Did Steve Kerr cost Team USA their third-position matchup against Team Canada in the 2023 FIBA World Cup? As many NBA fans might be aware, Kerr is a well-known head coach for the Golden State Warriors and has been a part of the franchise throughout their recent success over the years.
Due to his accomplishments with GSW, Kerr was given the position of the head coach for Team USA in the FIBA World Cup. Despite having played in the league and coached for several years, Kerr made some crucial judgment calls that ended up affecting Team USA negatively.
With that being said, NBA fans should certainly want to know what he did wrong. After all, Steve Kerr decided on the starting 5 for Team USA. After the team lost the third-place position to Team Canada, Kerr’s postgame interview earned him quite a lot of criticism from the basketball community. Let us take a closer look and find out more.
Did Steve Kerr make bad decisions as the head coach for Team USA?
One can only imagine the difficulties that come with being a coach for a professional sports team. While Kerr might have found it hard enough to choose his starting 5 when coaching GSW, there is no denying that deciding the playing time for an incredibly talented Team USA roster would be even harder.
After Team USA lost to Germany and then Canada, several NBA experts and analysts opined that it was due to the lack of size that the team had when compared to their opponents. Jaren Jackson Jr. was their only traditional center and underperformed throughout the FIBA World Cup.
Therefore, Kerr had no choice but to switch out his largest player for others such as Josh Hart or Mikal Bridges. He later revealed that the decision to compete with a small ball lineup hurt them greatly against Canada.
“Josh fouled out. We were going small with Josh at the 5. We made the decision to get those five guys on the floor. We were down by that time when Josh picked up his fifth. I think we were down six. I thought if we got Mikal in there we could spread the floor and get to the rim. Unfortunately, we didn’t get a good enough combination of scorers and stops to cut into the lead. I thought their 6-0 run to start overtime was crucial and they were able to control it from there.”
Steve Kerr on the decision to go small in OT w/ Mikal Bridges at the 5: “Josh (Hart) fouled out. We were going small with Josh at the 5. We made the decision to get those five guys on the floor. We were down by that time when Josh picked up his fifth (foul), I think we were down… pic.twitter.com/NMLg0lY5vv
— Joe Viray (@JoeVirayNBA) September 10, 2023
Fans who have been watching the Golden State Warriors over the years will know that Kerr has the same small ball lineup preference for his own team. However, he should have made better substitutions, adjustments, and timeouts to keep his team in the game. Hopefully, he learns from this loss and doesn’t cater to his own preferences in the future.
Discussion about this post