"We had three outstanding games and two less-than outstanding games," Jerry Colangelo, USA Basketball Managing Director, said on Thursday, after his team practiced for the first time in over a week.

"The last two were disappointing to ourselves," Colangelo continued, "and I think we attribute that to the fact that we're not sharp, and we need more practice time in terms of what we're trying to accomplish."

Except for some brief stretches, their overall defense was solid throughout the exhibition tour. Their defensive rating (points allowed per 100 possessions) was actually better in the last two games than it was in the previous two. It was 99.4 in Macao against Turkey and Lithuania, and 95.4 in Shanghai against Russia and Australia.

But their offense was significantly worse. In the two games in Macao, the U.S. had an offensive rating (points scored per 100 possessions) of 139.3, which can be described as "plenty potent." But in the two games in Shanghai, it was down to 116.6, which is still good, but not on the level they'd like it to be.

Russia played a zone for most of the game, and Australia played a sagging man with zone principles. Both kept the U.S. from getting the dribble penetration that they'd like. But Colangelo believes his team could still have done a better job of moving the ball.

"In the last two games," he said, "we didn't distribute the ball as well as we had in earlier games."

Indeed, if you look at their assist-field goal ratio, a rough way of measuring ball movement, it's clear that ball distribution was lacking in Shanghai. Against Turkey and Lithuania, the U.S. averaged 31.5 assists on 44.5 field goals, a ratio of .708. But against Russia and Australia, they averaged just 17.5 assists on 32.0 field goals, a ratio of .547.

And while the defense was solid overall, there were some issues on that end as well.

"Defensively, we had some breakdowns in the last two games," Colangelo admitted.

In particular, they struggled staying in front of point guards J.R. Holden of Russia and Patrick Mills of Australia. Both got by their American counterparts and to the basket too many times. But Colangelo doesn't believe that his point guards should shoulder all the blame for that.

"If we play smart defensively," he said, "the guys off the ball playing with vision, that shouldn't happen."

He talks of connectivity, of all five defenders playing together. If the point guard gets beat, the help needs to be there. And it wasn't there consistently enough in Shanghai.

"If you look at the videotape," Colangelo said, "the court awareness was not where it should have been. That's not being sharp."

So with both their offensive and defensive issues in mind, the U.S. team went back to work on Thursday, practicing for the first time in eight days. They went hard, and they'll practice again on Friday and Saturday, before opening the Olympics against China on Sunday (10:15 a.m. ET, NBC).

"It's meaningful anytime you get a practice in," LeBron James said, "because you don't have a lot of time because you play every other day. You don't have much practice time. So anytime we can get in the gym and reconstruct or just get better at what we need to do to go out when we play, it's good for us."

But before they worked on their game, they got to enjoy the Olympic experience. After arriving in Beijing on Wednesday, the team headed over to the Olympic Village to interact with other athletes. They met up with the U.S. swimming team, where Carmelo Anthony reaquainted himself with fellow Baltimore native, Michael Phelps, and Jason Kidd got to meet one of the only Olympic athletes older than him, Dara Torres.

Of course, even among fellow athletes, NBA players stand out. The team, particularly James and Kobe Bryant, caused a stir at the village cafeteria.

"When we got to the cafeteria," Deron Williams said, "we realized why we couldn't stay at the Village. It would be a great experience to stay there, but it turned into a bit of a circus."

"It was crazy," Anthony added. "Can't even explain it, we were swamped. It felt weird, but it felt good at the same time."

That was Wednesday night. Thursday afternoon was a different story, and Coach Mike Krzyzewski made clear where his team's priorities were.

"Now that we're here," Krzyzewski said, "there is only one thing that they're here for and that is to try to win a gold medal."

John Schuhmann will be covering USA Basketball through the Beijing Olympics. Send him a question or comment.