When the 2024 Paris Olympic Games begin next week, the Team USA men’s basketball team will know that it is beatable despite a roster containing the world’s greatest collection of talent.
Coaches and players don’t need see the evidence, the most compelling being the trophies earned by the last six NBA MVP award winners, each of whom was born on soil outside the United States.
That is sound reason for trepidation, or the “appropriate fear” term often cited by legendary coach Gregg Popovich.
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But the latest version of Team USA is built for triumph against all comers it will face in Paris. With two more exhibition performances, the next coming Saturday in London against South Sudan (noon PDT), coach Steve Kerr’s roster has an abundance of depth, defense and shooting, the three most important elements of Olympic success.
“The identity of the team is our depth, the strength of the team is the depth,” Kerr told reporters this week in Abu Dhabi after a 105-79 exhibition rout of Serbia. “If we can play in four- or five-minute bursts of intense defense, hitting bodies, rebounding, being physical, then it makes sense to play that way.”
Which is why it would be risky for Kerr to tamper with lineups and rotations utilized against Serbia, which was missing two starters and playing on back-to-back nights.
Stay the course, and gold awaits.
Golden State Warriors
There was howling from the cheap seats (and on social media) when Kerr replaced Stephen Curry in the middle of a dazzling run and turned to his second unit, which annihilated the Serbs.
“Warriors fans are hating me tonight,” Kerr said, half joking. “They hate me every time I take Steph out.”
There also is a chorus of observers lining up to suggest Kerr replace starting center Joel Embiid with Anthony Davis. The coach should resist any such temptation. Embiid would cramp the team’s depth, which is its greatest asset.
Sure, Davis would be excellent with Team USA starters against Serbia – Jrue Holiday, LeBron James, Jayson Tatum and Curry – but he’s at his best with a second unit designed to push the pace.
With Tyrese Haliburton and Anthony Edwards doing most of the pushing, that pace is too much for Embiid to maintain. He’s a lumbering mismatch against 95 percent of the basketball world, but he’d be an absolute misfit with the sprinters coming off the bench.
Kerr reportedly has settled on three starters: James, Curry and Embiid. The other two remain spots unsettled, but the lineup and rotations that blasted Serbia make the most sense.
Stay the course, and gold awaits.
The Curry-Holiday backcourt provides a splendid balance of offense and defense. The James-Tatum-Embiid frontcourt – until Kevin Durant is healthy enough to replace Tatum – is enough length and muscle to overcome any bunch they encounter.
That starting lineup is, with either Tatum or Durant, is like the first three legs of a relay team. It’s explosive, tested and smart enough to grasp the nuance required to thrive. It sets a powerful tone.
The second unit has the makings of a tremendous anchor leg. With Haliburton and Edwards, along with Devin Booker and Derrick White, racing about the perimeter, big men Bam Adebayo and Davis are granted license to petrify opponents at both ends.
That includes Canada, France, Serbia and Greece, the four teams best equipped to test Team USA.
“Bam and AD together are really something,” Kerr told reporters in Abu Dhabi. “Just the switching, but they can also protect the rim and be in a drop if we go to that coverage.”
Stay the course, and gold awaits.
There were reports of runaway ego within the roster. It wasn’t visible against the Serbian team led by Nikola Jokić, but Kerr might be one of the best at managing egos. Don’t think for a moment that none of those dynastic Warriors teams posed challenges.
Among Kerr, Curry and James – the team’s senior members – there ought to be enough sober intellect to massage the moods of those who threaten the goal. The younger stars – notably Edwards, Booker and Haliburton – must not allow their immense value to make them vulnerable to the “disease of me.”
In matters regarding lineups, rotations and commitment, Kerr and Team USA’s old heads have leverage. Not one member of the group wants to be in the position of explaining why this team left Paris without gold.