One of the most dominant forces throughout Olympic Games history has been the American men’s basketball team.
Since the sport’s first official appearance in Berlin in 1936, the USA have won 16 of 20 available gold medals – 19 if you take into account the country’s boycott of the 1980 Games in Moscow.
Of the remaining three, they had to settle for silver in Munich in 1972 after a controversial final showdown with the Soviet Union and bronze at both Seoul in 1988 and Athens in 2004.
The USA’s failure in Greece and their subsequent re-emergence in Beijing four years later is the subject of a new Netflix documentary The Redeem Team, an impressive film from Jon Weinbach, the man behind The Last Dance, the story of Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls.
With professional NBA players welcomed into the Olympic fold at the 1992 Games in Barcelona, the so-called ‘Dream Team’ featuring the likes of Charles Barkley, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson was born.