It's been a very good year for Boston Celtics stars Jayson Tatum, Jrue Holiday and Derrick White.
Not only did this trio win an NBA championship with their Celtics teammates back in June, they also helped the United States men's basketball team win a gold medal Saturday with a 98-87 victory over France at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.
Tatum and Holiday combined to score eight points versus France. White did not play in the gold medal game, but he had a strong tournament overall.
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Winning the Larry O'Brien Trophy and an Olympic gold medal over an entire career would be quite impressive. Achieving this feat in the same year is far more rare.
In fact, before Saturday only six players had ever done it.
Holiday actually was one of the first six. He helped Team USA win gold at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (played in 2021 due to COVID-19), which came a few months after his Milwaukee Bucks won the 2021 NBA Finals.
Tatum and White are the seventh and eighth players to join this exclusive club.
Here's the full list:
- 1992: Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen (Chicago Bulls and Team USA)
- 1996: Scottie Pippen (Chicago Bulls and Team USA)
- 2012: LeBron James (Miami Heat and Team USA)
- 2016: Kyrie Irving (Cleveland Cavaliers and Team USA)
- 2021: Jrue Holiday and Khris Middleton (Milwaukee Bucks and Team USA)
- 2024: Jayson Tatum, Derrick White and Jrue Holiday (Boston Celtics and Team USA)
Holiday joins Scottie Pippen as the only two players ever to win an NBA title and Olympic gold in the same year on two separate occasions.
Tatum, White and Holiday also join Larry Bird (1992) as the only players to win an Olympic gold medal while playing for the Celtics. NBA players first started competing at the Olympics in 1992.
