At the 2028 Paris Olympics, Victor Wembanyama is expected to be the best player in the Games. Team USA might have the best roster, but they don't have an answer for Wemby.
In 2028, Team USA basketball will be tested like it never has before. Sure, they lost the 2004 Games to San Antonio Spurs legend Manu Ginobili, and barely beat Victor Wembanyama and France in 2024, but the '28 Olympics might be the first time they aren't favored.
Not only will Nikola Jokic be leading a loaded Serbian team, but Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and other NBA players will be representing Canada, and Wembanyama and France are only getting better.
On top of that, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, and Kevin Durant will all have aged out of competition. With no answer for Wemby and limited "legacy" picks, the Americans might be truly hobbled for the first time in over 20 years.
Team USA Will Be No Match for Victor Wembanyama
There's an argument to be made that Wembanyama is not yet the best big man in the NBA. After all, Jokic has three MVP awards, and a healthy Giannis Antetokounmpo is still very, very scary.
Neither of them play on Team USA, though!
The Americans should have a star-studded cast featuring Devin Booker, Anthony Edwards, Cooper Flagg, Cade Cunningham, and other elite wings and guards. Down low, however, they are limited.
"Center is by far the hardest part of assembling the USA roster, in part because you have to build it out thinking about the USA’s biggest threat to the gold medal: France with Victor Wembanyama in the middle," prefaced NBC's Kurt Helin. "Bam Adebayo is a high-level two-way center who has proven he can handle the physicality of FIBA ball, and add in that Spoelstra is the coach, Bam is a lock."
Behind Adebayo, Helin has Evan Mobley, Chet Holmgren, and Walker Kessler or Jalen Duren projected as the center rotation, although that doesn't solve the Wemby problem.
"We have seen what Wemby does to Holmgren, and FIBA basketball is far more physical than the NBA, and Holmgren is going to struggle with that style of play," Helin added. "Holmgren and Mobley are not traditional bigs, and we need some size and bulk to handle Wemby and potentially others like Nikola Jokic or others. The consensus among the people I talked to was that Kessler is, in theory, the better fit, but he needs to play a couple of seasons to prove it and stay healthy."
In addition to Wembanyama down low, the French will be able to boast an emerging Alexandre Sarr and declining Rudy Gobert, both of whom will still be dangerous. On top of that, NBA players Bilal Coulibaly, Noa Essengue, Maxime Raynaud, Zaccharie Risacher, and Nolan Traore, as well as EuroLeague players, should be able to break out under FIBA rules.
While Team USA will have the deepest roster, the French will have the single best player, and no one in the tournament will have an answer for him.
Only the USA, the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, and Argentina can boast gold on the men's side. Two of those countries don't exist anymore. France could be the fifth.
