Miami Heat center Bam Adebayo and Team USA again will be going for Olympic gold, with a familiar foe awaiting in Saturday’s championship game.
Three years after defeating France in the title game at the pandemic-delayed 2021 Tokyo Olympics, with Adebayo also in that mix, Team USA punched its ticket to the Paris Olympics gold-medal game with a 95-91 comeback semifinal victory Thursday over Serbia.
Not that it was easy, with Team USA having to overcome a 17-point deficit.
“That’s why we’re in this business,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra, who is assisting Team USA coach Steve Kerr, said during a televised halftime interview, when his team was down 11. “We love when the games feel like this.”
Ultimately, there was relief, despite a nominal contribution from Adebayo, who closed scoreless, with one rebound and one assist in 9:25, Team USA outscored by 15 when he was on the court Thursday.
The Heat raise banners at Kaseya Center for those who return from the Olympics with gold medals while with the team, with Adebayo now positioned for a second such banner. Adebayo said prior to leaving for the Olympics that he hoped the Heat would similarly honor Spoelstra if this stint resulted in gold.
The championship game is Saturday at 3:30 p.m. Eastern against host France.
After defeating Serbia both in a pre-Olympic exhibition and then in the first round at the Olympics in pool play, Team USA seemed well positioned with Adebayo, Joel Embiid and Anthony Davis at center to counter Serbia big man Nikola Jokic, the three-time NBA Most Valuable Player. Instead, Jokic, whose Denver Nuggets defeated the Heat in the 2023 NBA Finals, closed with 17 points, 11 rebounds and four assists despite playing through foul trouble.
Still, with Embiid stepping up when needed most, Team USA escaped. Embiid, who had struggled with the international game earlier in the tournament, closed with 19 points, with Stephen Curry leading Team USA with 36 and LeBron James adding a triple-double.
“We knew Serbia was going to give us everything they had,” James said.
While Adebayo will next emerge with either silver or gold, Heat forward Nikola Jovic now finds himself in an all-or-nothing bid for a medal, when Serbia faces Germany in Saturday’s bronze-medal game at 5 a.m. Eastern.
In Thursday’s first semifinal, France defeated Germany 73-69, becoming the first host team assured of an Olympic medal since Team USA won gold in 1996, assuring a raucous crowd for Saturday’s championship games.
Among those on France’s roster are 2024 NBA Rookie of the Year Victor Wembanyama, Minnesota Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert and free agent guard Evan Fournier.
Thursday, Team USA opened with Embiid, Curry, James, Jrue Holiday and Devin Booker.
Adebayo again entered with Team USA down, this time 25-19, as often as has been the case for a Team USA second unit that has had to play in salvage mode.
This time, Team USA was outscored by 10 during Adebayo’s initial stint.
For Serbia, Jovic was back after missing Serbia’s quarterfinal overtime victory over Australia due to illness. He did not enter Thursday until late in the second period, with his first play an assist for a 3-pointer. That proved to be his lone 2:51 stint, as he closed scoreless.
Serbia led 31-23 after the first quarter, 54-43 at halftime and 76-63 entering the fourth quarter. Team USA had not trailed by more than eight points at any stage at this Olympics prior to Thursday.
“I’m really humbled to have been a part of this game,” Kerr told reporters afterward. “It’s one of the greatest basketball games I’ve ever been a part of. They were perfect. (Serbia) played a perfect game. Our coaches were saying, Villanova-Georgetown, for all of our older readers and viewers out there.
“But they played the perfect game, and they forced us to reach the highest level of competition that we could find. And our guys were incredible in that fourth quarter, and they got it done.”
Interviewed at halftime, Spoelstra cited the initial defensive struggles for the early deficit.
“We haven’t been our normal, impactful self on that side of the floor,” Spoelstra said.
Adebayo won gold with Team USA at the 2021 Tokyo Games in his lone previous Olympic appearance, with Jovic winning the silver medal last summer with Serbia at the World Cup in The Philippines.
