Will the horror of 2004 in Athens return for USA Basketball?
There are so many comparisons between the struggles of our current men’s basketball team in Tokyo and what happened the last time we did not win a Gold Medal in the Olympics.
That was in 2004 when Larry Brown was the coach and got screwed by circumstances beyond his control. After the Yanks returned home with the Bronze, USA Basketball became a two-man show as President Jerry Colangelo hired Mike Krzyzewski as coach and we won Golds in Beijing, London and Rio, with much the same core.
Coach K finally retired to let someone else have a turn, and current coach Greg Popovich is having similar problems to his mentor Brown, who lost 9 of his 12 players off the roster that qualified for Olympic pool play in 2003 by going 10-0 in Puerto Rico. And the replacement players weren’t nearly as good and had little time to practice together. The result was a semifinals loss to Argentina.
The current Americans have played erratically and lost to France in pool play, came back to beat Spain and now must face NBA-laden Australia Thursday in the semis. Could history be repeating?
France’s Evan Fournier (10) shoots over United States’ forward Kevin Durant (7) during a men’s basketball preliminary round game at the 2020 Summer Olympics, Sunday, July 25, 2021, in Saitama, Japan. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
The USA roster has fluctuated with Kevin Durant and Jayson Tatum coming off the NBA playoffs. Meanwhile, Australia has 6 NBA veterans from 3-time Olympians Patty Mills and Joe Ingles, two-timers Matthew Dellavedova and Aron Baynes, Chris Goulding in his second Summer Games and others, including Dante Exum, son of former UNC player Cecil. And almost had Ben Simmons before he dropped out.
The talk of the world catching up with the U.S. in basketball is hot, especially when the American team is basically made over from scratch every four (and this time five) years. So Australia has to be considered the favorite going into the game to play for a Gold Medal.
On paper, we still have Durant, considered the world’s best player who had 29 points in 31 minutes against Spain, plus Jrue Holiday, Zach LaVine, Damian Lillard and Tatum, all NBA all-stars.
So c’mon, guys, stay alive so you can bring home the Gold again!
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