RIO DE JANEIRO _ The question that has dogged Geno Auriemma at his regular job didn't stay behind when he traveled to Rio. After the U.S. women's basketball team overpowered Serbia, 110-84, on Wednesday, the UConn coach _ who also oversees the Olympic team _ was asked for the umpteenth time: Is a team this good ultimately bad for the game?
Never mind that Serbia (0-3) exposed the Americans' defensive weaknesses, or that the U.S. (3-0) committed 20 turnovers in an occasionally ragged performance. Auriemma knows some people will scrutinize his players rather than herald them if they win their sixth consecutive Olympic gold medal. He just chuckled when the question was posed again at Youth Arena, then calmly shot it to pieces.
Five U.S. players _ including the Lynx's Maya Moore _ scored in double figures as the U.S. ran its Olympic win streak to 44 games. Diana Taurasi scored a game-high 25 points and made 6 of 10 3-pointers. Moore finished with 10 points before leaving the game in the third quarter; she did not return after having her leg stretched and flexed by a member of the training staff, but her dance steps after several U.S. baskets suggested she felt just fine.
So did Auriemma, even after The Question was raised again.
"We live in a Trumpian era where it's OK to be sexist and degrade people that are good just because they're the opposite sex," Auriemma said. "We are what we are. We're never going to apologize for being that good.
"These are Olympians. They're supposed to play at a high level. We're not bad for women's basketball; what would be bad for women's basketball would be if nobody was great. We just happen to be somewhere else right now, and I don't mind. We just need to stay there another 12 or 13 days."
That "somewhere else" has been on another planet, as the U.S. beat Senegal by 65 and Spain by 40 in its first two games in Rio. For a little while Wednesday, Serbia pulled it back to earth. The Serbs were making their first-ever Olympic appearance after winning EuroBasket 2015, and they had much of the crowd behind them.
Many Brazilians in the stands sided with the underdog, booing and jeering the chants of "USA" that occasionally began in the stars-and-stripes section. Auriemma said Serbia was "impossible to play against" with its hot outside shooting, which forced the Americans to come out to guard them. An early 11-2 lead for the U.S. melted under a barrage of 3-pointers, putting Serbia ahead, 17-16, with three minutes, 41 seconds left in the first quarter before Taurasi began bombing away.
She scored 22 of her points in the first half and broke her own U.S. Olympic record for most 3-pointers in a game. Serbia kept its deficit to single digits until 6:26 of the second quarter, when the U.S. took off on a 16-4 run.
The question of whether her team's performance was somehow objectionable didn't sit any better with her than it did with Auriemma. "I don't even know how to answer it any more," she said. "Would it be better if we lost by 50?
"We have 12 women here who dedicate their lives to the game of basketball year-round. So to knock us for doing that? It's a bit disrespectful, I would say."
Auriemma pointedly noted there is "a guy in the pool with a USA swim cap that nobody can beat" _ a reference to Michael Phelps, who won his 21st Olympic gold medal Tuesday. Such greatness is a gift to the world, Auriemma maintained, no matter the gender or venue.
Though Taurasi and Auriemma had plenty to say on the subject, Lindsay Whalen didn't take the bait. She was more concerned with keeping the streak going than debating its merits.
"You have to really stay in the moment in these tournaments," said Whalen, who played 20 minutes off the bench and had five points and three assists. "We just had a real hard fight with Serbia. We're going to recover from this game, enjoy it for a couple of hours and get ready for the next one."
