USA 121, China 90
SAPPORO, Japan (AP) -- Yao Ming is back, and the United States was ready for him..
Using a swarming defense and their huge advantage in depth to make life miserable for China and its All-Star center, the Americans rolled to a 121-90 victory Sunday night to remain unbeaten at the world championships.
"We knew that they wanted Yao to be a big factor, so we wanted to take him out and make them take difficult shots," U.S. forward Antawn Jamison said.
Dwyane Wade scored 26 points for the Americans, who needed less than four minutes to build their first double-digit lead and led by as many as 36. Carmelo Anthony and Dwight Howard had 16 points each and Chris Paul 13.
LeBron James, Joe Johnson and Elton Brand all had 11 points while Paul added eight assists and Howard 11 rebounds.
"We were trying to share the basketball, share the defensive rotation and just be a team," Brand said. "There are a lot of individuals out there, especially on their respective NBA teams. We're trying to be a team out here, get assists and do the extra things."
The Americans, averaging 116 points through two games, next play Slovenia on Tuesday. They headed into Group D's off day tied with Italy at 2-0 for first place. China (0-2) is tied with Senegal at the bottom. The top four teams in the six-team pool advance
Yao led China with 21 points, but the Americans made him work for all of them. He had only one field goal in the first half, when the game was decided, and finished 5-of-8 from the field before fouling out with 6:08 remaining.
"We worked very hard to defend Yao," U.S. coach Mike Krzyzewski
said. "He's a terrific player."
Yao didn't play in the Americans' 119-73 victory in this month's exhibition game at Guangzhou, China, because he was recovering from a broken left foot. His return in time for this tournament gave plenty of hope to the Chinese, who had a large contingent of fans at the game waving flags and holding large pictures of Yao..
The 7-foot-5 center predicted China would advance out of pool play -- he was quoted in a story in the China Daily before the tournament as saying, "China will enter the last 16, I promise." Then he scored 30 points in China's opening loss to Italy
But the U.S. never let him be a factor when the game was still in doubt, delivering a couple of hard fouls when he had a clear path to the basket and even playing two centers together at times. Still not fully fit, Yao didn't even make it across midcourt at times after Chinese turnovers.
The United States improved to 5-0 in world championships play against China, the Asian champion. Wang added 17 points for China, which next plays Puerto Rico
2006 Worlds Teams and Groups:
GROUP A: Argentina, Venezuela, France, Serbia & Montenegro, Lebanon, Nigeria
GROUP B: Spain, Panama, Germany, Japan, New Zealand, Angola
GROUP C: Lithuania, Brazil, Greece, Turkey, Australia, Qatar
GROUP D: USA, Puerto Rico, Slovenia, Italy, China, Senegal
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USA 111, Puerto Rico 100: USA Wins first game