Kobe Bryant's finger-to-lips gesture followed a crushing 3-pointer while being fouled in the Olympic gold-medal game, symbolizing the silencing of doubts about American basketball's supremacy. His 13 fourth-quarter points, especially the four-point play against Spain, became cornerstones of the team's legacy. The 2008 U.S. men's Olympic team won gold after a humbling bronze in 2004, completing a redemption arc marked by four years of national disappointment. Many players who contributed emerged with emotional and physical scars from the difficult rebuilding process. Mike Krzyzewski began leading the program in July 2006 at UNLV after Jerry Colangelo took over as executive director, and Krzyzewski was promised full roster control.
The defiant pose, after a crushing 3-pointer as he was being fouled in a vital moment in the gold medal game, was dripping with symbolism -- Kobe didn't actually want anyone at Beijing's Wukesong Arena to be quiet, and his legions of Chinese fans in the stands were screaming anyway. He meant to silence the belief that the Americans were no longer kings of the world court.
Bryant's 13 fourth-quarter points that day, and especially the four-point play that drove a spike into Spain's heart, are some of the cornerstones of that team's lore. The redemption arc is what is so tangible about that summer, Team USA having been relegated to bronze in the 2004 Athens Olympics and the four years of suffocating shame that came in its wake. It too was a redemptive moment for Bryant, posthumously being enshrined for a second time this week,
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