The United States and Serbia got off to impressive starts at the basketball World Championship, while Australia and Greece had unexpectedly close games before winning too. The United States, which has not won the world title in 16 years, got 16 points from Eric Gordon and used a dominant second-quarter stretch in a 106-78 victory over Croatia. Aleksandar Rasic made six of seven 3-pointers to lead Serbia with 22 points in a 94-44 rout of Angola despite the absence of two key players. Australia came from behind for a lucky 76-75 win over Jordan, but another team from the Middle East, Lebanon, did win when it upset Canada 81-71 behind 31 points from forward Fadi El Khatib. Greece pulled away for a 89-81 victory over China, but not before China had gotten within two points late in the game. Russia defeated Puerto Rico 75-66, Lithuania beat New Zealand 92-79 and Slovenia eased past Tunisia 80-56 as the 24-nation tournament got under way on Saturday in four Turkish cities. In other late matches, Argentina beat Germany 78-74, Brazil downed iran 81-65, Turkey defeated Ivory Coast 86-47 and France upset Spain 72-66. In Istanbul, the Americans turned a close game into a blowout by limiting the Croatians to six points in the second quarter. Chauncey Billups finished with 12 points. The US team came to Turkey without any players who helped them win the gold medal in the 2008 Olympics. Instead of those superstars, the Americans are left with a young, undersized team that features Kevin Durant, the NBA's leading scorer, as its centerpiece. He scored five straight points to kick off the decisive burst early in the second quarter and added eight rebounds to his 14 points in just 21 minutes. In Kayseri, Angola was no match for Serbia, which shrugged off the absence of center Nenad Krstic and guard Milos Teodosic to blow past the African champion. Krstic has been suspended for three games and Teodosic for two for their roles in a brawl against Greece in a warmup tournament earlier this month in Athens. “It was important to play well and win the first game,” Rasic said. “We got a lot of easy points.” “My young team had many easy points, we were playing at a different speed than Angola,” Serbia coach Dusan Ivkovic said. Greece seemed to miss Antonis Fotsis and Sofoklis Schortsanitis, who were also suspended for two games for the brawl in Athens. Nikolaos Zisis and Ioannis Bourousis both scored 21 points to lead Greece. China, playing without Houston Rockets center Yao Ming who is recovering from surgery on his left foot, got within two points late in the game before Greece retook control. Yi Jianlian of the Washington Wizards had 26 points for China. “I feel bad, it was so close,” said China guard Sun Yue, who scored 15 points. Greece coach Jonas Kazlauskas was not happy with the performance of his team. “They played very well on one side, I am happy for them,” said Kazlauskas, who coached China previously. “We did not play well like we played before. We had good shooting positions but we hesitated and we had problems in defense.” Center Alex Maric had 23 points and nine rebounds for Australia, which didn't take its first lead until Maric's rebound basket made it 56-55 at the end of the third quarter. David Andersen added 22 points, including the game-clinching two late free throws. Zaid Abbas had 20 points for Jordan. Rasheim Wright added 16 points but he missed a layup in the final seconds and Australia took the rebound and held on for the win.
