The U.S. men's basketball team beat Brazil 122-87 in the quarterfinals of the 2024 Paris Olympics on Wednesday, but not before the win came from a facial injury that required four stitches for LeBron James.
The Los Angeles Lakers forward was elbowed by Brazilian forward Georginho de Paula in the third quarter of the game while struggling to get a rebound. De Paula was seen apologizing after James fell to the ground. Team USA called a timeout to remove James from the game, and he was seen holding a paper towel to his injured forehead on the sidelines for a moment before being taken back to the locker room for treatment.
LeBron left the quarterfinals against Brazil after taking an elbow to the eye. pic.twitter.com/xeSW3TGM6R
— Sports Center (@SporMerkezi) August 6, 2024
Still, despite only playing 17 minutes, James managed 12 points and nine assists before getting injured, then returning to the bench in the final minutes of the game and seeing off the bench just in time to secure the win for Team USA.
Next, the U.S. team will face Serbia in the semifinals on Thursday. The team is led by six-time NBA All-Star Nikola Jokić, who currently plays for the Denver Nuggets but represented his country at the Summer Games. If they win, it would be Team USA's fifth gold medal and James' third at the Olympics.
USA National Team Coach Steve Kerr told reporters after the game that James required four stitches but praised the four-time NBA champion.
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“That's who LeBron is,” Kerr said Los Angeles Times“For a guy who's really a power forward at heart, the fact that he's the leading scorer in NBA history, it's crazy that he's secondary to that. He's playing at such a high level, obviously he's got so much talent around him. So when he controls the game, it makes a lot of sense.”
“I'm fine. I just took an unintentional elbow,” James told ESPN NBA writer Marc Spears after the game.