The U.S. men’s basketball team, led by LeBron James, Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant won its fifth straight gold medal at the Paris Olympics on Saturday with a 98-87 win over the 2023-2024 NBA rookie of the year Victor Wembanyama and France. Over the 48 or so hours since the game ended, a debate has emerged about who should have won MVP, James or Curry?
Fédération Internationale de Basketball named James MVP late Saturday afternoon after he averaged 14.2 points, 8.5 assists and 6.8 rebounds in the six wins. By comparison, Curry averaged 14.8 points, 3.2 rebounds and 2.5 assists in the six games.
The controversy was caused by Curry’s explosions in the semifinal against Serbia, where the United States trailed by as many as 17 points, including 11 points in the fourth quarter before winning 95-91. Curry scored 36 points, one shy of the American record of 37 points scored by Carmelo Anthony, followed up by 24 points in the gold medal game against France, to outscore James in the six games, 89-85. Curry, however, went into the game against Serbia averaging a little over seven points a game in the first four games.
“I only had two MVPs on my list, Nikola Jokic and Stephen Curry,” said the very opinionated NBA analyst Charles Barkley. “Without Jokic, Serbia wouldn’t have gotten as far as [it] did, and without Steph, USA wouldn’t have brought home the gold.”
While Jokic led all players in total points, rebounds and assists, all while playing the maximum of six games, it seems less than ideal to reward Jokic with the MVP award when he let a 17-point lead go in a semifinal game and ended with a bronze medal. The best thing Curry does is score, and he only scored four more total points than James, who was also second to Jokic in assists for the six games and much more consistent in aiding the United States to a 6-0 record and the gold medal.
