During the 2023 World Cup, Team USA had particularly suffered under the rim. Due to an obvious lack of talent, but also of size, experience and weight, with only Jaren Jackson Jr. (often weighed down by fouls), Walker Kessler, Bobby Portis and Paolo Banchero under the panels. But also because of Steve Kerr's tactical choices.
The Americans had chosen to play with a lot of wingers and to change a lot in defense. Result: the interiors found themselves far from the circle at the time of the shots. From then on, the opponents could feast on the rebound, with a lot of points on second chances.
“They were shaken up last year”, Anthony Davis analysiswho is part of the trio of interiors tasked with avoiding this in Paris, at the Olympic Games, along with Joel Embiid and Bam Adebayo. A trio reminiscent of that of the 1996 Games in Atlanta, composed of Shaquille O'Neal, Hakeem Olajuwon and David Robinson.
Faced with Victor Wembanyama and Rudy Gobert, or even Nikola Jokic, it was necessary to come to France with much more important weapons. “I guess everyone knows that it's hard to push me around. And it's hard to intimidate others too.”believes Joel Embiid. “I think we'll quickly set the tone, no matter who is on the floor.”announces Bam Adebayo.
“We corrected our problems of size, physical intensity, rebounding”
With this trio, the reaction to the limitations of last summer is significant. On paper, anyway. “We've fixed our size issues, our physical intensity issues, our rebounding issues. There are Hall of Fame level rebounders on this roster.”rejoices Erik Spoelstra, one of Steve Kerr's assistants.
The three are among the best defenders in the league – even if the Lakers' center has a complicated relationship with the trophy in question – but they will still have to assert themselves on the court, in a FIBA basketball whose characteristics are not the same as in the NBA.
“International basketball is different,” judge and warns another assistant, Tyronn Lue. “In the NBA, you can't really touch players, you can't be physical. Over there, Team USA is going to find out that we can be physical, that we can get into opponents, use our hands. It's different and we weren't prepared. We talked to the players about it last week.”
First test tonight with Canada, who deprived them of the bronze medal at the last World Cup.
