Stephen Curry was relatively quiet on offense during the U.S. men’s basketball team’s first two exhibitions in preparation for the 2024 Paris Games.
He got a lot more assertive on Wednesday with his official Olympic debut less than two weeks away.
Curry scored 24 points, Bam Adebayo added 17, and the United States beat Serbia 105-79 to improve to 3-0 in its five-game slate of exhibitions.
Anthony Davis finished with seven points, six rebounds and six blocks for the Americans, helping lead a defensive performance that limited Serbia throughout the game. Anthony Edwards had 16 points and LeBron James added 11, but Curry scored the first nine for the U.S. in a flurry that James said was by design.
“We drew it up for that particular reason, to get him going,” said James, the Los Angeles Lakers star who — like Curry, the Golden State Warriors sharp-shooter — is a four-time NBA champion. “He sees one go through the hoop, you see what it opens up for the rest of his game, for the rest of the game for all of us. He set the tone.”
The U.S. led by as many as 31 points in the last of a pair of warmup games in Abu Dhabi. The Americans are headed next to England to play two more tuneups — against South Sudan on Saturday and against Germany on Monday, with both at London’s O2 Arena — before the final leg of their journey to France.
U.S. coach Steve Kerr likes the progress his team has made and said its ability to overwhelm teams with different defensive looks will be vital.
“I think the identity of the team is our depth, the strength of the team is the depth,” said Kerr, who also coaches the NBA’s Warriors. “If we can play in four- or five-minute bursts of intense defense, hitting bodies, rebounding, being physical, then it makes sense to play that way. We’ll see if we can keep doing it.”
Wednesday’s matchup was an important preview for the Serbians and the Americans, who will both compete in Group C in Paris. They open their quests for Olympic gold against each other on July 28.
The U.S. had an uneven start before using a 16-2 run in the second quarter to take a 56-42 advantage and led 59-45 at halftime.
Nikola Jokic had 16 points and 11 rebounds for Serbia, while Aleksa Avramovic added 14 points. Serbia was playing its second game in two days, coming off a loss to Australia on Tuesday in which it rested captain Bogdan Bogdanovic.
Serbia struggled offensively, shooting just 41% (29-of-71), and also got outrebounded, 30-21, with Bogdanovic out again. Adebayo and Davis combined for 14 rebounds.
“Bam and AD together are really something,” Kerr said. “Just the switching, but they can also protect the rim and be in a drop if we go to that coverage.”
After nearly squandering a big lead in its 98-92 victory over Australia on Monday, there was no such letdown for the U.S. this time. The Americans led by 25 points after three quarters and quickly increased the margin to 30 in the final quarter.
Kerr used his third different lineup in the exhibition schedule, which started with a 86-72 win over Canada in Las Vegas on July 10, going with Curry, James, Joel Embiid, Jrue Holiday and Jayson Tatum against Serbia, the runner-up to Germany at last year’s FIBA World Cup, where the U.S. lost to Canada in the third-place game. The only constants over the three exhibitions have been Curry, Embiid and James.
One of the reasons USA Basketball wanted the 7-foot, 280-pound Embiid on the roster this cycle was to counter bigger teams such as Serbia, which features a trio of 7-footers. The Philadelphia 76ers star’s conditioning still isn’t at its peak, but the 2023 NBA MVP was active on both ends of the court, finding cutters on offense and being an active deterrent in the lane on defense.
And for the second straight game, the U.S. reserves provided a spark. Adebayo, Davis, Edwards, Devin Booker and Tyrese Haliburton entered the game for the first time with 4:54 remaining in the opening quarter and their team trailing 16-13. The Americans’ 15-12 run from there made it 28-all entering the second quarter.
The U.S. wound up getting 28 first-half points from its bench.
Kevin Durant sat for the third straight game as he continues to recover after straining a calf muscle during the early portion of the Americans’ training camp in Las Vegas. However, guard Derrick White made his debut after joining the team over the weekend as Kawhi Leonard’s replacement. White had four rebounds and an assist in just more than nine minutes.