Kevin Durant, Team USA Advance To Gold Medal Game Against France

While Serbia gave Team USA, led by Lebron James, Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant, everything it could handle on Thursday in Paris, the Americans would prevail 95-91 to advance to the gold medal game against host nation France on Saturday.

In the first three quarters, the more talented Americans simply didn’t impress. A roster teeming with NBA superstars entered the locker room down 12 points at halftime, having trailed by as many as 17. Things did not improve in the third quarter as both nations traded buckets, as Bogdanovic, Jokic, and Co. got whatever shot they wanted against the American defense.

Despite facing a 13-point deficit entering the fourth quarter, Head Coach Steve Kerr and his bench were largely unflappable, which translated to the players on the floor all seasoned veterans who have seen it all. Curry, James, Durant, and Joel Embiid would flip the switch, producing a monster fourth quarter in which the quartet would score 29 of their team’s 32 points.

James would finish with a triple-double, and Curry turned back the clock with a game-high 36 points on 9/14 from three. Embiid poured in 19 and went on a crucial run of four straight buckets in the fourth, while Durant hit a pair of crucial jumpers late in the fourth.

Durant, now the all-time leading scorer in USA Basketball history and a Texas Ex, has been almost unstoppable in his sixth-man role throughout the tournament. This has often meant that he is in Kerr’s closing lineups to finish games despite not starting.

If Saturday’s gold medal match against 20-year-old phenom Victor Wembanyama and the French on their home floor is close late, one would imagine that the same closing lineup featuring eight NBA MVPs between them will be out there.

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