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betweenrivalsBraziland Argentina would provide a fantastic finish to the tour- nament. It would also provide plenty of drama for the hosts, as Brazilians would be forced to painfully re- call the finish to the 1950 World Cup, the last time they hosted the cup. That year in a round robin final group, Bra- zil needed just a draw in their final game to win the cup. Instead 170,000 fans watched as South Amer- ican rival Uruguay beat them to raise the Jules Ri- met Trophy. Could Argentina play spoilers this year? It seems absurd to say that their star Lionel Messi still needs a strong World Cup performance to cement his all-time great status, but he does. Argentina has a favor- able draw, but I have them getting bounced out in the semifinals by Italy. That would set up a fi- nal where if Italy won they could tie Brazil for most World Cup titles with five. Azzurri is in a tough draw in Group D with England, Uruguay and Costa Rica, so they won't be able to survive their typical slow start to tour- naments. But I think they'll han- dle familiar England in their opener and in typical Italian fashion continue to get stronger as the tourna- ment progresses. Their customary staunch defensive work with a blend of creative flair will help them prog- ress. As for the other semifi- nalist give me the country with the third most titles and darlings of the 2010 World Cup, Germany, who will reach their third con- secutive semifinal. So I have Germany in the knockout stage, do I have the other country ad- vancing out of Group G as the United States? Sadly, no. I think the team will work hard and play a re- spectful brand of soccer, but the U.S. doesn't have the depth, at last not in ex- perience, that even other recent American teams have had. The back four also pose more questions than even Tim Howard will be able to answer. On the bright side I see them avenging the past two Ghana losses and pos- sibly even earning a draw with Portugal. However FIFA Player of the Year Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal will beat Ghana by more than the U.S. will and advance on goal differential. The U.S. will finish 1-1- 1, not too shabby consider- ing the group, and have to set their sights at 2018 in Russia. Coach Jurgen Klins- mann's contract runs through that World Cup and by all of his actions that's where he's already focused. I do hope to see Cali- fornia State University, Chico product Chris Won- dolowski get a run-on in the final 10 minutes of at least one match and see if he can poke home a goal. As for some dark horses, those who follow soccer have been tagging Bel- gium for so long now they almost have to be consid- ered a favorite to reach the quarterfinals. I like them as well, but I'll go ahead and throw an- other name out there as well – Bosnia-Herzegovina. They may be the only team making their first World Cup finals appear- ance, but they have a rather favorable draw in Group F. Obviously I have Argen- tina pegged to win that group, but I see Bosnia- Herzegovina getting past Iran and Nigeria to take second and advance to the knockout stage. Once there just one win, puts them into the quar- terfinals and I like their chances against who- ever wins Group E – ei- ther Switzerland, Ecuador, France or Honduras. Bosnia-Herzegovina has the perfect recipe for an upset. A strong goalie in Asmir Begovic and an even better set of strikers in Miralem Pjanic and Manchester City's Edin Dzeko gets the job done. One more bold predic- tion, how about Japan winning Group C. They'll then bow out in the knockout round to Uruguay who will advance to meet Brazil in the quar- terfinals for that 1950 re- match. If you couldn't tell by now, I'm predicting quite a large party celebrating redemption and success for Brazil over the next month. Then again I've also left defending World Cup champion and winners of the past two European Championships Spain out of the mix. Which could make it a safe bet that the Span- ish become the first Eu- ropean country to win a World Cup on South Amer- ican soil. Greene FROMPAGE1 MLBBASEBALL Washington Nationals at San Francisco Giants:12:30p.m., CSNBA. NBA FINALS San Antonio Spurs at Miami Heat. Game 4: 6p.m., ABC. GOLF U.S. Open Championship, First Round: 6a.m., ESPN. U.S. Open Championship, First Round: noon, NBC. U.S. Open Championship, First Round: 2p.m., ESPN2. U.S. Open Championship, First Round: 3p.m., ESPN. SOCCER FIFA World Cup Group A, Brazil vs. Croatia: 12:30p.m., ESPN. ON THE AIR tough test." For all the talk about brown, the character of Pinehurst No. 2 always has been the greens. They of- ten are described as turtle backs or inverted saucers. Masters champion Bubba Watson offered a different description. "It's going to be tough for me just because the greens are so unfriendly, I guess is the best way to say it," Wat- son said. Unfriendly meaning un- fair? "No, they're going to be fair to somebody," he said. "The top 10 this week are going to be happy with them. The guy winding up holding the trophy is going to be happy." The course measures 7,562 yards, extremely long for a par 70. There are six holes over 500 yards, and only two of them par 5s. Da- vis, however, said the course will never play as long as the scorecard because of tees moving forward over the next four days. "It is unusual," McIlroy said. "You think of a U.S. Open and you think of tight fairways, you think of thick rough. You used to miss the green in a U.S. Open by 3 or 4 yards and you're having to hack out of cabbage. But now ... you've got so many differ- ent ways to play. You're going to have to be imaginative." Only nine of the 156 play- ers in the field were at Pine- hurst for the 1999 and 2005 championships. That expe- rience won't help all that much now. Jason Day had never seen Pinehurst un- til recently, so this is all he knows. "I think it's going to be a very difficult course," he said. "And I think it's going to be a good challenge for all of us." Open FROM PAGE 1 routes. Acrobatic type of catches that he's able to make. Really good hands. So far really good. No, it does not seem like a guy that's had a layoff from football for a year." Lloyd signed a one-year contract in April to re- join the team that drafted him in the fourth round in 2003. He caught 105 passes for 1,510 yards and 13 touchdowns for San Francisco from 2003-05. That included leading the team with 48 receptions, 733 yards receiving and five TD catches in 2005. Lloyd then played two seasons with Washing- ton, one in Chicago be- fore stints with Denver, St. Louis and New Eng- land. Lloyd was cut by the Patriots in March 2013 and didn't join any other team despite catching 74 passes for 911 yards and four touchdowns in 2012. Lloyd topped 70 catches each season from 2010-12 and his 221 receptions in that span were the 10th most of any wide receiver in the NFL. "I know that we played him, he got behind our de- fensive backs a few times. But when you see him on film, I swear I don't know how he comes out of the breaks, comes off his start, as fast as he does," line- backer Patrick Willis said. "We're glad to have him on our team and I know he's going to make some plays for us." Lloyd has shied away from talking about his comeback this spring, saying his focus is on just making the team. Lloyd and recently ac- quired Stevie Johnson should give quarterback Colin Kaepernick more options at receiver besides Michael Crabtree and An- quan Boldin. Throw in tight end Vernon Davis and the Niners could be the first team ever with five players with 1,000- yard receiving seasons, ac- cording to footballperspec- tive.com. It gives Kaepernick a number of options after having just one receiver — Boldin — catch more than 20 passes last season when Crabtree missed most of the year with an Achilles injury. "We'd like to think so," Harbaugh said. "It's been a good offseason in that regard. Everybody feels now like they belong here. We've been here numerous weeks. They know where to go and what they're do- ing. I think we can make some real strides right now. I'm pleased with the job everybody is doing." Davis and Boldin have mostly stayed away from voluntary workouts so far this spring, while Johnson has nursed a hamstring in- jury and Crabtree has been getting limited work after getting injured last offsea- son. That has given more opportunities to Lloyd, who spends much of prac- tice talking to Kaepernick about intricacies of the of- fense. "I think it's something, a position we're definitely stronger at this year," Kae- pernick said. "I think we have a lot of weapons at that position that we can use in a lot of different sit- uations." APSportsWriterJanie McCauley contributed to this report. Lloyd FROM PAGE 1 By Brian Mahoney The Associated Press MIAMI LeBron James has learned an important les- son during his journey from 19-year-old rookie to two- time NBA champion: Never talk back to the coach dur- ing a film session. "Let him make his point, whether he's right or wrong, and you live with it and move on," James said. Especially when the coach has as much to show his players as Erik Spoelstra did to James and the Miami Heat on Wednesday. Miami's defense didn't offer much resistance early in Game 3 of the NBA Fi- nals; the San Antonio Spurs played like they were on the court by themselves. San Antonio made 19 of its first 21 shots and shot a finals-re- cord 75.8 percent in the first half of a 111-92 victory. Just like last year, Game 3 was a blowout that left the Heat facing a 2-1 deficit. Mi- ami came back to win the series, so nobody was over- reacting to what happened Tuesday, especially since the Spurs themselves don't expect to shoot that way again. But the Heat have things to clean up before Game 4 today, or they risk going back to San Antonio facing the end of their title reign. "You're always on edge in the postseason, but I don't want to be concerned at this point," James said. "For us, we have to make the adjust- ments." The Spurs had the same lead last year after a 113-77 victory in Game 3, a start- to-finish beating that was even more thorough than Tuesday's win. So they were taking no satisfaction in their position, and certainly not comparing it. "I don't think about last year at all at this point," Spurs coach Gregg Popo- vich said. "I don't think about last year Game 3, Game 4, at all. This is a dif- ferent animal and I'm just concerned about the game tomorrow night." The bigger concerns be- long to the Heat, whose de- fense was also sliced up by the Spurs in the fourth quarter of Game 1. So Spoel- stra gathered his team to look at the painful tape of Tuesday's performance, which featured among its problems: —Chris Bosh getting only four shot attempts after scoring 18 points in Games 1 and 2. —James trying to do too much to rally the Heat and ending up with seven of their 20 turnovers. —Mario Chalmers miss- ing all five shots and fall- ing to 3 for 12 in the finals. "We did not play a good basketball game," Spoelstra said. "All of us have owned that. It doesn't matter ulti- mately how many you lose by or what the game is like. You have to learn from it, move on." Spoelstra said watching themselves get clobbered on tape was "painful" and "frustrating," but necessary. He wouldn't reveal what he told his players, but what- ever it was, James wouldn't have argued. That's a lesson he said he learned "quite a few years ago, when you realize that it wouldn't change anything." "You know, the coach is always right," James added. "It's like a teacher. They're always right, and that's fine. That's fair. They make the rules and we've got to live by them." NBA FINALS Heat turn to the tape to make fixes for Game 4 MiamiofferedlittleresistancetoSpursinGame3,getsnextchancetonight LYNNE SLADKY — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Tim Duncan (right), Tony Parker (le ) and the San Antonio Spurs lead the Miami Heat 2-1 in the best-of-seven games series of the NBA Finals. Game 4is tonight. and Lundqvist was in goal for all of them. The Rangers also have won an NHL-record eight consecutive home games when facing elimination, dating to 2008, behind Lundqvist. New York has also won a home game in 15 consec- utive playoff series, tying a league mark. The Kings pressed for the tying goal in the third period and outshot the Rangers 15-1 in the frame and 41-19 overall. "I think we sat back a little too much in the third period. But we didn't blow the lead this time," Stepan said. Two nights after Jon- athan Quick stopped 32 shots in a 3-0 victory that put the Kings on the brink of another championship, Pouliot got a puck past him. St. Louis then put in a rebound at the left post 6:27 into the second, giv- ing the Rangers their fifth two-goal lead of the se- ries. But just like in Games 1 and 2, a two-goal deficit sparked the Kings. At the tail end of a Rang- ers power play, New York defenseman Dan Girardi broke his stick and lost the puck to Kings captain Dustin Brown for a break- away the other way. Brown made several moves in front of Lun- dqvist before tucking a forehand inside the right post to make it 2-1 with 11:13 left in the second. The Kings had a chance to get even, but the Rang- ers killed Dominic Moore's cross-checking penalty late in the period. Jeff Carter then got behind Girardi before being stopped on a breakaway by Lundqvist. Pouliot broke Quick's shutout streak at 123 min- utes, 1 second. New York hadn't scored since Der- ick Brassard's second-pe- riod goal in Game 2. Pou- liot's fifth goal of the play- offs came 2 seconds after Kings defenseman Willie Mitchell finished serving a high-sticking penalty. John Moore fired a drive from the center of the blue line that Pouliot deflected high with his stick blade into the top right corner behind Quick, who fin- ished with 17 saves. The Kings almost tied it at 1-1 with 8:11 left — sec- onds into a power play. Finals FROM PAGE 1 SETH WENIG — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS New York Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist (30) makes a save in the second period during Game 4of the Stanley Cup Final against the Los Angeles Kings on Wednesday in New York. The Rangers defeated the Kings 2-1to get their first win of the series. | SPORTS | REDBLUFFDAILYNEWS.COM THURSDAY, JUNE 12, 2014 2 B