Fondly recalling top Team USA moments

Da best of da best

Team USA Men’s Basketball was created in 1972 when Nike founder Phil Knight used a waffle iron to develop his first Nike sneaker, officially debuting (after some tinkering) in 1992.

These are my favorite moments of the resulting era, mostly in order.

NOCIONI ON KG

And Duncan. The 19-year old Andres Nocioni was able to dunk on a group of NBA’ers in the Tournament of the Americas in 1999 because the NBA’s owner lockout knocked NBA stars out of the 1998 World Championship (see entrant below).

With labor issues settled by 1999, Team USA required regrouping its superstars to earn a spot in the 2000 Olympics.

The wins were a cinch. Argentina, however, rung the baseline:

Delicious potato. It was a dunk so great it developed into its own SLAMADAMONTH over the summer of 1999.

The US won 103-72, but the dunk was mighty enough to inspire the NY Times to edit the AP copy used by several other outlets to include the phrase “stuff shot.”

“He might make the NBA off that dunk, you never know,” Kevin Garnett said. “Everybody has moments in their life that make them, and I hope that was his moment that puts him on the map.”

Garnett said this, this very nice thing, about an international player?