If you aren't already psyched for "The Dream Team", a new documentary about the USA's 1992 Olympic basketball squad airing tonight on NBATV, do yourself a favor and check out Lang Whitaker's fantastic oral history that ran on GQ a few days ago. It's loaded with great anecdotes about the entire experience, from choosing the squad to the ultra competitive practices to America's unimpeded domination on the way to a gold medal.
We've got the trailer for the documentary and a few choice nuggs from Whitaker's piece, after the jump...
Former Knicks star Allen Houston, who was part of a college squad that practiced against the Dream Team:
Allan Houston (college squad player): When we got to the gym, there was this balcony [overlooking] the gym, so we didn't walk right in. It was almost, like, suspenseful. We look down and we see Barkley dunking. We see Michael stealing from somebody and doing one of his things where he takes off from outside the lane and double-pumps under the rim. We're like, "Wow, they do this in practice, too?"
On the Olympic experience, from Reggie Miller and Marv Albert:
Miller: We had a helicopter that followed us from the airport. One guy on a motorcycle had a briefcase which we learned had, like, Uzis inside.
Albert: It's been said many times—it was like the Beatles. They were rock stars.
The Dream Team won its first game over Cuba by 79 points. Here's the rest of the bloodshed:
The Dream Team won all of its games at the Barcelona Olympics by an average of forty-four points. Croatia came the closest of any opponent, losing by thirty-three points in the first game and then, in the gold-medal game, by a razor-thin thirty-two.
Trailer:
The documentary airs tonight at 8 p.m. local time.