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I’m sure we’ve all heard by now that Team USA failed to grab the gold medals at this year’s World Championships, despite the fact they were incredibly talented (albeit young) team. Team USA had their first and only defeat to Greece 101-95, finally having a taste of “real” competition in the tournament. Sure, Team USA had loads of talent with Lebron, Carmelo and D-Wade, but international teams like Greece (Silver), and Spain (Gold) played dazzling team basketball…and could shoot lights out.

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Team USA did bounce back with intensity in the Bronze medal game, with a 96-81 victory over Argentina. That will be their last game until next summer when they will try to earn an Olympic berth in the FIBA Americas tournament in Venezuela. A gold medal in the worlds would have punched their Olympic ticket.

Long gone are those days when the Dream Team of USA dominated international basketball. Once the best, U.S. now settles for getting better.

Team USA’s LeBron James sat down with FIBA to give his thoughts on the team’s bronze-medal performance at the World Championship and what the future holds for the American team…

James scored 22 points, grabbed nine rebounds and dished out seven assists - all personal bests in the tournament - in the United States’ 96-81 victory in beating Argentina for the bronze medal. He also took over the point guard duties and helped disrupt Argentina playmaker Pepe Sanchez into three turnovers - after commiting five in total over the previous four games.

FIBA: What needs to happen for the U.S. to win a tournament like this again?
James: We just have to keep improving and do what we’ve been doing. We’ve improved since the first training camp in early July. Man, that’s so long ago. It feels like it was last year. But we’ve gotten better and come together and become a family. We just need to keep driving and getting better, and loving FIBA basketball because it’s great. It’s been good to us.

Click here for the full interview