Anthony Edwards as Team USA’s ‘No. 1 option?’ Not even he really thinks that

Follow our Olympics coverage in the lead-up to the Paris Games.

LAS VEGAS — Anthony Edwards knows his place on this roster of superstars that is the U.S. Olympic men’s basketball team.

It’s true. When the cameras weren’t rolling on him Sunday, and he was seated at a roundtable with a handful of reporters, in a hotel ballroom somewhere on the Las Vegas Strip hours after USA’s second practice this summer, he said:

“We got LeBron, KD, and Steph. So I don’t feel like nobody can beat those three by themselves on the court. You mix in two of us regular guys, we’ll be all right.”

Edwards, 22, with that megawatt smile, those Jordan-like maneuvers and mannerisms on the court, a quote machine for a brain, is playing for the American team for a second consecutive summer. Last year, at the FIBA World Cup, he led the USA in scoring (18.9 ppg) and minutes (25.9 mpg). That team did not have a single player with any previous national team experience.

This year’s group, the one headed to Paris later this month for the Olympics, indeed has Kevin Durant, the all-time leading scorer for Team USA who could become the first male basketball player to win four gold medals. Yes, it has LeBron James, a two-time Olympic gold winner, Team USA’s all-time assists leader, and oh, yes, the NBA’s all-time leading scorer. And of course, there is Stephen Curry, who like Edwards is new to the Olympics, but unlike Edwards has won four NBA titles, two MVPs and made more 3s than anyone, ever.

Seemingly every time this iteration of Team USA is mentioned, it is compared to the 1992 Dream Team, arguably the most talented team ever, and so on and so forth. James, Durant and Curry are perhaps chiefs among the team’s most decorated players, but the list is long and Edwards is at the bottom in that regard. He is chiefly aware.

It’s just that, perhaps Edwards’ self-awareness of his place on Team USA in 2024 doesn’t quite bleed through, or maybe gets overshadowed by the clip of him, on Sunday, seated in a high-back chair immediately following practice, with a microphone in hand and the cameras rolling, saying: “I’m still the No. 1 option. Y’all might look at it different, I don’t look at it no different.”

Timberwolves’ Anthony Edwards on how he fits in with USA Basketball Olympic team: “I’m still the number one option. Y’all might look at it differently. … They’ve got to fit in around me. That’s how I feel.” pic.twitter.com/Cga5kTiR2J

— Ben Golliver (@BenGolliver) July 7, 2024

That’s the Edwards we remember from the Minnesota Timberwolves last season, when he led them in scoring and led them to the Western Conference finals. The one who responded to USA coach Steve Kerr last summer, after Kerr tried to get him to embrace coming off the bench by reminding him Dwyane Wade did so in 2008 because Kobe Bryant joined the team, by saying, “We don’t have a Kobe.”

Edwards usually backs up the braggadocio. He stunned crowds with jaw-dropping dunks over other human beings last summer and erupted for 35 points in a game, tying Carmelo Anthony for the U.S. record in a World Cup. Kerr said last summer that Edwards “has become the guy;” U.S. assistant coach Erik Spoelstra said Edwards would be a “household name.”

Edwards is one of only two players from the World Cup team (Tyrese Haliburton is the other) who made the Olympic team. He may not be the dominant player wearing an American jersey this summer, but he also isn’t going to change who he is.

“He’s authentically himself,” Team USA center Bam Adebayo opined Sunday, in that same ballroom. “He’s not going to be different. He’s going to be the same person every day on the court, off the court. Like, you see him on TV when he says, when some of y’all make some of his moments go viral. But being next to him, it’s like, this is just you. And that’s one thing I love about Ant — he’s himself.

“He’s one of those guys where obviously he can say something wild, as we heard, but it’s him being himself.”

Edwards said numerous times on Sunday that Durant was his favorite player. Durant played for Oklahoma City when Edwards attended his first NBA game as a child, in Atlanta against the Hawks, and Durant stood out immediately to him. Edwards wore Durant’s No. 35. “My feet were big; I pretty much always bought KD’s (Nike shoe) to play in,” Edwards said.

Durant has yet to practice with Team USA because of a calf strain, and Edwards said, “I haven’t even gotten to play alongside him yet. Definitely still butterflies there, waiting for that to happen. I’m ready to see the Olympics KD.”

Asked who would be the “alpha” on Team USA, especially in a close game, late in the fourth quarter, if the Americans should need a bucket, he said, “I think Kevin Durant — he better be. That’s who I came to see.”

Smooth.

🇺🇸 @KingJames x @theantedwards_ pic.twitter.com/Q4AxOpApse

— USA Basketball (@usabasketball) July 7, 2024

In the portion of a team scrimmage Sunday that the media was allowed to see, Edwards shared the court with James, Haliburton, Anthony Davis and Adebayo. Kerr subbed in a new five for the last five minutes of the scrimmage, but Edwards was back in after two minutes for Kawhi Leonard.

“They mentioned some guys might not play some games, or might not play many minutes,” Edwards said, referring to a speech Kerr made Friday night with the team assembled for the first time. “I don’t mind. Like I said, I’m playing alongside Hall of Famers. So I’m just here. But if they need me, I’ll be one call away.”

He knows where he stands, even if occasionally, he doesn’t sound like it.

“Some nights, some guys ain’t going to get it going — some nights some guys will,” Edwards said, explaining what he meant about being the No. 1 option. “So it’s going to be different players’ nights. I think we got to be OK with that as a group.”

GO DEEPER

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(Photo: Juan Ocampo / NBAE via Getty Images)