Olympics in store for Americans

They're in. Next stop, Beijing.

A happy if not somewhat relieved group of elite American basketball players helped the United States qualify for next summer's Olympics in China.

Team USA put any doubts to rest that it is on the right path in attempting to reclaim the top spot in international basketball as it continued to dominate at the FIBA Americas Championship with a resounding 135-91 dismantling of Puerto Rico in Saturday's semifinals at the Thomas & Mack Center.

Joining the USA at the Olympics will be Argentina, which rode the hot hands of Luis Scola and Carlos Delfino to beat Brazil 91-80 in the other semifinal.

Argentina and the USA will play for the FIBA Americas gold medal at 4 p.m. today on Fox Sports Net (Cable 49), and Brazil and Puerto Rico will meet for the bronze at 1.

"We didn't expect to do it this way," USA Basketball managing director Jerry Colangelo said. "We wanted it to happen last summer (at the world championships). But the reality is, and it sounded trite at the time, is we'd be better off for the experience in terms of losing. It's done. You make the best of it and you move on.

"Now we can prepare for next summer. Where are we? We're a lot further ahead than had we won the world championship and had a summer of just a week of work. This is preparing us for our eventual goal and objective, that being the gold medal in China."

LeBron James said losing last summer might have been a blessing in disguise.

"We wouldn't have had this chance to come together with this particular group of guys if we had won last summer," James said. "Nobody likes to lose. But something good definitely came from it.

"We've really grown close, on and off the court. Everyone gets along. Everyone sacrifices. This is the best team I've ever played on."

On Saturday, the USA took a while to get rolling. But once it started to gain momentum, it wasn't stopped. Carmelo Anthony and Michael Redd had hot stretches that put to rest any doubts of Puerto Rico pulling off a miracle.

Anthony had 17 points in the third quarter en route to a 27-point performance as the Americans extended a 57-42 halftime lead to 88-62 with 3:39 to go in the quarter.

Then Redd took over. He hit his first 3-pointer and never stopped. He was 7-for-8 from beyond the arc and finished with 23 points. His miss came on his last attempt, and it brought a collective groan from the 7,259 who came to watch the carnage.

"All I can say is thank God," Redd said. "After I hit that first one, I truly didn't think I was going to miss."

Puerto Rico hung in through part of the second quarter, as it was patient on offense and limited the USA highlight-reel plays to a couple. But Anthony threw down a slam dunk and hit a trey as the Americans opened a double-digit lead.

That set the stage for Anthony and his teammates' third-quarter surge, and it was off to the bronze-medal game for the islanders, who were led, as usual, by Elias Ayuso and Carlos Arroyo with 22 and 21 points, respectively.

The Americans celebrated their accomplishment the way the San Antonio Spurs would a win in January over the Los Angeles Clippers: A friendly wave to the crowd, and they were gone.

Argentina, conversely, acted the way Northern Arizona would after it won the Big Sky Tournament and had earned a spot in the NCAA Tournament. The Argentines jumped up and down, danced and waved flags as a dejected Brazil trudged off the court, its Olympic future to be determined next summer as it gets one last chance to qualify for Beijing, along with Puerto Rico and Canada, which finished fifth at the FIBA Americas.

"I am excited. I am really excited," said Argentina coach Sergio Hernandez, whose team will get to defend the gold medal it won in the 2004 Olympics in Athens. "Five, six months ago, we tried to put this team together. (Manu) Ginobli didn't want to play. (Andres) Nocioni decided not to play. Many people in Argentina were upset. They didn't think we could do it.

"But we believed. We played hard, and we were a team."

Led by Scola's 27 points and Delfino's 13, Argentina overcame an 11-point second-quarter deficit with a 30-13 third-quarter scoring edge and passed Brazil, which lost star center Nene to a pulled right calf muscle four minutes into the game. Nene, who plays for the Denver Nuggets, left the Thomas & Mack on crutches and is not expected to play in the bronze-medal game.

As for the gold-medal game today, the USA players say it matters and they will not lay down for Argentina.

"We came here to win every game," Amare Stoudemire said. "Just because we clinched a spot in the Olympics doesn't mean we stop playing. We want to finish strong and take that momentum to Beijing with us next summer."

Said Anthony: "To go back to 2004, we as a country had that memory in the back of our mind. We know what's at stake, what's our goal, to not only win this tournament that we're playing in right now, but to win that medal, to go get the gold medal."