Rose

ISTANBUL -- No question Kevin Durant was the story of the US-Lithuania game. One of the biggest questions for Team USA going into Sunday's gold-medal game against Turkey at the World Championship is this: Has Mike Krzyzewski lost faith in Derrick Rose?

Rose had one of the best seats in the house for the entire fourth quarter of an 89-74 victory over Lithuania on Saturday night, sitting courtside with the American subs as Eric Gordon and then Russell Westbrook played alongside Chauncey Billups in the backcourt.

Rose was 0-for-4 in just 12 minutes, and his lack of an outside shot was the reason his warm-ups never came off for the final 10 minutes.

"The zone, you know the zone, I thought with Andre [Iguodala] and Derrick out there, they were playing off of those two guys. So it became more difficult for Chauncey to get a look, or Kevin Durant. And Russell can really penetrate against any defense," Krzyzewski said. "So you had that, and Eric has been our best shooter outside of Kevin Durant, and Chauncey at the point in that situation is something that we talked about as a team and as a coaching staff.

"So we went to that, and that was a good thing to go to."

Indeed it was.

Coach K has been playing Billups off the ball at shooting guard, away from his natural position at the point, and has been getting mixed results. Billups was in the zone from 3-point range in the Americans' round of 16 game against Angola, but he has been spotty with his perimeter shooting in practically every other game.

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