The United States, which has won the first two U17 World championships, defeated Greece, 83-73, in the first round of the FIBA U17 world championships in Dubai, UAE, but never dominated play the way it did in 2013 at the U16 FIBA Americas tournament when it rolled to a gold medal, winning all its games by an average of 53.4 points per game.
Center Diamond Stone, a 6-10 senior from Dominican High in Whitefish Bay, Wisc. led the Americans with 22 points, 10 rebounds and four blocked shots. Senior guard Malik Newman from Jackson, Miss. Callaway, the MVP of the U16 FIBA Americas tourrnament last year, added 12. Both Stone and Newman have openly talked about attending the same college next year. Jayson Tatum, a 6-9 junior guard from St. Louis Chaminade, chipped in 10.
The Greeks, which were expected be America’s most difficult competition in Pool A play, showed they are a dangerous team. They got 17 points from 6-8 small forward Vasileios Charalampopoulos and 16 points and 11 rebounds from Georgios Papagiannis. The 7-1 Papagiannis who signed a professional contract in June after playing high school basketball for the Westtown School near West Chester, Pa. had 16 points, 11 rebounds and 3 assists and and was a difficult matchup for the United States. Antonio Koniaris chipped in 15 points in the loss.
And they are just catching their second wind.
Greece’s U17 coach Dimitrios Papanikolaou went into training camp missing five of his players, who were playing up in an attempt to get the Greek U8 team qualified for the 2015 FIBA U19 World Championship. The Greeks accomplished that goal with a fourth place finish in the tournament, which ended last Sunday in Turkey. Papanikolaou will have four of those players available as Dionysis Skoulidas broke his left hand and will miss all of the U17 Worlds.
But the two biggest pieces of Papanikolaou’s team– Charalampopoulos, who was named to the all tournament team at the U18 Euros, and Papagiannis, who was arguablly the most dominant big man when he was on the court in Turkey, are here, as well as Konariis, who played a major role as the starting point guard while averaging 6.2 points, 2.8 rebounds, 2.1 assists and 1.7 steals. And guard Vasileios Mouratos, who will not turn 17 until Novmber, chipped in 5.2 points, 2.2 assists and 1.9 rebounds in 22 minutes as the youngest player at the U18 Euros.
Papanikolaou’s high level team could definitely challenge for a medal.
The U.S. got off slowly and led the Greeks just 32-31 in the second quarter before going on a 13-2 run to create much needed space. Greece never got closer with eight but the game never reached blow out stage..
There was one noticeable upset in the first round. Puerto Rico, playing in its first U17 world championship, stunned the 2013 U16 European champions Spain, 67-65, in Group C. Leandro Allende scored 16 points and Amadlo Troo added 13 points, 12 rebounds and three blocks as Puerto Rico hurt Spain badly from the line, making 17 of 20 free throw attempts.
