The debate over who the greatest five, 10, and 50 basketball players of all time is subjective, exhaustive and redundant. It is an argument that will never be definitively settled and essentially is little more than a lure for social media clickbait, sports talk show rants, and barbershop banter. Where LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry rank among their multi-generational and historical peers is insignificant and imprecise. What is more measurable is the global impact each has had on the sport.
Numerous players, both U.S. and foreign born, have patterned their games and the building of the brands on the models constructed by the aforementioned trio. Anthony Edwards, a member of Team USA that defeated France 98-87 in the gold medal game on Saturday to earn the men’s Olympic basketball program its fifth consecutive gold medal, has often shared that Durant has long been his basketball idol.
The 23-year-old Edwards was born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. Around the same time he was forming his skills as a young boy, nearly 4,400 miles away in Les Chesnay outside of Paris, a younger Victor Wembanyama, now 20, began honing his basketball talents and mimicking the remarkable abilities displayed by Durant. As fate would have it, all three were on the court in Saturday’s gold medal game, Wembanyama scoring 26 points and depleting every joule of energy in trying to will France to victory. But the legacies of James, Durant and especially Curry had more chapters to be written. Curry staged one of the most astounding shooting exhibitions anyone has ever witnessed, scoring 36 points and drilling nine three-pointers, lifting the United States from a 17-point deficit in a 95-91 win over Serbia in the semifinals. Then in the finals, when France, riding a magical carpet guided by the aspirational home crowd in Bercy Arena in Paris, trailed the Team USA by just 82-79 with 2:48 to play, Curry made the first of his four three-pointers over the next two minutes and 13 seconds to put the U.S. up 85-79—the closest France would be again.
For the day, Curry netted eight treys totaling all of his 24 points.
His teammates, nearly all certain to someday be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, were left awestruck as were the tens of millions watching around the world. It reaffirmed that over the past two decades Curry has demonstrably changed how the game is played.
“I was just trying to settle us down,” Curry said of his late game heroics. “It had been awhile since we had a good possession.”
The 35-year-old Durant set the tone for Team USA in their opening game of the tournament, making his first eight shots and scoring 23 in a 110-84 win over Serbia. He posted 15 on Saturday and his 518 points going back to the 2012 London Games and four gold medals are the most all-time for a men’s Olympic basketball player.
As for the 39-year-old James, he was the alpha who ensured the mission of the U.S. coming away with gold was not undermined by egos and personal agendas. He was deservingly named the tournament’s MVP, averaging 14.2 points on 66% shooting, 6.8 rebounds, 8.5 assists and 6.8 rebounds. The quibbling as to who is better between him and Jordan will continue and intensify after James’s latest achievement. What matters is both, along with Durant and Curry, have accorded us a lifetime of indelible sports memories.