Olympic 5 Things: Lithuania vs China

During the remainder of the Olympic men's basketball tournament, FanHouse will give you 5 Things to watch for in each game.

Will Yao play mad? On Monday, Chinese coach Jonas Kazlauskas held Yao Ming to seven minutes in the second half. Yao was furious. We assume he's gotten over things. If he hasn't? Yao rarely plays angry; he's an extremely mature fellow, typically calm and reserved, unless he's getting mauled on the court. But he's had a bit of an edge to him this week. He's barked at Yi Jianlian and Sun Yue more than he ever has in Chuck Hayes' presence. He looked like he wanted to punch Kazlauskas when he was removed. He didn't talk to reporters. I've only seen Yao under the spell of bloodlust once, in Sacramento last season as some combination of Mikki Moore and (surprise!) Ron Artest aggravated the snot out of the big guy. He was ineffective and eventually got ejected. I imagine things are fine on Team China now. If there are, however, raw nerves, Yao might either play with a fire we haven't seen ... or he might be distracted into malperformance.

Trade secrets. One more Kaslauskas note: this Coach K is Lithuanian, and coached the Lithuanian national team until 2001, and knows the games of many of Lithuania's top players well. That sort of trade secret thing won't work without talent ... with China has with Yao and sometimes Yi. As a longtime Oakland Raider fan (pity me), remember the Jon Gruden Super Bowl.

Did Lithuania bluff against Australia? The Lithuanians got absolutely murdered by Australia. The consensus is that the team didn't quite tank the game (nothing was at stake), but Lithuania didn't go full-brew either. If you're of the mind the team tried close to its best and still came up with the pitiful result, you'd be wary of Lithuania, who boasts only the sixth best efficiency differential of The Games, behind even Greece (who has not been impressive). If the Australia loss was a fluke owed to boredom and lookingforwardedness (aw yeah! Oxford word of the year), Lithuania's record looks much better, and China would look to be a smashed gourd coming right up.

Linas Watch. My friend Matt Moore has helped preach the Gospel of Linas Kleiza; the young Nug has been a bucket-getting ox, I tell you. That is, of course, what he does in the NBA as well. The only difference in international competition is that he actually gets plenty of minutes. Kleiza is Shane Battier's long-lost shadow, twins in threeball range and bench-pressing prowess. But Battier opts to defend nastier than any Blue Devil in history while Linas shows the dark side of gunnerdom. If this were 2000 and Vince Carter were defending him, Kleiza could win the tournament by himself.

Rest for the weary. The Olympic schedule isn't terribly repressive: there are no back-to-backs, and everyone has one rest day between games, no excuses. But some cats are playing a ton of minutes. With deep Spain possibly looming on Friday, Lithuania would do well to put China away early, if possible. The next two tests are hard enough without spilling blood in the quarterfinals against a team Lithuania should be able to handle handily.