The United States men’s basketball team won its fourth consecutive Olympic gold medal on Friday evening. The Americans got the chance to exercise something of a demon in the championship match and made the most of it, taking down a France team that knocked them out of the 2019 FIBA World Cup and in their opening game of group play in Tokyo, 87-82.
In the aftermath of the game, two former NBA teammates who reunited on the international stage took a moment to celebrate by calling out those who thought Team USA was going to come up short. Kevin Durant and Draymond Green, while heading over to a postgame press conference, took a moment to hop onto Instagram Live and celebrate winning gold despite some folks expressing doubts.
KD: “Talk about they catching up to us. Are you serious. This skill is unmatched.”
(Via @ComplexSports)
pic.twitter.com/Gp9C00RlGo— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) August 7, 2021
Durant’s attention was on some power rankings that had the U.S. behind Slovenia, while Green focused his moment on IG on ESPN’s Kendrick Perkins.
“Talkin’ about they catchin’ up to us, like, are you serious?” Durant asked. “This skill is unmatched, you dig? Shout out to everybody that won this gold, everybody that chipped in and helped out. We goin’ to the press conference, but I had to talk my sh*t real quick.”
While the U.S. were betting favorites during the tournament, there were some people who believed this was a vulnerable team. After they lost to France in their group opener, Evan Fournier said that the Americans were a bunch of excellent individual talents, “but they can be beaten as a team.” Perhaps that was true early on in their time together — they did lose to Nigeria and Australia during their pre-Olympic exhibitions — but whatever was going on got sorted out, and as a result, Team USA are champions once again.