It will all be over today, or two weeks from Thursday on the NBC schedule of deigning to show the broadcast to this remote, unpopulated outpost known as the Western United States. Team USA will beat Spain for the Olympic gold medal, complete the three-year mission of redemption, and the basketball world will be back on its axis.

And then it will all start again.

This, then, is an important benchmark moment for Kevin Martin, with the U.S. reaching a transition stage and the Kings guard a possibility for ascension to the roster that will play for the 2010 world championship in Turkey and the 2012 Olympics in London. There will also be a qualifying tournament in the summer of '09 if the Redeem Team loses an automatic berth in the worlds by stumbling to the silver today, but that's highly unlikely given the dominance in Beijing that includes a 37-point win over Spain in pool play.

Jerry Colangelo, the former Suns owner named managing director to rescue USA Basketball after a series of embarrassing moments, and Mike Krzyzewski, the Duke coach running the current team of pros, have been proven right in building on perimeter players.

The team has trounced all seven opponents with great pressure defense that created easy transition baskets and rarely let opponents find an offensive rhythm. China (Yao Ming, Wang Zhizhi, some Yi Jianlian), Argentina (Luis Scola, Fabricio Oberto), Spain (Pau Gasol, Marc Gasol), Australia (Andrew Bogut) and Germany (Chris Kaman) all had big men that were at least credible – and in some cases NBA All-Stars – and yet none have come close against a roster with two players taller than 6-foot-9, Dwight Howard and Chris Bosh.

The direction for Team USA will now decidedly be guards and athletic wings, agile players who can disrupt the pick-and-roll schemes that ruined the Americans in the past. Same thing on offense: movement and passing against the waves of zone defenses in international play, on those occasions quickness does not win out.

Talk about a summer of great advances without even playing for the United States. First, Martin was named to the select team, the group of young players brought to Las Vegas to work out against the Beijing-bound stars, in a clear sign that USA Basketball regards him as a serious prospect for international play. Then, Colangelo and Krzyzewski go perimeter heavy and are vindicated with overwhelmingly positive results, surely setting a tone for future rosters. That Martin is also a good match in the new emphasis on citizenship, after too many ugly-American moments moved Colangelo to make character a priority, is the intangible fit.

Finally, there is the current roster. Michael Redd, supposedly the designated shooter, has played the second-fewest minutes and almost certainly will step aside/be moved aside. Jason Kidd is 35 and destined for a similar outcome.

Among the uncertainties, it is impossible to predict the next international step for Kobe Bryant – he turned 30 on Saturday and, while it's easy to still see him as a popular and marketable star in four years, it's also realistic that he will not want to make another lengthy commitment to USA Basketball. That goes for Dwyane Wade, too. He's much younger, 26, but a lot of these guys might want their summers back.

That leaves Chris Paul and Deron Williams as the only real newbies in the backcourt, making them more likely to stay in the program. Brandon Roy would be an obvious choice as a future addition. O.J. Mayo, Rodney Stuckey, Derrick Rose, Kevin Durant and Luther Head were on the select team as well, with Martin.

Either way, this is all very good news for a 25-year-old who was a relative unknown coming out of high school, a relative unknown coming into the NBA and who has yet to be an All-Star. It's not reaching the Kobe-LeBron-Wade stratosphere, but 23.7 points a game in 2007-08 and zone-busting range is serious résumé-building for a summer job.

Read Scott Howard-Cooper's blog at www.sacbee.com/blogs.