After a challenging Monday night victory, Team USA now prepares for their upcoming game tonight against Great Britain.
Team USA last played on Monday night in Washington, D.C. at the Verizon Center against Brazil. After struggling early, they took control of the game with defense and squeaked out an 11-point win, 80-69.
Now against Great Britain, Team USA hopes to improve their record to 3-0.
Head coach Mike Krzyzewski expects a tough challenge from his former player Luol Deng, knowing all too well Deng's threat on the offensive and defensive end of the floor.
Great Britain is sets at 350-1 underdogs to win gold in London, just winning two of their last nine friendly exhibition games this summer.
Though the expectation is that they will be seriously over-matched against the defending Olympic champions, coach Krzyzewski is respectful of what London can achieve with Deng in their ranks.
"The first thing they've done already is that their best player has shown an amazing commitment to his country," he said. "I get chills just thinking about it. I love Luol's commitment; he's done an amazing job of bringing attention to the game in Great Britain in a very positive way.
"And, knowing him, I am expecting some amazing performances that might produce some upsets," Krzyzewski added. "They will obviously be an underdog throughout, but this is a great step for basketball in the UK to take. I hope they have a great showing."
Deng shows equally enough respect to his former coach as well and also believes playing against Team USA in Manchester will make a significant step forward for the sport in his country.
"I'm excited to be playing against 'Coach K' but more than anything I'm excited for British basketball," said Deng. "Growing up in Brixton [in south London], I never saw anything like this happen. The other week we played France, who are number four in the world; we played Spain who are second, now we are playing the USA who are number one.
"As a kid, that was my dream, to play against the best," Deng added. "There are still a lot of people in the UK who don't know much about the sport but our basketball program is there. Now the USA are here, I'm excited about it."
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