Basketball Look For the Silver Lining

By PAUL A. WITTEMAN BADALONA

At 9:30 a.m. the plaza leading to the basketball venue in the gritty Barcelona suburb of Badalona is free of T-shirt hawkers, ticket scalpers and the sunburned masses sporting Cleveland Indians caps and L.A. Raiders shorts. The basketball junkies from the land of Johnson, Jordan, Bird and Barkley are still asleep. But inside the arena, there are large men, graceful and lithe, already hard at work. Their goals: silver, bronze or merely a good finish in the basketball tournament.

Make no mistake. Lithuania wants to beat Croatia. Australia plans to beat them both. The Unified Team thinks it can take home silver in what is sure to be its final appearance in the Games. Puerto Rico has ambitions for a medal. Even Angola has its sights set on ninth place and greater respect. In the most competitive Olympic tournament since the sport was introduced in 1936, none of the other 11 teams think much about trying to beat the U.S. Dream Team. They are not idiots, after all.

More important, they are too busy worrying about one another. Donn Nelson, a coach with the National Basketball Association's Golden State Warriors, who is assisting the Lithuanian team, says, "There are two totally different events. When the U.S. plays, it is more of an entertainment. When the other teams play, it is very exciting. Anybody can win." Petar Skansi, the thoughtful coach of the Croatian team, has a slightly different perspective. "No one wants to beat the Dream Team," he says. "It would be bad for the sport because they are clearly the best. Maybe someone will beat them in 15 or 20 years."

For Skansi and other coaches, there are more immediate concerns as the tournament moves into the single elimination medal round this week. Can anyone stop Lithuania's Sarunas Marciulionis? Will Brazil's Oscar Schmidt ever forgo a three-point shot for a pass to a teammate? Will U.S. forward Charles Barkley keep his elbows to himself? The answers are: no, no and most definitely not. "Charles is Charles," says Michael Jordan. "He's not crazy. He just likes to push his behavior to the edge." Jordan and his teammates have been trying to push it back, with only modest success. When Barkley threw an elbow at Angola's spindly David Dias in the U.S. team's first outing, he was quickly yanked offstage by director-coach Chuck Daly.

Barkley's act of Ugly Americanism was played down by Angolan coach Victorino Cunha. "We know Charles Barkley," he said. "No problem. He does this 10 times a year in the N.B.A." For his part, Cunha deserves a medal for perseverance. In 1975 he started the Angolan basketball program. From scratch. In the 17 years since, he and his team have endured a war that virtually destroyed their nation. On the court they have put up with ridicule. For all who would listen in Badalona, Cunha had one message. "We can play. We can play," he repeated. No one thought so after the U.S. obliterated them by 68 points. But the next day, Angola led Germany, only to fall short by a point in the last minute. "We were very lucky," says German center Hansi Gnad. The host Spaniards were not. Behind Jean Conceicao's 22 points, the Angolans buried the favored home team 83-63 in the upset of the week. Angola can definitely play.

If Angola's Olympic debut was unlikely, consider those of Lithuania and Croatia. Neither team existed last year. Their countries, new to the conjugation of nations, exist only perilously and amid great hardship. But on the court, Lithuania and Croatia do honor to their homelands. Lithuania is led by Marciulionis, whose favorite painter is Hieronymus Bosch. Most N.B.A. players do not have a favorite painter or would not know Bosch from Beethoven, but they all know Marciulionis. This past season as the Golden State Warrior's sixth man, he was fourth in the N.B.A. in points scored for minutes played. "He is the most exciting player I have seen in the tournament so far," said Puerto Rican coach Raymond Dalmau Perez, who at that point had not had to face Jordan & Co.

Marciulionis is a bull, driving fearlessly to the hoop. He will shoot in traffic or pass the ball to 7-ft. 4-in. Arvydas Sabonis or three-point-shooter Rimas Kurtinaitis. Croatia's Drazen Petrovic, on the other hand, is a picador, launching shots like lances from all over the court. Those fans familiar with the Boston Celtics will also recognize 7-ft. 2-in. Stojko Vrankovic. In Badalona, at least, Vrankovic is an intimidating shot blocker. The Croatians are deeper than the Lithuanians, and both are more talented than the Australians. Says Croatian Danko Cvjeticanin: "We are the Dream Team of another part of the world." Not so fast, Danko. The Grateful Dead, admirers of Marciulionis, are backing the Lithuanians. They should know. As performers, at least, the Dead have been on a 25-year-long winning streak. But even if the silver medal is carried back to Moscow and not Vilnius, all teams can celebrate. The Dream Team, too, though it will have to settle for gold.