Team USA and Puerto Rico are playing live ahead of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2014 tournament on Friday at Madison Square Garden in NYC and the matchup is on TV from ESPN2 and is streaming live from WatchESPN as the US team plays in front of fans in the United States with names like Derrick Rose, James Harden, Chandler Parsons and Kenneth Faried leading the way.

Team USA comes into the tournament as one of the favorites and things will get started up after next week and this is another chance for the team to play together. The team dealt with the loss of Paul George and the slight injury to Derrick Rose and now he is ready to play again. The George injury was devastating and things took a bad turn after that, but only Kevin Durant left and now the players are taking pride in playing for their nation as the FIBA World Cup gets ready to start.

The team played against the cadets at West Point last week and also played against the Dominican Republic and that was also at MSG and now the team is playing there again. The game against the DR ended up being a rout and that allowed some of the reserve players to get a chance to play and that actually could be very good for the United States, as the team is going to need everyone on the roster contributing with the way the team is shaping up.

Rose did not play in the game against the Dominican Republic to rest his knee and while many were worried about his injury history, all involved said it was nothing serious and was just rest. The game saw Rose come in as a late scratch, but he is expected to play in this game against PR and the team is ready to get things going. The FIBA tournament starts next week and USA will have a tough schedule, as they have to play five games within their group set over a six day period and things open up on August 30.

Rose said that he has been feeling good and that came after he scored seven points in his first action back and that was in the game at the United Center against Brazil. That game marked the first playing time for Rose since getting injured last season and now Bulls fane are hoping he makes it through this with no issues. Kyrie Irving started the previously game in place of Rose and he has played well so far and he looks like a like to make it after scoring 12 points in that game.

James Harden has been playing well on top of that and he was one of the leading scorers in the game and Rudy Gay and DeMar DeRozan came in and scored 13 points each and they could be major players come FIBA time as well. The team is going to have to cut down to 12 players and while all involved said that it would be hard, head coach Mike Krzyzewski said that everyone knows what the number one goal is.

Check here for the Team USA and Puerto Rico live coverage from ESPN.