The 3×3 basketball competitions at the 2024 Paris Olympics finished on Monday with a pair of thrilling gold medal games. Germany beat Spain by one point to win the gold medal in the women’s tournament, while the Netherlands beat France by the same margin to win the gold in the men’s tournament.
Now, BIG3 founder Ice Cube wants to bring the Dutch champions to the United States for a winner-take-all showcase game against the BIG3 All-Stars. The BIG3 officially issued the challenge on social media on Monday:
Ice Cube had previously discussed the idea during an appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” earlier this month:
“We feel like they should have the BIG3 players in the Olympics. We do have the best 3-on-3 players in the world, and it’s not even close,” Ice Cube said. “We’re so confident, Pat, that we want to challenge the gold-medal winners to a game. We can play right before our championship game in Boston August 18th. We’ll fly ’em in, and they can play against our All-Stars and we’ll see who’s the best in the world.”
The BIG3 All-Star Game is scheduled for Aug. 18 in Boston ahead of the championship game, but the league has not yet announced any players for the game. Isaiah Briscoe led the BIG3 in scoring during the regular season at 21.4 points per game, just ahead of former No. 2 overall pick Michael Beasley (21.3). Other notable names excelling in the BIG3 this season include Corey Brewer and Jeremy Pargo.
Netherlands’ gold-medal-winning roster features Worthy de Jong, Jan Driessen, Arvin Slagter and Dimeo van der Horst. None of that quartet has NBA experience, but they excel at the 3×3 game and have great continuity. It would certainly be interesting to see how they would fare against the best from the BIG3.
