Team USA’s Olympic dominance and depth evident in the sports that matter to them

PARIS — After narrowly defeating Serbia in a surprising semifinal on Thursday, U.S. men’s basketball coach Steve Kerr was asked how the United States pulled a rabbit out of a hat and overcame a 17-point deficit to win 95-91.

“I think for 40 minutes or so our talent wore them down,” Kerr said. “They were brilliant, but we always feel we have the deepest team, we have the best players. Other countries, they all have great players now, but we have the best players.”

That’s the U.S. Olympic team in a nutshell: excellent resources.

That was the theme of those games. In the sports they care about — in the pool, on the court, on the track — the United States still has a deep bench of talent.

The Americans defeated France in the gold-medal game Saturday, 98-87, to win their fifth straight Olympic gold medal. The American women, much more dominant than the men, are favorites to win an eighth Olympic gold medal.

The women’s gymnastics team, led by sensational Simone Biles, showed its dominance, winning gold in the team final and then winning a combined seven medals in the individual events. But greater than per week after the competition ended, Team USA suffered an apparent significant setback when the Court of Arbitration for Sport dismissed the appeal that had catapulted Jordan Chiles from fifth place to bronze. In a unprecedented decision, the CAS restored the starting order, with Romanian Ana Barbosu taking bronze, her teammate Sabrina Maneca-Voinea in fourth and Chiles fifth.

In the pool, the United States won eight gold medals, its lowest total since the 1988 Seoul Games. Of the seven relays, the United States won three, while its men won only one individual medal. The women won 4 individual events, the same as Australia.

The remainder of the world remains to be trying to catch up.

The biggest display of muscle got here on the track, where the United States put in its best effort since the 1984 Olympics, winning 34 track and field medals, 14 of which were gold. The women’s 4 × 400 relay team finished with eight consecutive gold medals in the event. Relay runners Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and Gabby Thomas won their second and third gold medals, respectively. Thomas became the second U.S. runner since Allyson Felix to win three gold medals at the Olympics.

The biggest muscular spectacle took place on the track, where the United States had won 19 medals through Friday, including six gold.

McLaughlin-Levrone, the most dominant athlete on the track, broke her own world record in the 400-meter hurdles. She said an enormous a part of her inspiration was the presence of friends and family in the stadium. For a lot of the Olympians, who competed in the delayed 2020 Tokyo Olympics, where fans weren’t allowed, the Games were fueled by the energy provided by the fans.

McLaughlin-Levrone said her 2021 Olympic performance was greatly impacted by the absence of an audience due to COVID-19 restrictions.

“It’s special to know that your people are here,” she said. “Just having those moments to look back on when you’re done running, having those pictures with your family and friends, no matter the outcome, that’s one of the things I’ve missed. Rio (2016), I didn’t win a medal, and in Tokyo there was no one. Those were my first real Olympics.”

But she also warned that despite her dominance, the world is gaining.

“The event is getting faster and faster,” she said. “That depth always keeps me on my toes, makes me want to find ways to improve and get better at the race. I love being able to improve.”

On Wednesday, Thomas won gold in the 200 meters, beating 100-meter champion Julien Alfred of St. Lucia. Thomas’ teammate Brittany Brown finished third, winning bronze. On Friday, the women’s 4×100 relay team, led by lightning-fast Sha’Carri Richardson, won its twelfth gold medal and third in 4 Olympics.

As heavy rain fell, Team USA endured a failed rally between Twanisha Terry and Thomas, but Richardson made up for it by chasing down two runners and ending together with her signature kick. The kick had come up short two days earlier when Richardson lost the gold medal match to Alfred.

Richardson closed operations on Friday.

“I just trusted Gabby and knew she was going to give me a hard time no matter what,” Richardson said later.

The U.S. men weren’t so lucky. For the fifth straight Olympics, the men botched their transition and were disqualified. Canada took gold, South Africa silver, and Great Britain bronze.

The men’s performance was so woeful that it drew criticism from Olympic sprinter and long jumper Carl Lewis, who won nine gold medals in the Nineteen Eighties and Nineteen Nineties. Lewis slammed Team USA coaches on X, formerly generally known as Twitter.

Missing from the relay was sprinter Noah Lyles, who won gold in an electrifying 100-meter dash on Monday and bronze in the 200-meter dash on Thursday; he later revealed he had tested positive for coronavirus on Tuesday.

“It’s time to blow up this system” Lewis wrote“This continues to be completely unacceptable. It’s clear that EVERYONE at @usatf is more interested in relationships than winning. No athlete should get on the track and run another relay until this program is changed from top to bottom.”

However, there have been also positive results.

Rai Benjamin won his first Olympic gold medal Friday in the 400-meter hurdles. Grant Holloway won gold in the 110-meter hurdles. Cole Hocker pulled off a surprise in the 1,500 meters in an Olympic-record time and Quincy Hall made a spectacular comeback to win gold in the 400 meters. Hall became the first American to win gold in the 400 meters since 2008.

And on Friday, Quincy Wilson, the 16-year-old phenom, became the youngest athlete to run for Team USA when he ran the first leg of the men’s 4×400 relay in the first heat. Wilson didn’t run well, and the U.S. simply had to hustle to qualify for the final. But the experience was invaluable to the young sprinter, and perhaps an indication of the depth of the U.S. bench. With Wilson in the stands Saturday, Team USA won the gold medal in the 4×400 relay.

But the world remains to be playing catch-up, and the query is whether or not the depth we took without any consideration is being undermined. At the end of Saturday’s competition, the United States was one behind China in gold medals, with 37, but led the overall standings with 121 medals, while China had 89. Through Saturday, the Americans had won 24 gold medals, to China’s 17; the Chinese had 17 gold medals, to the United States’ 12.

We can all the time nitpick. The United States has never won a medal in badminton, table tennis, handball, trampoline, or rhythmic gymnastics. On the other hand, in cycling, the U.S. women’s pursuit team won its first gold medal in 12 years. Team USA won its first medal in artistic swimming in 20 years and won its first men’s Olympic weightlifting medal in 40 years.

The lesson learned from these Olympics is that in the sports that matter to the United States — swimming, basketball, gymnastics and track and field — dominance continues.

The query is, for a way long.