Team USA looks ahead to familiar faces in Olympics bracket (2024)

PARIS – The focus for Team USA may be on Brazil, a team they haven’t seen this summer, but awaiting the American stars in an Olympic semifinal will be a very familiar face.

The U.S., ranked No. 1 overall through the group stage in men’s basketball with a 3-0 record and point differential of plus-64, plays Brazil in the last quarterfinal of four on Tuesday, at 3:30 p.m. eastern. The Americans are seeking their fifth consecutive gold medal and, yes, have beaten every team they’ve played at the Olympics comfortably, but overlooking the Brazilians could be a grave, unaffordable mistake. Losses end medal hopes now.

But with the goal the U.S. has – gold, of course, and nothing less as the favorite to win the tournament – it’s reasonable to at least take a peek at the rest of the path, which is available now that the Paris Games has released a bracket for the knockout stages.

The other two teams on the Americans’ side of the bracket are Serbia, who they’ve beaten twice in the last few weeks, and Australia, who they beat narrowly on July 15 in Abu Dhabi. The Olympic semifinals are Thursday and the medal games are Saturday.

“Looking at the bracket, it probably played out as it should have,” Kerr said Sunday.

What he meant is all the highest ranked teams are on the other side. Canada (3-0) plays France (2-1) at noon eastern, and Germany (3-0, No. 2 overall) plays Greece (1-2) at 5 a.m. eastern. The Germans are the defending World Cup champions, the Canadians have an NBA-stocked roster, with stars Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jamal Murray, and the French have NBA Rookie of the Year Victor Wembanyama and Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert. Greece will not be favored to beat Germany, but the Greeks nevertheless have two-time NBA MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo.

But if you’re thinking the U.S. caught a break with the bracket (there was a draw, so theoretically it could have been the winner of either of the other two games awaiting the USA-Brazil winner)…slow down.

Serbia has the reigning NBA MVP Nikola Jokić, Atlanta Hawks sharpshooter Bogdan Bogdanovic, and the mix of size and 3-point shooting that can be the formula for beating the U.S. The Australians have numerous NBA players, including Josh Giddey, who gave the U.S. a ton of problems in a 98-92 loss to the Americans last month.

“(The draw) doesn’t mean anything to us because all these teams are really good at this point and it’s one and done, so we got to be ready for everybody,” Kerr said.

The Serbian threat to the U.S. Olympic dynasty has not materialized in two previous games this summer. But what’s the old adage in the National Football League, about having to beat a team three times in one season when two divisional foes meet in the playoffs? A U.S.-Serbia matchup would be like that, and the two blowouts the Americans have over the Serbians so far should not cloud anyone’s judgment as to the difficulty of that potential semifinal match.

When the U.S. blasted Serbia 105-79 on July 17 in Abu Dhabi, the Serbians had played Australia the night before and Bogdanovic didn’t play against the Americans. The U.S. made 16 3s and Steph Curry enjoyed what turned out to be easily his best game this summer with 24 points (he’s shooting 43 percent from the field for the summer). That game was tied at 40 midway through the second quarter.

In the second game between the two, which was the Olympic opener for both clubs, the U.S. again won handily, 110-84, behind 23 points from Kevin Durant in his 2024 USA debut. But it was a tense first half marked by the Serbians’ relentless ball pressure, which the Americans struggled to handle. The Americans pulled away with 18 3s in that one

In two games against the U.S., Jokić is averaging 18 points, eight rebounds, and five assists. The Americans have effectively used a trio of bigs – Joel Embiid, Anthony Davis, and Bam Adebayo – to slow Jokić down, but if Bogdanovic were to catch fire (as he did in a win over the U.S. at the 2019 World Cup, in which he scored 28 points with seven 3s) the Serbians become a tougher cover. Bogdanovic, not Jokić, is the Serbs’ all-time leading scorer.

The Australians, meanwhile, were within four of the U.S. with 3.4 seconds left after trailing by as many as 23. The Americans committed 18 turnovers in their friendly with Australia and confessed to falling asleep after building a huge lead early. Jock Landale of the Houston Rockets hurt the U.S. with 20 points. Giddey added 17 points, eight rebounds, and seven assists.

All of which to say, whomever advances from the 8:30 a.m. eastern match between Serbia (2-1) and Australia (1-2) should not be taken lightly.

“There a lot of great teams right now, obviously Canada, Germany, I like the battles Greece has had,” said LeBron James, the Americans’ leading scorer this summer at 14.5 ppg in eight games. “Serbia, we had them in our group play. We know what they’re capable of. Australia. So it’s a lot of great teams and we got to be ready for whoever our matchup is, no matter who it is.”

Brazil is of course not an afterthought. In Olympic pool play last week, the Brazilians lost by 13 to Germany and by 12 to France, before beating Japan with 17 3s.

Gui Santos, who is averaging 7.3 points at the Olympics, appeared in 23 games for Kerr on the Golden State Warriors last season. Joao Cardosa, Bruno Caboclo, Didi Louzado, Cristiano Felicio, Marcelinho Huertas, and Raul Neto all have NBA experience – constituting more than half the roster.

“They’re very physical. I think they’re the number one offensive rebounding team in the tournament,” Kerr said. “They made 17 threes against Japan, so they got a lot of really good shooters and they just play hard. They compete play after play, so we’ll have to be ready for their physicality and they’re shooting and we need to be on edge and ready for them because they’re not going to back down.”

Required reading

• Embiid says he chose Team USA over France because ‘these guys wanted me’
• Antetokounmpo opens up on Olympic experience: ‘I cannot stop smiling’

(Top photo: Pool/Getty Images)

Joe Vardon is a senior NBA writer for The Athletic, based in Cleveland. Follow Joe on Twitter @joevardon