Basketball World Cup: Luka Doncic v Boomers, Xavier Cooks dominates Japan
Luka Doncic is one of the biggest basketball names on the planet - but his overexaggerated flailing is an embarrassing sideshow to his all-world talents, writes Michael Randall.
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A major roadblock stands in the way of the Boomers next.
Some bloke named Luka Doncic and Slovenia — the team Australia beat in Tokyo for that historic bronze medal.
“They (Slovenia) are a very talented roster — Luka is a heck of a basketball player, so we’ve got to try and figure him out,” says Boomers centre Xavier Cooks.
“But we’ve got some great defenders in our team.”
Luka, one of the best basketballers on the planet, will have revenge on his mind.
But could that bring about his undoing?
The Dallas superstar — a teammate of Green and Dante Exum at the Mavericks — has a penchant for letting his emotions get the better of him.
That was on full display in the 2021 bronze medal game where, nursing a sore wrist, he whined, whinged and pleaded with the referees, before ultimately finishing up with nothing to show for his efforts.
“We were a little bit too emotional in both games — especially me,” Doncic said after the Boomers’ historic 107-93 win over his nation.
“I have got to learn from that and it is not the way I should be behaving.”
“It is their way to try and get into my head and sometimes I let them in and that is my fault.”
The Aussies are masters of the mental game and any weakness, even in the biggest stars, will be quickly identified and seized upon.
Doncic is known as the biggest whiner in the NBA and his overexaggerated flailing is an embarrassing sideshow to his all-world talents that has helped him go to the line 44 times across three World Cup games.
He knows he’s going to get belted up by the likes of Green, Thybulle and the Aussie bigs, how he handles it — and how the refs adjudicate — will go a long way to deciding the contest.
BEST SINCE MILLS: THIRD-GAME BOOMER’S PERFORMANCE FOR AGES
Xavier Cooks plonked into a seat on the Boomers’ bench late in the third quarter of his team’s 20-point FIBA World Cup win over Japan, the shock of curly hair on his head momentarily covering his face.
Once the 203cm star swept away his locks and tied them back in his trademark ponytail, a broad smile was revealed.
Cooks, in just his third game as a fully-fledged Boomer, sat for a well-earned rest after ripping down his 10th rebound to complete a double-double in what was the most influential Boomers’ performance since Patty Mills’ 42-point masterpiece that secured bronze at the Tokyo Olympics.
Flanked by teammates Nick Kay and Matisse Thybulle, Cooks joyfully chattered away, safe in the knowledge the Boomers led 83-56.
He deserved to smile.
Japan refused to go away, but the game was effectively all over and the Washington Wizard was a, if not the, key reason for that.
The 20-10 that became 24-16 by game’s end in a 109-89 win which kept Australia’s World Cup dream alive was another marker the 28-year-old truly belonged on the world stage.
Not that he didn’t believe it before, but stack another milestone up as further tangible proof he was a vital cog in a green and gold machine that harbours golden dreams.
“Every time I put on this jersey, I want to play as hard as I can,” he told CODE Sports, post-game.
“That is one thing about me, man, I just play my arse off out there and whatever happens, happens.”
When you’re as relentless as Cooks, good things are what tends to happen.
He was an early beneficiary of the desire of guards Josh Giddey and Dante Exum to exploit their superior size and strength to get their feet in the paint and make good decisions.
Cooks made those decisions easy, moving with speed and purpose off the ball, providing options for his guards close to the hoop. When they took it themselves and missed, Cooks simply wanted the rock more than anyone else on the floor, helping himself to several putbacks at the cup.
Cooks plays with a non-stop motor that helps him impact the game from anywhere on the floor. Defensively, he was equally at home guarding Japan’s bigger boys in Yuta Watanabe and Josh Hawkinson as he was against the little speedy guards, among them former Melbourne United flash Yudai Baba.
Cooks has serious above-the-rim ability, throwing down a litany of nasty dunks in his time in the NBL. Against Japan, he had a trio of special deliveries, roaring and mean-mugging after every one of them.
By game’s end, some were calling it Cooks’ ‘arrival’ but, truth be told, he’s had several of those moments.
He’s already here.
The son of former NBL import Eric Cooks, the Xavier Cooks’ story is well-documented.
Overlooked for state teams as a youngster and plagued by injuries, major and minor, that have conspired to wreck his Boomers’ dreams — until now — Cooks has been gifted nothing, and worked his arse off for everything.
It took time, lots of time, but he’s now bearing the fruits of back-to-back NBL titles with the Sydney Kings that yielded finals, then league MVP gongs, which helped him catch the eye of the Washington Wizards.
Hoops supporters in the US can be fickle — and, at times, downright ignorant.
More astute watchers know he’s a winner and an athlete whose ability to switch defensively is as elite as the best in the NBA. He’s a big guy who can lead the break, is an elite passer and crashes the offensive glass like his life depends on it — 10 of his 13 boards against Japan were off Boomers’ misses, producing second (and third, and fourth) chances.
Of course, some Wiz fans responded to Cooks’ arrival in more negative ways including ‘tank commander’, owing to the projections of a tough season, ‘who?’ and ‘surely we could have
Not saying an elite performance like that on the international stage changes anything for them — those types are beyond saving — but it’s certainly made more pundits and fans stand up and take notice of the kid from the ‘Gong who made it big.
Sam Vecenie, of The Athletic: “Xavier Cooks is good. Have had a bunch of NBA scouts/execs ask me “yeah but what position does he play? What’s the role?” Here’s the thing: he’s just good at basketball. He knows how to play. Has an innate feel for moving off the ball into dead zones. Good defender. Passes well.”
All things Aussie hoops fans have known for a long, long time.
BOOMERS BIG MOVE AND THAT GIDDEY KID
Some were calling for Cooks to start after Nick Kay (13 points) was exposed on switches in Sunday night’s three-point loss to Germany. Kay, a much-loved Boomers’ servant, was, again, picked on by Japan. He had dramas stopping Watanabe and was left on an island when switched onto Japan’s quick guards, especially in the second half, where they outscored the Boomers 54-52.
Boomers coach Brian Goorjian resisted the urge to insert Cooks into the first five — savvy stuff, given what he produced — instead opting for a change on the wing with Dallas Maverick Josh Green inserted for Matisse Thybulle.
Thybulle is a great defender, but he’s clearly not the player the emergent Green is — at both ends of the floor.
Green shoots the hell out of it, is confident attacking the basket and displays a meanness on the defensive end that makes him one of the best wing stoppers at the World Cup. He’s a bulldog on the ball and makes great decisions gambling in the passing lanes.
The Sydney-born 22-year-old was the first Boomer to double digits, helping the Boomers address their worrying trend of slow starts, and finished the game with 15 points and four steals.
Thybulle looked banged up after the Germany game and, while Basketball Australia assures he is OK, he hasn’t quite looked like the disrupter who played such a crucial role in the Tokyo bronze.
If Kay was having trouble on switches at one end, Giddey gave Hawkinson (game-high 33 points, 13-16 from the field) fits at the other.
Giddey actively sought out the Washington State behemoth and made him look like barbecue chicken.
The towering Victorian point guard — ‘he’s only 20’ is fast becoming a meme — is growing into his first major international tournament, producing a double-double of his own with a team-high 26 points and 11 assists.
The Boomers had 31 assists on 44 made buckets — Patty Mills adding nine dimes — in a true team effort that Cooks believes showed they were beginning to mesh.
“We’ve got a lot of talent in the whole roster, but I think this whole team is starting to figure each other out,” Cooks said.
“We haven’t really played too much as a group, compared to the last Olympics (in 2021).
“They had a lot of guys with continuity, whereas we’re still trying to figure that out.
“You could tell in the first half that we played better basketball. We had 19 assists at halftime.”
Tip of the hat to the Boomers’ biggest boy in Duop Reath (eight points) who didn’t have a monster night on the stat sheet, but set the tone with a pair of huge blocks inside the first two minutes of the game that left the diminutive Japanese guards hesitant to take it to the rack.
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