Final Cut: Team USA cuts Gani Lawal

Unfortunately Gani Lawal was the last player cut from the USA Basketball team today which was training in San Antonio, Texas. Lawal, who was the youngest player on the floor by almost a year, is a 2007 Georgia Tech recruit. 23 players arrived in San Antonio for tryouts, and Gani made the Top 13, but unfortunately they were taking 12. Lawal seemed upbeat about the whole situation.

"I went there with the mindset of learning as much as possible. I wanted to go in there and learn as much as possible about myself and the other guys in the country," Lawal said. "I was going to be happy if I made the team or not. At the end of the day, I learned a lot and now I'm gong to take what I had learned and use it to my advantage.

"It was fun. You had a chance to test your skills against the best players and the best coaches you can get. Day in and day out, you were getting better. I was loving it."

Gani said he also enjoyed playing for Coach Hewitt during tryouts. Looks like Paul was probably one of the coaches who had to decide on the final roster.

"It was fun working with him. He coached my team in one of the scrimmages we had and I worked with him in some of the shooting drills that they ran. It was good learning experience for me because I learned more about his style and how he works with his guys. The thing that struck me about him was he said he was more of a teacher before being a coach. That really made me look forward to getting there in the fall of 2007."

Good luck Gani, looking forward to seeing you in 2007.