BEIJING — San Antonio Spur star Tim Duncan made no secret his disgust for international officiating following the 2004 Athens Olympics when he played for the bronze-medal winning USA team.

Duncan spent most U.S. games on the bench in foul trouble and thoroughly frustrated. Dwyane Wade, LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony and Carlos Boozer were teammates of Duncan's on that team. The bad taste lingered and pushed them to make the commitment to the 2008 team.

But Wade understands why Duncan didn't want anymore to do with FIBA and international ball.

AP photo

BEIJING — The gold medal belongs again to the USA.

The U.S. men's basketball team beat Spain 118-107 at the Beijing Olympic Basketball Gymnasium on Sunday to secure a 13th Olympic gold medal for the USA.

Spain held on throughout the game, trailing by four with about two minutes left in the game. Dwyane Wade hit a 3 with 2:02 left then a Kobe Bryant drive and four Chris Paul free throws kept the Spaniards from getting any closer.

BEIJING — USA guard Dwyane Wade doesn't go many places where he's not noticed but apparently the Great Wall of China is one of those places.

Wade was visiting the drink stand at the Wall several days ago looking for something to quench his thirst when, lo and behold, he ran across a bottle of Gatorade with his mug on the front. That's where the audio clip picks up. He can tell the story better than I can.

BEIJING — That killed the buzz.

The U.S. destroyed any illusions Spain might have had about being a close second favorite in the men's basketball competition at the Beijing Olympics with a 119-82 Pool B victory over the defending World Champions at the Beijing Olympic Basketball Gymnasium on Saturday.

USA forward LeBron James scored nine of the Americans' first 16 points, while the U.S. forced Spain into boo-boo after boo-boo and beat Spain to the other end to score.

BEIJING — The U.S. is playing Spain in the hottest game of pool play at the Beijing Olympics, which is being touted, yes, by me and the rest of humanity, as a possible gold-medal game preview. The U.S. is favored to win the gold. Spain is the defending world champion.

Since they last played each other at the 2004 Athens Games, we finally get to see how they stack up. Here are some numbers to chew on before the 10:15 a.m. ET start:

minus 0.4 — The U.S. is getting outrebounded by an average of 0.4 boards per game (37.3 to 37.7).

0 — Number of times Spain has beaten the U.S. in eight tries in Olympic action.

1 — Number of times the U.S. and Spain have met in the Olympic gold-medal game. The U.S. beat Spain in 1984. The silver for Spain in Los Angeles was its highest-ever Olympic finish.

10 — Spain has outworked its opponents by an average of 10 rebounds per game (41.0 to 31.0).

17.7 — Points per game average for Pau Gasol, who leads the Spaniards in scoring.

18.3 — Points per game average for Dwayne Wade, who leads the U.S. in scoring.

19.3 — Number of assists, on an average of 37 made baskets, the U.S. records per game.

Unknown — Number of Chinese who dig on U.S. guard Kobe Bryant.

BEIJING — Here's USA guard and leading scorer Dwyane Wade describing USA head coach Mike Krzyzewski like a kid on too much sugar.

This comes from the U.S. practice session at Beijing Normal University on Wednesday.

BEIJING — USA guard Dwyane Wade took the podium after the Americans beat Angola 97-76 on Tuesday night at the Beijing Olympic Basketball Gymnasium, took a question, and immediately looked thoroughly confused.

Wade turned to U.S. coach Mike Krzyzewski and told him he couldn't understand the question.

Krzyzewski explained and Wade, who'd just led the U.S. scoring a second straight game with 19 points, finally answered.

Wade wasn't suffering from a brain cloud. Turns out he had his headphones, which pipe in translations of questions in other languages, tuned to the Chinese channel. He was listening to Mandarin instead of English.

Krzyzewski later teased Wade, "I was wondering about you," before explaining to the assembled media what had happened.