Utah Jazz: Williams, Boozer 'virtual locks' for Team USA

Two Jazz stars — point guard Deron Williams and two-time NBA All-Star power forward Carlos Boozer — both have an increasingly likely shot at making USA Basketball's 12-man Olympic roster when it is unveiled Monday.

ESPN The Magazine's Ric Bucher reported Tuesday that Detroit Pistons point guard Chauncey Billups has withdrawn from consideration for the team, citing undisclosed personal family issues.

That makes Williams, who probably would have made it anyway, a virtual certainty for making his first Olympic team.

USA Basketball managing director Jerry Colangelo and head coach Mike Krzyzewski both have said previously the national team plans to take three point guards when it goes for the gold this August at the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, China.

Williams, Billups, Dallas' Jason Kidd (who supposedly has been promised a spot) and Chris Paul of New Orleans were the four under consideration.

"It's nerve-wracking," Williams said Monday, before word of Billups' withdrawal became public. "But I have no control over it.

"They're not even having tryouts, so hopefully what I did last year (at FIBA's Zone of the Americas qualifying tournament) was enough to secure my spot on the team," Williams added. "I'm going to keep working out and getting ready and in shape for training camp."

The Olympic team will hold a mini-camp later this month in Las Vegas, followed by training there in mid-July.

Colangelo recently told the Rocky Mountain News that Denver Nuggets star Carmelo Anthony would fill one spot on the team.

But little else seemed set in stone when U.S./Duke University coach Krzyzewski told The Associated Press on Tuesday that picking the team is no easy task.

"Really we have more people qualified for those 12 spots than we can take, so that's what makes it tough," Krzyzewski said.

The other 11 choices beyond Anthony remain undetermined and/or undisclosed, with a trimmed-down pool of 13 — including Anthony, but not Billups — still in the running.

Boozer, a 2004 bronze medal-winning Olympian, has said often that he fully expects to go again this year, and ESPN.com's Chris Sheridan — based on conversations with unidentified USA Basketball officials and NBA sources — reported this week that he's a "lock" to make it along with Anthony, Kidd, Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers, Toronto's Chris Bosh, Orlando's Dwight Howard, Cleveland's LeBron James, Milwaukee's Michael Redd and Miami's Dwyane Wade.

Wrote Sheridan: "(Boozer) brings a physical, low-post offensive game that will be utilized against opponents who will be able to slow the pace and make it a battle of half-court sets."

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