‘Scary’ Is Upgraded to Horrific for Brown

Even before the U.S. men lost to Puerto Rico by 19 points in Olympic basketball Sunday, Coach Larry Brown was not feeling good about his team.

“I’m not confident at all right now,” he told NBC. “With the amount of time we’ve had to prepare and the fact that we’ve had to play so many games without practice time, it’s a little scary.”

It’s gotten so bad now that even team co-captain Allen Iverson probably sees a need for practice.

Trivia time: When basketball first became part of the Olympics at the 1936 Berlin Games, there were no indoor courts. Where were the games played?

Target practice: After Lamar Odom scored the first points for the U.S. on a three-point shot, the Americans missed 16 consecutive shots from three-point range.

Randy Hill of foxsports.com showed foresight when, commenting on the team being housed on the Queen Mary II in Piraeus Harbor, wrote: “Critics may be interested to find out if the Americans have any perimeter shooters capable of actually throwing one in the Mediterranean.”

Different perspectives: Before the Games began, Odom, quoted by Associated Press, said of the Olympic experience:

“To travel like we’re doing is the best education you can go through. It’s an amazing experience being in this part of the world, especially at this time. It’s really a blessing for us.”

Teammate LeBron James was less enthusiastic: “I don’t go out too much. I don’t want to be on the street too much. I ain’t no sightseer.”

Dark humor: NBC Olympic host Bob Costas, on the Greek tragedy “Oedipus Rex”: “Oedipus, as you know, is the tragic Greek king who killed his father and married his mother -- a sequence of events that seldom turns out well.”

A misnomer: Costas, on Alexander the Great’s unimpressive performance as an Olympic sprinter: “As an athlete, he might have been Alexander the So-So.”

Art critic: Bill Lankhof of the Toronto Sun, on Phevos and Athena, the maligned official mascots of the Athens Olympics: “My 18-month-old granddaughter can come up with better caricatures -- and we have the drawings on our ‘fridge door to prove it.”

Bus stops here: Ian O’Connor of the Westchester (N.Y.) Journal News, on the difference between bus drivers at the Atlanta Olympics and the Athens Olympics: “The Atlanta bus drivers didn’t know where they were going. The Greek bus drivers know where they’re going -- but only know the third-fastest way to get there.”

Trivia answer: In an outdoor tennis stadium on courts of clay and sand.

And finally: From NBC’s Jay Leno, on his network paying $793 million for the rights to the Olympics: “It’s amazing what we can do now that they don’t have to pay the cast of ‘Friends’ anymore.”

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Larry Stewart can be reached at larry.stewart@latimes.com.