There has been a lot of talk surrounding the current state of Team USA basketball and possible age restrictions moving forward. A decade ago it was only college players who were allowed to represent the United States in the Olympics. This changed in 1992 when the original Dream Team took the best players from the NBA and sent them to compete in the Barcelona games.
Now, 10 years later, talk of a 23-and-under age limit being reinforced has circulated around the London games. NBA owners aren’t entirely thrilled with having their million-dollar investments playing highly competitive games in the summer every four years, as there is a risk of injury whenever they take the floor.
But, according to Ian Thomsen of Sports Illustrated, the new age limit probably won’t be coming into play during the next summer Olympics that are set to take place in Rio de Janeiro in 2016.
The NBA’s interest in pursuing an age ceiling for Olympic basketball is “unlikely” to be instituted in time for the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro, according to the source, who has direct knowledge of the talks involving the International Olympic Committee and FIBA, the international ruling body for basketball.
If the NBA doesn’t institute an age restriction for the next games you can expect to see current Team USA players like LeBron James and Kevin Durant on the squad again in Rio. But those players (and all other current roster members besides Anthony Davis) would be unable to compete due to the age limit.
Whether or not the NBA does pass this rule or not is obviously yet to be seen, but if they don’t reach an agreement you can expect Team USA to be the dominant basketball force in Rio come 2016.