USA Men's Basketball's Opponents for 2024 Olympics Revealed After Tournament Draw

A matchup against two-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokić potentially awaits the United States in the 2024 Summer Olympics.

The draw for the men's basketball tournament was announced Tuesday, with Team USA placed into Group C with Serbia, South Sudan and the winner of the qualifying tournament in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Six teams will be taking part in the qualifying tournament, which tips off less than a month before the Summer Games open: Mexico, Ivory Coast, Lithuania, Italy, Bahrain and host Puerto Rico. Lithuania (No. 10) is the highest-ranked of the six in the FIBA World Ranking.

Should the Lithuanians advance, Group C would have three of the best 10 countries in the world with the USA and Serbia sitting first and fourth, respectively.

The matchup with Serbia figures to be the stiffest test of the group stage for the United States, though Jokić hasn't definitively stated whether he's playing in the 2024 Olympics. The country becomes much less imposing if you remove the Denver Nuggets star from the equation.

Regardless of Jokić's involvement, Team USA will be the heavy favorite to not just come out of Group C but win the tournament as a whole.

In the wake of the United States' fourth-place showing in the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup, all of the major stars threw their name into the hat for the Olympics. The 41-player pool is a who's who of the top American talent.

Some took the World Cup to be a sign the rest of the world has meaningfully caught up to Team USA, perhaps to a point where it's no longer as simple as the U.S. throwing out its "A" team and rolling to gold.

That theory will be put to the test in Paris.