Kelvin Sampson welcomed the chance to be an assistant to George Karl on the Team USA bench. He wanted to pick the Milwaukee Bucks coach's basketball mind about getting quicker shots with an offense, rather than Oklahoma's recent tendency to make a few passes before settling on the best shot.

And, of course, he wanted to win a gold medal last week at the 2002 World Championships.

Well, Sampson left Indianapolis with a few wrinkles ready to install into the Sooners' secondary break offense.

	“	USA basketball will get the right players and the right attitude. Sometimes you have to falter before you can succeed again. ”
		— Kelvin Sampson, Oklahoma head coach

As for the gold? Beating the best teams in the world might have been a reach from the moment Team USA got together in mid-August.

Each coach and player on Team USA, and certainly every media member, has a theory as to why the U.S. finished sixth in the World Championships -- leaving without a medal on its home court. Sampson's simply points at a lack of respect, for the entire event, by the players. As for an overall failure to commit, or at least USA Basketball's refusal to demand total commitment from professional players? Well, that's almost unavoidable because of the structure of the NBA schedule.

"We had a team full of good players, but not a team that played well together," Sampson said. "Because of the NBA season, we're going to have to 'out-talent' them because we won't 'out-team' them. It's hard to get that commitment from the players. If you start practice June 1 and went through the summer then you can do it. But then you're not going to get any players who were in the playoffs, or coaches."

Sampson said the scheduling conflicts with NBA players, or the results in Indy, doesn't mean the U.S. won't redeem itself at the 2004 Olympics in Athens (assuming the Americans qualify next summer), or take the gold at the next World Championships in Japan in 2006.

"But the era of dominating the way we used to is over," Sampson said. "Our country was hamstrung. The teams we played like Yugoslavia and Argentina can point to 2006 and know their team. We won't know our team probably until 2006. We need to make more of a commitment to regain the dominance in the world."

The Team USA staff stayed in Indianapolis on Sunday to watch the gold medal game between Yugoslavia and Argentina. Sampson said he wished the U.S. players could have seen how important the game was for the teams involved, not to mention their passionate fans.

"We've got to understand that competing internationally is as much an attitude as it is talent," Sampson said. "Talent isn't the issue. We're getting players, but they have to understand the importance."

Sampson believes having a healthy Jason Kidd, who was unable to play in Indy because of an injury, would have solved a lot of problems. Kidd would have taken pressure off every other scorer, even the post players like Jermaine O'Neal. He wasn't dissing Baron Davis or Andre Miller, but saw Davis as a combo guard. Jay Williams, the other point guard on the roster, didn't play in either loss to Argentina or Yugoslavia. Having Kidd on the squad would have given the U.S. two true point guards.

"The reality is we don't need wholesale changes," Sampson said. "We don't need to panic. It's a tremendous privilege and honor to play basketball (at this level) and I'm not sure our kids and our guys, at least all of them, savored that. They didn't appreciate the opportunity to play in the World Championships.

"Argentina played 44 games together. Yugoslavia has been together for 10 years. Our guys were there for 10 days. You're not going to 'out-talent' teams like Argentina and Yugoslavia."

Sampson said Karl worked his tail off, and was passionate about the tournament but leaves disappointed and "very hurt" over the results. But Karl's approach to the game still left a valuable impression on Sampson, so too, did the time with San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich. Sampson, and Stanford's Mike Montgomery, got a course in NBA X and O's that they don't normally receive in their busy schedules. Both were off recruiting on the road Monday, making it nearly a month since they were at home.

"This was a great education," Montgomery said Thursday before the U.S. lost to Argentina. "But the way George and Popovich approach it is a pro approach. George assumes they've been there and done it. It's more telling them something and letting them figure it out. There isn't as much teaching as in college and it helped me understand coaching in the pros and wonder if I could or couldn't do it."

After the week in Indy, Sampson and Montgomery would probably rather stay where they are -- a level of the game where they have ultimately more control.

The NBA and the World Championships are now, and will remain, a player's game more than a coach's game. And the players, according to the coaches, didn't value it as much as the rest of the world. Until they do, the results could be similar.

"USA basketball will get the right players and the right attitude," Sampson said. "Sometimes you have to falter before you can succeed again."

Andy Katz is a senior writer at ESPN.com.