Three more games to report on from the first annual BallinEurope Festivus Invitational Tournament brought to you by sports simulation website What If Sports – all apologies for the late reportage, but even BiE can’t ignore the family for hoops 365 days a year has to merrily celebrate the holidays – as day two wraps up.
December 24: All-Time Toronto Raptors 111, 21st Century Dream Team 99. In a shocker, the Raps dominated the ultra-talented Century 21s in the late game of day one. Vince Carter had a monster game from the floor with 30 points and Charles Oakley finally exploited that much-hyped weakness Team USA 2010 was ostensibly to have had, i.e. lack of height, with a crazy 24 rebounds.
The 21st Century Team came out ice cold to score just 14 points to the Raptors’ 30 and basically never recovered. Kevin Durant had 22 for the 2010 side on 7-of-13 shooting, but Kevin “Summer Of” Love was an eye-poppingly abysmal 6-of-25 against the big presences of Oakley and Antonio Davis, the latter of which had three blocks of Love.
December 25: The Dream Team 116, All-Time Toronto Raptors 85. As a younger Charles Barkley might’ve told the Raptors, “Merry Christmas, *(#%(&#!”
The Dream Team established on the Lord’s Day just who the lords of this tournament are by torching the Raptors a day after the Canadian side had made holiday mincemeat out of Team USA 2010. Toronto started the first quarter 1-of-7 and even though they eventually recovered to put in 28 for the opening stanza, the Dream Team had already scored 36 on 14-of-24 shooting and there was the proverbial no looking back.
Vince Carter again benefited from a statistic-based simulation, racking up 33 points and four steals (three in the first quarter), but the Dream Team showed its ridiculous depth as six players went for double figures: game MVP Michael Jordan (28 points), David Robinson (16), Larry Bird (14), Patrick Ewing (13), Clyde Drexler (11) and Magic Johnson (10).
December 25: The Redeem Team 108, 1960 Team USA 85. Santa Claus was not so kind to those wishing for close matches on Christmas Day as the Redeem Team reminded spectators of just how good their team is in its first game.
The Redeemers’ performance was marked most by the 53.8% shooting as a team; Dwight Howard was completely fearless against the twin towers of Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell, going for a huge 10-of-11 shooting (read: dunks, mostly) for 21 points and nine rebounds. King James was also a monster with so much unexpected attention being given Superman in the low post, contributing a sweet all-around line of 27/7/8.
And so, after two days of play in the BiE Festivus Invitational, the standings are as follows:
Group A
Dream Team Europe, 1-0
Redeem Team, 1-0
1960 Team USA, 0-2
Group B
Dream Team, 1-0
All-Time Toronto Raptors, 1-1
21st-century Dream Team, 0-1
Tomorrow’s games: Redeem Team vs. Dream Team Europe and Dream Team vs. Century 21s.
