BEIJING — There was one person missing from a sensational gold-medal basketball final between the United States and Spain on Sunday.
Jose Calderon.
The Toronto Raptors point guard, who plays for Spain, missed his second consecutive game of the Olympic tournament with a partially torn right adductor muscle suffered in a quarter-final victory against Croatia last Wednesday. Speaking with reporters for the first time since injuring himself, Calderon called it a minor ailment and said he will be back to full health in seven to 10 days.
Asked about being reduced to spectator status for the gold-medal game, Calderon said: "It wasn't boring. I was enjoying it like everybody else. It was a great game."
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Given the number of times Spain's guards turned the ball over in the backcourt, Calderon's participation might have made the game even more competitive than it already was.
The United States won 118-107 in a highly entertaining contest. Spain committed 14 turnovers and was using 17-year-old Ricky Rubio and Juan Carlos Navarro, who has one year of NBA experience, as its primary ball handlers.
"You never know," Calderon said when asked whether he could have helped author a different result. "It was a close game. We couldn't finish, but I think we played great tonight."
Calderon said he was satisfied with a silver medal, and that missing two important games was necessary so he will be healthy come NBA training camp, which will begins in one month.
But Spain's head coach, Aito Garcia Reneses, hinted that an upset was possible had Calderon been available.
"When we compete against USA, Calderon is very strong and very beneficial," he said. "Those kinds of [NBA] players are very beneficial for us."
Reneses added that the guard did not arrive at the Olympic tournament as prepared as some of the other Spanish players. The reference was to Calderon's missing nearly the first two weeks of Spain's training camp because he was a restricted NBA free agent who needed to sign a contract and secure insurance coverage before risking an injury while practising with his national team.
Calderon was also stapled to the bench for Spain's semi-final win against Lithuania after doctors advised the team that he should not risk worsening the partial tear. He did not log huge minutes for Spain as Reneses often brought him off the bench and started Rubio, his player from DKV Joentut in Spain's professional league.
