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SLATE: Bruce Weber, World Champion

You all know about one World Cup Team USA won yesterday, but it wasn’t the only one.

Talk about boosting your profile.
Talk about boosting your profile.
Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

This was a really dead weekend in Wildcat land, but there’s one Kansas State personality with something to celebrate.

Bruce Weber is a World Champion. Weber, head coach of the Team USA Under-19 squad and a first-time head coach in the USA Basketball system, led his charges to the championship of the 2019 FIBA U-19 World Cup in Greece. They captured the title with a 93-79 win in the final over Mali at the Heraklion Indoor Sports Arena on the Greek island of Crete on Sunday.

Team USA went 7-0 on the way to their seventh World Cup championship. Reggie Perry of Mississippi State was named the tournament’s MVP, and was joined on the all-tournament team by Iowa State‘s Tyrese Haliburton.

In the final, however, the star of the day was undeclared high schooler Cade Cunningham, who drained 21 points with seven boards and seven assists. Haliburton had eight assists, while Perry — along with Villanova‘s Jeremiah Robinson and high schoolers Scott Barnes and Jalen Suggs — also scored in double figures.

Weber wasn’t the only Wildcat involved, as he took along K-State staffer Shane Southwell as his director of video operations for the tournament.

Of course, that wasn’t the only World Cup win of the day, and we’d be remiss in not celebrating Megan Rapinoe’s brilliant penalty kick, Rose Lavelle’s insurance goal, and Team USA’s fourth Women’s World Cup title after a 2-0 win over the Netherlands yesterday. A fabulous performance end-to-end by the American women, and in truth the tournament as a whole was a fine exhibition of quality association football.

Murica. BLEEP YEAH.