In the summer of 2008, LeBron James and Kobe Bryant took a break from battling for the crown of current best player in the NBA to accomplish the shared goal of winning gold at the Summer Olympics in Beijing for Team USA.
Having played in different conferences their entire careers, Bryant and James didn’t get the opportunity to play on the same team until the 2007 FIBA Americas Championship leading up the Olympics, which was also Bryant’s first appearance with the national team. Bryant would have made the Olympic team in 2004, but an ongoing sexual assault trial kept him off of the roster.