Opinion: Gold is great, but USA Basketball can't keep counting on Kevin Durant at Olympics

TOKYO – When it was all over, Gregg Popovich could finally admit the truth about what it was like to have this one shot toward the end of his career to coach the U.S. men’s basketball team. It weighed on him. You could even say it frightened him a little bit, if only because the potential cost of failure was so immense.

“I can be honest and say this is the most responsibility I’ve ever felt,” said Popovich, who had been a part of the failure to win gold in 2004 and desperately wanted a chance to right that wrong. “I felt it every day for several years, so I’m feeling pretty light now and looking forward to getting back to the hotel and having…something.”

Go ahead, Pop, and let the expensive wine flow. You deserve it. But while you’re toasting this team and celebrating your long-awaited gold medal, you might also want to say a little prayer for whomever succeeds you as the Olympic coach in 2024. They’re probably going to need it.

Even as Team USA won the Americans’ fourth straight gold medal Saturday in a tight final against France, the job of maintaining this operation has revealed itself to be simultaneously more difficult and thankless than ever. And the margin for error on both fronts is only going to be smaller in Paris three years from now.

“It’s going to be great,” men’s national team managing director Jerry Colangelo said, referring to the future of USA Basketball. “We have the players willing to commit, we have coaches who are willing to commit and do their part. It’s a great organization and we represent the country well.”

Colangelo rides off into the sunset 4-for-4, having accomplished the job of getting the U.S. back where it belongs. He now hands that task to Grant Hill, who played on the gold-medal winning team in 1996 and remains one of the most respected figures in the basketball universe.

At the same time, if there’s a lesson to be learned from the Tokyo Games, it’s that America’s margin for error is not what it used to be. The primary difference this time was that Team USA had Kevin Durant and the other teams didn’t. What happens when he’s gone and the new generation of stars takes over against an increasingly committed, motivated and talented series of competitors in 2024?

If you thought the backlash to this team was ugly when Team USA lost to France in the first matchup to start these Olympics, just wait for the inevitable day when someone else claims their crown.

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“I think it’s more joy than relief, but definitely some relief,” guard Damian Lillard said, describing what it felt like to have his long-awaited gold medal moment. “Because of the expectations that gets placed on Team USA, obviously there’s going to be some relief because of it. Especially with us losing a few games, it’s like, ‘All right, let’s get to it,’ and finally getting there and pulling off the gold medal game, you can kind of exhale.”

That’s the difference between trying to establish greatness, as American teams did in 2008 and 2012, and what the last two have faced. The thirst to restore a country’s basketball reputation is gone, because it has been quenched a few times over. The task now is getting players to buy into the program when it only earns them a fraction of the celebration and all the downside risk of being associated with an Olympic embarrassment. How much longer before that doesn’t really appeal to the best players America can offer?

If you could hear Draymond Green talking to reporters as he walked off the court Saturday, it was obvious that the American players took keen notice of what was being said about them back in the U.S. during their early struggles.

“You turn on American sports talk TV or whatever and you’ve got guys like Kendrick Perkins doubting us,” Green said, referring to the former NBA player and current ESPN analyst. “You know, someone needs to teach these people some loyalty. How ‘bout you cheer for your country? Then when a guy don’t play, (they say), ‘Oh, you need to go represent the country,’ then you lose, hit a bump in the road … You’re an American too! Act like it!”

One narrative of what happened here is that the U.S. sent its so-called “B Team” to Tokyo, didn’t have its full roster together until literally the night before the Olympics and still won the gold. But the U.S. wasn’t the only team that was impacted by the COVID-compressed NBA schedule.

How much difference would Ben Simmons have made to Australia if he had decided to play? Serbia didn’t make it to Tokyo, largely because the NBA’s reigning most valuable player said he hadn’t recovered enough from the season to play the qualifying tournament. How much of a threat would they have been with Nikola Jokic and Bogdan Bogdanovic? One of these days, Canada is going to have its best players available and actually qualify for an Olympics. When it does, a team led by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, R.J. Barrett, Jamal Murray and Dillon Brooks is going to be formidable – and motivated.

America is never going to run out of great players who would fit Team USA, but the room for complacency has evaporated. In 2024, you could envision Zach LaVine, Jayson Tatum and Devin Booker as the foundational pieces with gold medal experience, but the bulk of the roster that won this time will be 34 or older. Maybe Durant will come back for a fourth go-round at age 35, but you can’t count on that.

As Hill and whomever he picks as the next coach look toward the future, they’re going to have to lock in commitments early and bring a representative roster to the 2023 FIBA World Cup in the Philippines so that they aren’t showing up in Paris behind the eight-ball like they were this time.

The days of just grabbing big names are over. The U.S. should never have to bring a team to an international competition without a point guard who excels in halfcourt offense or big men with the size to match up against the likes of Rudy Gobert.

The U.S. was able to overcome it this time thanks mostly to Durant’s brilliance, but there wasn’t a whole lot of room to spare. Unless the best American players believe USA Basketball is worth the investment of their time like Durant has done his whole career, the bench isn’t so deep that gold medals can be assumed in perpetuity.

They don’t need to wait for a comeuppance – whether in 2024 or 2028 -- to learn that lesson. Given the stakes and the expectations, it needs to start now.

Follow Paste BN Sports Dan Wolken on Twitter @DanWolken.