Takeaways from Team USA -- Serbia, and the exhilaration of escaping annihilation

Calm observations and exuberant feelings after one of the best basketball games in years

If you’re one of those people who blithely assumed that Team USA would always triumph even after facing a nearly 20-point second-quarter deficit, glanced at the final score, and nodded in self-satisfaction, congratulations. You were technically correct.

But I promise that little in the moment-to-moment gameplay felt like any sort of preordained American comeback. This was an insane, emotional match that deserves Olympic classic status, and if you haven’t watched it, you’re missing out.

Usually, I spend an embarrassing amount of time organizing my thoughts, looking up stats and film, and putting it all together in a cohesive, flowing manner. This piece won’t be that, partially because the IOC is very picky about video clips.

Instead, these are raw, uncut reactions (that I then fed through several grammar checkers and edited within an inch of their life).

Let’s take a walk down Short Memory Lane for seven takeaways.

1) Steph finally has his night

Remember a few days ago when Stephen Curry admitted to struggling with a smaller role on Team USA? Well, he’s properly calibrated now.

Curry was the sole source of American offense to start this game, including 17 desperately needed points in the first quarter. Halfway through the period, every Serbian starter had netted a bucket, while Curry had 14 of the USA’s 15 points.

Serbia converted multiple triples in the second half that could have been daggers in another timeline. In this one, though, Curry came down and immediately banged one home each time to keep the Americans alive.

Even Curry’s misses were fun, the kind of wild, can-you-believe-he-shot-that heat checks that only Curry will even try. From a lesser player, those sorts of shots derail an offense and kill momentum. From Curry, they can be beneficial, a reminder to the defense that they’re dealing with a mythological figure. He’s the only player in the world who can intimidate with his misses.

Without Curry, the USA loses this game by a billion points. The chef saved a lot of reputations from spoiling (at least slightly) with his heroic performance.

2) EMBIID!! and EMBIID?!

I was texting a buddy from Philly during the game, and he dryly remarked that we were getting the full Embiid experience today. That’s the understatement of the tournament.

Embiid had 19 points (two more than Jokic, for what little that’s worth) on 8-of-11 shooting and went on a mini-tear in the fourth quarter. Like pollen in a new state, all those clutch buckets caused his box-out allergies to flare up, and the USA surrendered multiple second chances in a row at his expense. Watching Embiid give up offensive round after offensive rebound but then get it back on the other end with jumpers and and-ones was not good for my emotional stability. I’m not sure how my friend deals with it nightly.

Embiid fell down for no reason at all; he dunked all over someone. He dribbled off his foot; he drew a critical foul on Jokic. He was mercilessly attacked in isolation; he had a monster block. He swiped a sweet steal; he immediately threw it directly to the Serbian team.

You have to take the good with the bad. In the final accounting, Embiid brought solid one-on-one defense (in the post, anyway) and scoring on a night when most of his teammates couldn’t. The USA wouldn’t be advancing without him.

3) Containing Jokic in an unconventional way

The Americans were uber-keyed-in on Nikola Jokic and largely did a solid job on him, even on switches (although they switched too much for my taste). They fouled when they should have, didn’t when they shouldn’t, helped aggressively, forced him to the perimeter, and only got beat on backdoor cuts when ballwatching a handful of times — an acceptable number, given Jokic’s genius.

Perhaps the most telling number was Jokic’s rebounding — just five boards. He only had four games of under six rebounds in the NBA all last season (and just two more with six exactly, if you want to adjust for minutes)!

Jokic has the best hands in the league. He’s a master of tipping, tapping, and slapping the ball up out of the reach of everyone else until he can safely guide it into the net with one giant, eerily delicate meat hook:

But against the USA, every 50/50 ball became an aerial affair, with LeBrons and Durants and Adebayos and Embiids battling him for it. I’ve never seen Jokic come up empty so many times, even if it took an army to do it. That mattered; Jokic getting an offensive rebound, in particular, immediately leads to an easy putback or an open three-pointer most of the time. Eliminating those killed a crucial source of offense for the Serbian team.

The US team was aided by Jokic’s 0-for-6 line from downtown, but that was all part of the plan. They were laser-focused on Jokic at the expense of almost everything else, and it worked — barely.