THE 1988 AND 2004 UNITED STATES OLYMPIC MEN’S BASKETBALL BRONZE MEDALS
As far as the United States Men’s Olympic Basketball pedigree is historically concerned, the competition must readily admit that riding in the back seat is almost exclusively where they have belonged.
“Almost” is the operative word.
Up until the debacle in 1972 all seven U.S. appearances at the Games dating back to 1936 resulted in Gold Medal victories.
After ’72’s Silver — which team members voted unanimously then (and later as well) to summarily reject as an act of protest — there were eight more Gold Medal celebrations for the Americans including this summer past.
And in 1988 and 2004 our boys had Bronze hanging around their necks.
The United States Men’s National Basketball Team is the most successful and highly-decorated team in the annals of international play, capturing medals in all of its eighteen Olympic Tournament appearances. Fifteen were Gold.
Two of its gold medal-winning squads were inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in August, 2010 — the 1960 unit spiced with 6 Hall-of-Famers (4 players, 2 coaches) and the intergalactic 1992 “Dream Team,” which featured no fewer than 14 HOFers (an unheard of 11 players — sorry Christian Laettner — and 3 coaches).
The 1972 Olympic Men’s Basketball Championship game in Munich was arguably the single-most controversial event in Olympic history.
The Gold Medal game final score is in the record books as a 51–50 Soviet Union victory.
By any reasonable account, the U.S. won the game 50–49.
Politics and buffoonery dictated otherwise however, and any and all formal U.S. appeals immediately thereafter and over time were denied.
To this day 44 years later, 12 Silver Medals are packed in a box, unclaimed, sitting in a storage space belonging to the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland.
And the twelve American team members — all still alive — are fine with that. They were 3 seconds from Gold but in their hearts they knew they won.
As for the 1988 and 2004 Men’s U.S. Bronze Medalists?
Different stories altogether.
The 1988 United States Olympic Men’s Basketball Team was coached by Georgetown University’s John Thompson in Seoul, South Korea and achieved two notable distinctions.
They bit the country’s first bronze ever and they were the last team featuring college players only, “amateurs.”
A look at the ’88 roster reveals notable names such as Bimbo Coles, Jeff Grayer and a pair of Charles Smiths, although the inside was anchored by David Robinson.
The 2004 Team piloted by the peripatetic Hall-of-Famer Larry Brown lost an unprecedented 3 games in Athens, only the second time in 32 years that a Gold Medal was not the order of the day.
And this team boasted a roster full of NBA players including two previous league MVP’s (Tim Duncan and Allen Iverson).
Iverson, who was just recently enshrined into the Hall of Fame’s Class of 2016, had mixed emotions about his Olympic experience. He was proud to represent his country but certainly the dubious distinction of being part of the first group of NBA players to have ever lost in Olympic competition — i.e. not won Gold — weighed heavily on him.
As did the widespread notion that he was the chief architect of the team’s selfishness and abysmal chemistry.
But in fairness, a handful of the league’s best players of that vintage — Kobe, Shaq, Kevin Garnett, Tracy McGrady, Paul Pierce and Jason Kidd — passed on the opportunity to play, leaving Iverson and Duncan heading a cast including Stephon Marbury, Shawn Marion, Lamar Odom, Emeka Okafor and 19-and 20-year-olds LeBron and Melo respectively.
Predictably, Iverson led the team in scoring (13.8 ppg) and team captain Duncan in rebounding (9.1) and blocks (1.3).
When Team USA was being assembled for the 2008 Olympic battle in Beijing, Iverson was not invited.
And while his ego perhaps precludes him from acknowledging the sting and the hurt associated with the snub, The Answer still longs for that Gold. “I felt that I truly should have been a part of the team. I should obviously be saying that I have a gold medal at 41 years old,” he unabashedly remarked.
Despite tarnishing the otherwise pristine U.S. Olympic Men’s Basketball resume two of the three times such a thing has happened, the 1988 and 2004 Olympic teams — duplicate Bronze medal finishes aside — have almost nothing in common.
But the fact that each member of each squad burst his buttons with swelling pride at the prospect of representing the United States with honor and dignity counts for something.
And some would argue that it means everything — gold, silver or bronze.
[Editor’s Note: This piece was written by Mr. Kaplan in September 2016.]
ADDENDUM:
Boasting a 138–5 overall Olympic W/L record, the 2020 USA Men’s Basketball Team was anxious to lay claim to their fourth consecutive Olympic Gold Medal in Tokyo. The coronavirus has dictated that the Games be postponed until the summer of 2021.
