sport news OLYMPICS SPOTLIGHT: 20 years on from disaster in Athens, USA goes for ... trends now
The Olympics are now just 14 weeks away, and Mail Sport is looking ahead to the Paris Games with a series of interviews, flashbacks and deep dives...
When the USA men's basketball team waltzed into the 2004 Olympics with a roster featuring Tim Duncan, Allen Iverson and a young LeBron James, most would have thought that a fourth straight gold medal was a foregone conclusion.
Instead, the tournament started and ended with disaster, as Team USA dropped its first game to Puerto Rico by 19 points (its worst Olympic loss ever) and lost two more times before finishing with the bronze medal.
'We didn't have the discipline, we didn't have the structure to be able to play on a world stage,' James, who was just 19 years old during the tournament, later told ESPN.
'We had great basketball players but we didn't have the structure, and I think that's part of why we finished third.'
LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony had to settle for a bronze medal at the 2004 Olympics
The team, led by Allen Iverson at point guard, was clunky on offense and lost three times
Lamar Odom is seen pouting during the USA's 19-point loss to Puerto Rico in the opening game
20 years later, James - along with the likes of Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant and reigning MVP Joel Embiid - is expected to take his last crack at Olympic gold this summer.
And while James is far more wise now than the kid he was in Athens, America's understanding of basketball has also massively evolved.
The 2004 roster featured plenty of elite talent, with the likes of Stephon Marbury, Dwyane Wade and Amare Stoudemire also included. But it didn't quite fit.
A backcourt of Marbury and Iverson was undersized and ball-dominant, and there was a huge dearth of effective spot-up shooters.
The results were clunky, as the Americans made the fewest three-pointers of any team per game (5.5) and shot the second-worst percentage (31.4).
Nowadays, spacing rules the NBA, and the final roster selected for this summer will be constructed with that thinking in mind.
The likes of James and Durant won't be the only All-Stars in Paris, but don't be surprised if names like Mikal Bridges or Austin Reaves are given the nod over more decorated pros due to their seamless fit alongside primary scorers.
Mikal Bridges, seen at last year's FIBA World Cup, has never been an NBA All-Star but could go to the Olympics as a complementary piece
Kevin Durant has confirmed he'll be back at the Olympics this summer if he is selected
Stephen Curry hasn't represented the USA since 2004 but will return to the squad in Paris
Coach Steve Kerr, ultimately, has some tremendous options at his disposal for Paris, but that wasn't quite the case in 2004.
Larry Brown certainly had talent on that roster, but it was far from the A-team it could have been.
Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett (the reigning MVP at the time) and Jason Kidd were just some of the players who didn't make the trip.
'I think foreign players feel
