USA rolls past Japan, rises to 3-0 at World Cup

Team USA easily took care of business against Japan Thursday morning and the pair of representatives for the Milwaukee Bucks, Brook Lopez and Khris Middleton, put in mixed showings throughout the rout.

After facing quite the scare last time out against Turkey, Team USA didn’t face a single second of adversity Thursday as they finished out their first group stage against Japan.

The Americans absolutely obliterated Japan with a 98-43 wire-to-wire victory that maintains their undefeated run at the 2019 FIBA World Cup and advance out of Group E.

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Team USA quickly climbed to double digits two and a half minutes into the contest as Japan struggled to find their first points until the 5:20 mark of the first quarter.

That obviously set the tone for how the morning’s proceedings would go for the USA as they didn’t rest on their laurels to build on their incredible margin over the Japanese, leading by as much as a whopping 60 points midway through the fourth quarter.

While the US put in a standout performance on the whole, Brook Lopez and Khris Middleton of the Milwaukee Bucks had relatively mixed outings off the bench, respectively.

Starting with Middleton, the 28-year-old opened up his account by knocking down a triple. However, unlike in Team USA’s narrow win over Turkey, Middleton struggled with his shot for the majority of Thursday as he couldn’t add another three-pointer, and also struggled when looking to penetrate the opposing defense for floater attempts.

Where Middleton really shined was distributing the ball and his probing with the ball in his hands helped USA to decimate Japan’s zone defense as he regularly found open shooters and teammates streaking through in transition for easy scoring opportunities.

The All-Star swingman finished with nine points on 3-of-8 shooting from the field (1-for-4 from three, 2-of-2 from the free throw line), six rebounds, six assists, and two steals, and was a +31 in nearly 22 minutes of play.

Like Middleton, Lopez came out firing blanks from long distance for most of the game, save for hitting his lone three at the 1:14 mark in the second quarter. That said, the 31-year-old had no problem capitalizing on scoring opportunities inside the arc between a nice and-one finish at the basket as well as an easy diving, two-handed slam dunk out of the pick and roll.

Defensively, Lopez was stout, as he often is, as he shuttered away a pair of shot attempts from driving Japanese guards and he fended off opposing big men to corral misses on the glass as well. In the end, the Stanford alum posted seven points on 3-for-6 shooting from the field (1-for-4 from beyond the arc, 0-for-1 from the foul line), four rebounds, two blocks, one assist and was a +9 in exactly 17 minutes of action.

With the first group stage now done and over at this point in the World Cup, Team USA is set to take on a spirited Greece squad that rebounded from their defeat to Brazil with a 103-97 win over New Zealand Thursday.

Of course, that also means the Americans will go up against the reigning MVP in Giannis Antetokounmpo and it will be a face-off against Bucks teammates between both Antetokounmpos, Lopez and Middleton.

As of now, Team USA’s duel against Greece will go down on Saturday, but when it starts is TBD.